(urth) Lupiverse(es)
DAVID STOCKHOFF
dstockhoff at verizon.net
Fri Mar 16 13:32:22 PDT 2012
I plan to read it to my daughter when she's old enough---in a year or two. That's why I collected all the MacDonald I have, though there was a selfish motivation as well.
I have to apologize for shocking everyone, however. It wasn't The Golden Key I was thinking of at all. Had I read that as a child I might recall it more clearly than I did in fact---probably as much as Curdie---but I enjoyed it nevertheless.
I am not sure which story it was that struck me as stilted and dull, only that the protagonist was a girl. But I shouldn't venture to opine until I get back home and find the physical books.
Auden is amazing---no, not dull at all.But then he never wrote stories for children, or did he?
________________________________
From: Daniel Petersen <danielottojackpetersen at gmail.com>
To: The Urth Mailing List <urth at lists.urth.net>
Sent: Friday, March 16, 2012 3:30 PM
Subject: Re: (urth) Lupiverse(es)
I really enjoy the edition where it's printed as its own small book, with illustrations by Maurice Sendak and an afterword by W. H. Auden. (And I'll side with Auden over Stockhoff as to the story and its author's worth - but maybe the Stock finds Auden dull as well? [If so only further proving my theory that he is inhuman.])
You know, I actually first read that edition aloud to my daughter when she was 5 or 6 and that was the go that really bowled me over. David, do you know of any bairns you can read it aloud to?
(Does anyone have experiences reading Wolfe aloud? I've never done that, I don't think. Lafferty gains whole new dimensions when you do it with him - I wonder what it would be like with Wolfe. I picture it being more of a reading to fellow adults scenario, rather than to children.)
-DOJP
On Fri, Mar 16, 2012 at 7:11 PM, Antonin Scriabin <kierkegaurdian at gmail.com> wrote:
The Golden Key was a favorite of mine growing up. I wish I could find my copy!
>
>
>On Fri, Mar 16, 2012 at 3:09 PM, Daniel Petersen <danielottojackpetersen at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! It's the BEST! You have no soul! You are not human, you are machine!
>>
>>
>>(To be honest, it was on a second read that it blew me away.)
>>
>>
>>-DOJP
>>
>>
>>
>>On Fri, Mar 16, 2012 at 5:11 PM, DAVID STOCKHOFF <dstockhoff at verizon.net> wrote:
>>
>>Golden Key: THAT's the one. Dull, dull, dull, dull, dull.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>;)
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>________________________________
>>> From: James Wynn <crushtv at gmail.com>
>>>To: The Urth Mailing List <urth at lists.urth.net>
>>>Sent: Friday, March 16, 2012 10:19 AM
>>>Subject: Re: (urth) Lupiverse(es)
>>>
>>>
>>>Try some of his short stories and novellas:
>>>
>>>Photogen and Nycteris (aka Day Boy & Night Girl, aka Son of the
Day, Daughter of Night)
>>>Light Princess (aka Little Daylight)
>>>Golden Key
>>>Translations for Novalis
>>>
>>>Lewis and MacDonald never met. But Lewis credited MacDonald's
fiction as an important element in his conversion. He (and the
reception of his children) were important in the publication of
Alice in Wonderland. Although he was a pastor for a time, his
sermons and theology got him in trouble and he was eventually pushed
out.
>>>
>>>J.
>>>
>>>On 3/16/2012 8:09 AM, David Stockhoff wrote:
>>>I'm not sure which of MacDonald's books I consider stilted and boring, although I encountered those as an adult. But I loved the Curdie books my mom read to me when I was four or five.
>>>>
>>>>On 3/15/2012 10:51 PM, Craig Brewer wrote:
>>>>Phantastes was a beautiful book! Never besmirch the name of MacDonald! heh heh...
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>As someone who was raised in a relatively a-religious family, I usually just ignored the obviously religious bits of Lewis/Tolkien/whoever else. But as I got older, I found that the non-"preachy" manner of fictional Christian works actually worked to explain why faith was interesting and attractive. After all, here was some fantasy that might be real on a certain level, or at least a number of people thought so.
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>That's a perspective I've had trouble explaining to friends who had that "betrayal" reaction to Narnia.
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>________________________________
>>>>> From: David Stockhoff <dstockhoff at verizon.net>
>>>>>To: The Urth Mailing List <urth at lists.urth.net>
>>>>>Sent: Thursday, March 15, 2012 9:42 PM
>>>>>Subject: Re: (urth) Lupiverse(es)
>>>>>
>>>>>On 3/15/2012 10:32 PM, António Pedro Marques wrote:
>>>>>> Wasn't MacDonald a good half century older? And he
was one of those mollified Presbyterians.
>>>>>> But is it fair to criticise didacticism which didn't
pretend to be anything else? I mean, neither MacDonald nor
Lewis, that I know of, tried to present their books as
doctrinally free. At least MacDonald was overt as to their
didactic nature. It isn't Lewis's fault if the Narnia
books got popular that they were pushed everywhere as mere
children's books without a caveat that they were had a
religious undercurrent. Maybe the real issue is that they
are popular because that undercurrent pleases people, just
as Praise of Empire pleased others, and those who take
exception to that way of writing resent the popularity.
>>>>>
>>>>>Well, if it's boring, it's boring. And it depends on what
you mean by "didn't pretend"---as with Lewis, most of his
readers were children. If you have no idea what you might
be reading, you can't know whether it's pretense or not.
>>>>>
>>>>>Certainly Lewis wasn't responsible for whatever marketing
got his books in my local library and into my hands. But I
doubt they were and are popular because they are
religious: rather, they probably are popular because they
are accessible, imaginative (sometimes magical, as you
said), action-packed, well-written, comforting (Aslan
always appeared to set things right), and morally
nonthreatening. Girls read them as much as boys did, and
no parents objected to them.
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>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
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>>>>
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