The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe - and me!

I cant wait for Christmas-time to come around! Not because I've suddenly discovered the festive spirit - I havent and I'm not likely to. It's just that The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe is due for release in December this year. It's the first of the seven books by C S Lewis that makes up The Chronicles of Narnia, and the whole series has always been one of my favourite reads. Still is, actually.

I came across C S Lewis by accident, at my uncle's house. They had a wonderful collection of all kinds of books, stored in several enormous cupboards which were also collection points for all kinds of junk starting with stuffed toys and going on to various sizes of tricycles to training-wheel bicycles and roller skates - and not forgetting the extra bedding that was also shoved in there, out of sight.

It was my special joy to burrow into those cupboards and unearth books from them. There was everything from encyclopedias to old old copies of Readers Digest, Enid Blytons, assorted fiction and non-fiction and any number of magazines. If the light in the cupboard was bright enough, it was an even more special joy to make a nest of some blankets and pillows and read right there. If I could have locked the door from the inside, I probably would have just so I could be left in peace (and probably suffocated eventually)... luckily for me, that option wasnt available. (Come to think of it, there cant be many store cupboards that have locks on the inside. Whatever for - right?)

The Silver Chair was one of the gems that I discovered on one of those digging expeditions - and Puddleglum, the morose, eternally pessimistic yet brave and faithful marsh-wiggle was the character I fell in love with. I must have read the book a dozen times before I thought to go in search of the rest. And boy, were they ever worth the read! Probably the slowest of them was The Voyage of the Dawn-Treader, but I'm not complaining really.

I had another pleasant surprise when I read The Magician's Nephew. Years ago, I'd been given a big Hamlyn story book that had excerpts from various children's books - tantalising glimpses that have stayed in my mind even though the book hasnt been in my possession for years (and how it disappeared is what I consider a personal tragedy, but that's another story).


Anyway, the most interesting chapter from The Magician's Nephew had been in that book... and I cant begin to describe the jolt of happy surprise that went through me when I recognised the excerpt while reading the book. Knowing that I had put one of those tantalising excerpts to rest, as it were, added an extra dimension to my enjoyment of the book!

And now the books are going to be made into movies... I'm looking forward to them rather a lot. I have high hopes for The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe as a movie, because the director (I think) is the guy who made the Shrek movies - and I absolutely loved those. I just hope that the storyline does not differ too much from the book... after all, there's nobody who can insist, as J K Rowling did for the Harry Potter movies, that the plot CANNOT deviate from the print version. Fingers crossed, for C S Lewis' sake!