First of all, I would like to salute the good Capt. Picard for doing an amazing job at narrating "The Last Battle." Sure, the female voices could be... more female, but I really don't see anyway of getting around that (likewise to all the male voices by Kate Reading (Mistress of the Art of Death (Mom, did you ever finish it?) and weirdly Shopaholics as well).
Harrrrrryyyyyy!)
I find that, once into a book, I really start to forget whether or not I like the narrator, as long as the book is good. Sometimes the narration is helped by having appropriate accents for the narrators (Life of Pi) or additional voices (Broadway Nights). I was continuously appreciative of several things about Patrick Stewart, including his definably different character voices and his ability to speak quickly in extreme situations while still dictating/annunciating well (he also just has a really nice voice)!
As for the book, I really love most all things Narnia and this is no exception. Having gone through the audio books lately, however, it has been interesting to re-gauge my reaction to them with my somewhat more feminist and analytic eye/ear. It is always frustrating to listen to anything I idolized as a kid, and then realize as an adult that the girls are sometimes really treated as 'little delicate things...' I disagree, however, that Lewis was completely sexist. I don't want to defend his treatment or old-school thinking, but the fact remains that Aslan appears most to Lucy and there is ne'er a book where an important (if non-fighting) female is opposite a male. I seriously wonder if the girl characters would be written differently if Lewis was writing today. I also am a supporter of girls and boys being different and better at certain things than the other
in some cases, which also come into play often. I, after all, feel a little surer of showing a bike problem to a Dad or guy friend, but I would just as soon show it to Capers if she is around! I don't really feel like addressing the Christian analogies right now, but I like them, and maybe it's something for the comments.
Hope I haven't lost anyone here. My
personal opinion (of which there are plenty in the various book blogs/reviews found simply in searching for a picture for this blog) is that I still love the book and find its metaphors good, but there are somethings I don't like. The good outweighs the bad, however, and I don't feel like I'm compromising my standards to say that.
