1. Summary

Digory and Polly lived in the same building in England around the beginning of the century. One day, when they where playing, they decided to go into an empty townhouse in the neighborhood. But they came on the wrong door, which was the door of Digory's uncle's study. He told them that he was a magician. The children learned that the yellow ring that he created led out of the world and the green one led back into the world.

After the kids exited our world, they came out of a pool of water. The world they came in was the "world in between worlds". That meant that it was the world from which you could go to any other world you wanted. The kids realized that the green ring enabled them to exit the "to world in between worlds" and go to any other world (not only to return to our world). So they marked their pool and went into another world.

There, they met an evil queen who wanted to conquer our world. They wanted to escape but he followed them in their world. There, she caused only confusion and turbulence. Digory and Polly managed to bring her back in the "world between worlds". They also, brought with them a horse and its cabby and the magician. Accidentally they went into yet another world, which was completely dark. But then a lion, Aslan, awakened the world and called it Narnia. Then the witch fled. After the awakening was completed, the lion made the cabby into the king and his wife the queen. He gave the horse wings and the ability to talk and he sent Digory and Polly to get a magic fruit from a tree in a magic garden. The fruit grew in a tree which was supposed to protect Narnia from the Evil. Then Digory, and Polly went back home caring with them the magic fruit. Digory healed his sick mother with the fruit. He planted the fruit's seeds in the back yard and they grew into a tree.

2. Characters

Digory is a young, curious and courageous boy. He is a nice and caring person and a devoted friend and son.

Polly is a young girl, good like all the girls back then. She is courageous too and she helps Digory to make good decisions.

The witch is very cruel. She killed all the people in her world (even her sister) with a special curse so she could rule the world forever. After she did the curse, she fell into a deep sleep until the ring of a special bell awakened her.

Digory's uncle is a man who likes to be neat. He is a magician but he does not seam to be a very wise man as he falls in love with the evil queen. He is the one who made the rings that allow you to travel trough the numerous worlds.

3. Conflict and Resolution

Digory and Polly want to get rid of the evil witch that they had met. How could they bring her back to her world? Did her world came to an end already?! The only possibility would be to bring her to another world. And so they did. But its not quite as easy as that: the world they brought her into was newly born and she had escaped! The only possible solution was to go and get a magic fruit and plant it in Narnia so that a tree would grow and protect Narnia. To get that magic fruit, you had to travel far through the mountains to get to a secret garden were the tree with magic fruits was growing. If you would jump over the fence or eat a magic fruit, a curse would be put on you. The kids did neither and so they were able to bring the fruit back to Narnia.

But the witch did both the forbidden things.

4. Personal Critique

This book is extraordinary! The author made it captivating for kids to read on without wanting to stop. The characters were very funny and well developed. If I was Digory, I would feel the same way as him.

The moral of this book is to never be tempted and never give up hope.

Aslan, the lion, is like Jesus: he created Narnia and life in Narnia.

The story of the magic fruit resembles the story of Adam and Eve. Like Eve, the witch ate the forbidden fruit.

5. About the author

Clive Staples Lewis was born in Belfast, Ireland in1898. In his childhood he was fascinated by fairy tales and ancient myths recounted to him by his Irish nurse.

At sixteen years of age, the first images describing the Narnia story occurred to him. Lewis later wrote: "All my seven Narnian books, and my three science-fiction books, began with seeing pictures in my head. At first they were not a story, just pictures". But only after 1954 when he became Professor of Medieval and Renaissance Literature at Cambridge, he began to write the Chronicle of Narnia.

C. S. Lewis is also a well known and admired Christian writer. He died on 22nd November 1993 in Oxford.