Tony Watkins has just published a short but sharp perspective on the tension between Phillip Pullman’s perspective and work, and C.S. Lewis’s perspective and work.
Philip Pullman’s hostility towards The Chronicles of Narnia is a very strong reaction to a mere story, even if it is perhaps over-revered by some. Yes, Lewis’s work contains some serious flaws, but the real problem seems to be that it is a story which expresses and argues for a worldview completely antithetical to Pullman’s. Sadly, his ‘paroxysm of loathing’ … feels distinctly intolerant.
Watkins asks one question which I think has an automatic snappy (but true) answer:
“Indeed, the outspokenness of Pullman’s comments has made him something of a hostage to fortune: how will his own works be read fifty years on?”
They won’t.
I like it, but then I loved Funeral too, so i would like it.