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3.95 AVERAGE
3.95 AVERAGE
adventurous
funny
lighthearted
mysterious
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
The Voyage of the Dawn Treader is a decidedly different kind of adventure than the first two Narnia books published by C. S. Lewis, those being The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe and Prince Caspian. Where those first two have a clear villain (the White Witch and King Miraz, respectively) and a central conflict related to that villain which largely drives the actions of the main characters, Dawn Treader instead finds just two of the Pevensie children, Lucy and Edmund, returned to Narnia, along with their cousin, Eustace, on a journey of discovery--an outright adventure to go and find seven lost friends of King Caspian, and to search out the edge of the world.
When I read this book as a teenager, after having read The Magician's Nephew, The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, and Prince Caspian, I found The Voyage of the Dawn Treader to be listless, and then tedious, and then outright boring. I missed the straightforward villainy of the White Witch, and the plain threat of Miraz's reign. I wished for heroic chivalry by means of swordplay, and great battles to save Narnia. (Admittedly, I don't recall The Magician's Nephew very well at all, but I remember liking it better than Dawn Treader at the time, if not so much as I liked the other two.)
As an adult, particularly having just studied Book One of Edmund Spenser's The Faerie Queene, as well as Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials (and his related works), I found a lot more to love in The Voyage of the Dawn Treader. For starters, I recognized it for what it was in an historic literary sense: an immram--or a voyage, on water, with many independent but thematically linked encounters on magical "islands" (sometimes literal, sometimes not), which reveal truths about our heroes, and about people. This is not at all to say I'm an expert in the genre--indeed, I'd only just learned about it two months ago!--but being prepared for that structure (and having loved it quite a lot in the latter half of Pullman's La Belle Sauvage), I let go any expectation for a straightforward three-act story. I took my time soaking in the details of the different places and peoples the sailors and lords and lady of the Dawn Treader encounter, and I found most of them quite enchanting. This is a novel the rewards with ideas and character, not plot and action.
And if I had to pin down a central idea of the text, it would be that a person is never truly beyond hope, if only somebody would give them the opportunity, and the help they need, to improve. This is most obvious in the character of Eustace Scrubb, the Pevensies' cousin, who begins the book as an obnoxious bully, but winds up turned, by mistake, into a dragon effectively stranded on an island. I recall simply detesting Eustace as a teen reader, but as an adult (and specifically as a parent and as someone working in education), I can reflect back on times when I was lonely myself as a child, and may have behaved poorly to try and make myself feel better, and I can recognize that what Eustace needs is authentic connections with other people-- which he attains after the dragon incident, when he realizes (with the help of Aslan) that he needs to allow himself to be vulnerable, and honest with himself and others.
But I think variations on these ideas about trust and goodwill, which of course builds off of Edmund's character arc in The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, is evident in several other instances, such as Lucy with the Dufflepuds and the Magician (whom they all need to trust in order to help), Reepicheep (whose faith in the adventure compels the crew to venture to the Dark Island, where they rescue Lord Rhoop), and Caspian (who must be reminded by Aslan of his responsibilities, and to relinquish the quest to Reepicheep, Lucy, Edmund, and Eustace).
Of course, each adventure has its own morals, as well. The Island of Deathwater warns against greed, while the Lone Islands condemn the evils of slavery (albeit in a somewhat silly kind of way for some contemporary tastes, given the seriousness of the subject). And the overarching idea of light in the text is of course rooted in Lewis's Christian faith (as is the character of Aslan in each book, but overwhelmingly in this one), yet remains totally accessible as a secular fantasy story: faith in the good of others, I think, can be just as powerful as faith in the good of God or Aslan, and the heroes' journey toward the light is emblematic of the will of the human spirit to discover, and to seek both beauty and good.
Admittedly, of the three I have read this year, this was my least favorite. I did find the concluding religious imagery, and allusion to real-world Christianity, more didactic than I'd like, particularly as Aslan seems more to intrude into this book and do things alone than he does to aid in what's already being done by the main characters; it makes the characters feel more passive in some instances than they do normally. (Not to say that Aslan doesn't function in much the same way, or that the scenes are not good; it is just that I found it a bit overwhelming by the end.) And while I did enjoy all of the mini-adventures a lot, they don't quite measure up, for me, to the thrill of discovering Narnia for the first time in The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, or the clever time-compression puzzle of Prince Caspian; and while I love Reepicheep, I missed the larger cast of non-human characters from those books.
All the same, I still found this a very rewarding read, and now that I'm on board with it (pun intended), I think it's time to finally check out the film adaptation! I lament that I'll have to take a break from reading these in order to get into the flow of the fall semester at grad school, but I'm still looking forward to finishing the series as soon as I can, and sharing it with Lorien as soon as we're able to.
When I read this book as a teenager, after having read The Magician's Nephew, The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, and Prince Caspian, I found The Voyage of the Dawn Treader to be listless, and then tedious, and then outright boring. I missed the straightforward villainy of the White Witch, and the plain threat of Miraz's reign. I wished for heroic chivalry by means of swordplay, and great battles to save Narnia. (Admittedly, I don't recall The Magician's Nephew very well at all, but I remember liking it better than Dawn Treader at the time, if not so much as I liked the other two.)
As an adult, particularly having just studied Book One of Edmund Spenser's The Faerie Queene, as well as Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials (and his related works), I found a lot more to love in The Voyage of the Dawn Treader. For starters, I recognized it for what it was in an historic literary sense: an immram--or a voyage, on water, with many independent but thematically linked encounters on magical "islands" (sometimes literal, sometimes not), which reveal truths about our heroes, and about people. This is not at all to say I'm an expert in the genre--indeed, I'd only just learned about it two months ago!--but being prepared for that structure (and having loved it quite a lot in the latter half of Pullman's La Belle Sauvage), I let go any expectation for a straightforward three-act story. I took my time soaking in the details of the different places and peoples the sailors and lords and lady of the Dawn Treader encounter, and I found most of them quite enchanting. This is a novel the rewards with ideas and character, not plot and action.
And if I had to pin down a central idea of the text, it would be that a person is never truly beyond hope, if only somebody would give them the opportunity, and the help they need, to improve. This is most obvious in the character of Eustace Scrubb, the Pevensies' cousin, who begins the book as an obnoxious bully, but winds up turned, by mistake, into a dragon effectively stranded on an island. I recall simply detesting Eustace as a teen reader, but as an adult (and specifically as a parent and as someone working in education), I can reflect back on times when I was lonely myself as a child, and may have behaved poorly to try and make myself feel better, and I can recognize that what Eustace needs is authentic connections with other people-- which he attains after the dragon incident, when he realizes (with the help of Aslan) that he needs to allow himself to be vulnerable, and honest with himself and others.
But I think variations on these ideas about trust and goodwill, which of course builds off of Edmund's character arc in The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, is evident in several other instances, such as Lucy with the Dufflepuds and the Magician (whom they all need to trust in order to help), Reepicheep (whose faith in the adventure compels the crew to venture to the Dark Island, where they rescue Lord Rhoop), and Caspian (who must be reminded by Aslan of his responsibilities, and to relinquish the quest to Reepicheep, Lucy, Edmund, and Eustace).
Of course, each adventure has its own morals, as well. The Island of Deathwater warns against greed, while the Lone Islands condemn the evils of slavery (albeit in a somewhat silly kind of way for some contemporary tastes, given the seriousness of the subject). And the overarching idea of light in the text is of course rooted in Lewis's Christian faith (as is the character of Aslan in each book, but overwhelmingly in this one), yet remains totally accessible as a secular fantasy story: faith in the good of others, I think, can be just as powerful as faith in the good of God or Aslan, and the heroes' journey toward the light is emblematic of the will of the human spirit to discover, and to seek both beauty and good.
Admittedly, of the three I have read this year, this was my least favorite. I did find the concluding religious imagery, and allusion to real-world Christianity, more didactic than I'd like, particularly as Aslan seems more to intrude into this book and do things alone than he does to aid in what's already being done by the main characters; it makes the characters feel more passive in some instances than they do normally. (Not to say that Aslan doesn't function in much the same way, or that the scenes are not good; it is just that I found it a bit overwhelming by the end.) And while I did enjoy all of the mini-adventures a lot, they don't quite measure up, for me, to the thrill of discovering Narnia for the first time in The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, or the clever time-compression puzzle of Prince Caspian; and while I love Reepicheep, I missed the larger cast of non-human characters from those books.
All the same, I still found this a very rewarding read, and now that I'm on board with it (pun intended), I think it's time to finally check out the film adaptation! I lament that I'll have to take a break from reading these in order to get into the flow of the fall semester at grad school, but I'm still looking forward to finishing the series as soon as I can, and sharing it with Lorien as soon as we're able to.
adventurous
inspiring
medium-paced
adventurous
hopeful
lighthearted
mysterious
reflective
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
adventurous
emotional
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
adventurous
mysterious
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
adventurous
funny
lighthearted
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
adventurous
mysterious
medium-paced
adventurous
inspiring
relaxing
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
I really enjoyed this installment of the Chronicles of Narnia.