7. The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe: The hunt for the White Stag does not interest me & the Shakespearian talk bugs me for some reason (though both Edmund and King Lune speak somewhat Shakespearian English in The Horse and His Boy, Rilian does it a bit to at the end of The Silver Chair, and there are other examples in the chronicles, but for some reason this is the only book where I find it jarring). Compare the BBC scene where the characters speak the dialog from the book word-for-word verses the Waldon scene where the characters dialog has been modernized - for me, the latter is far more enjoyable and feels more realistic too. I also prefer Lucy remembering and telling the story of how the Pevensies came to Narnia in The Horse and His Boy to Lewis' comment at the end of the Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe that 'if ever they remembered their life in this world it was only as one remembers a dream'.  Where C. S. Lewis likes to end each book in a paragraph talking about something that is kind of mundane, this is one of my favourites.  I do like that they talk to the professor and the things that he says before hinting at a coming sequel.

6. The Voyage of the Dawn Treader: The door in the sky felt anti-climatic to me.  Having said that, I love the ending of Reepicheap's story - what a champion!  He boldly goes over the end of the world, without fear, full of hope of what he is going to find.  I do like Aslan's conversation with the kids, it breaks my heart every time when Lucy says, 'It isn't Narnia, you know, it's you. We shan't meet you there. And how can we live, never meeting you?'.  It is such a simple, humble, unpretentious statement of love and devotion.  It breaks my heart every time.  It is such a tender conversation.  I know Lewis is being humorous, but the comment about Eustace's mum no longer liking him actually makes me quite sad.  I would rather Eustace have a happy home life with his parents, rather than ride off his parents as lost causes, saying that they now found Eustace quite tedious.

5. The Silver Chair: The scene of Caspian's resurrection in Aslan's country somehow always bores me (heartless, I know, but it does not affect me at all in the way in which it should).  The scene with them conquering the bullies also feels a bit empty to me.  But how can anyone not like the Principle 'living happily ever after' in Parliament?  It is so funny.  I also liked hearing about Eustace burying his clothes and Jill smuggling hers out of school - it feels like the end of this story but a new beginning for the children.  It is full of hope and I like it.  The final paragraph about the caves in Narnia feels unnecessary though - it is a mundane point which did not add much to the story.

4. Prince Caspian: I really like how walking through the doorway, they see the Narnian's and Aslan, but simultaneously the pacific Island and the Railway station all together - I do not think you could do it in film (they would probably do some cross-dissolve overlay effect that would look really cheap and cheesy if they tried).  It is simple and it works.  Edmund's anti-climatic 'oh bother, I left my new torch in Narnia' is funny too.  It oddly reminds me of Sam's "Well I'm back!" from the end of The Lord of the Rings.

3. The Magician's Nephew: I love the gentleness of Digory's final words in Narnia, "Please, may we go home now!"  He had forgotten to say “Thank you, ”but he meant it, and Aslan understood.  That statement is two chapters before the end of the book and yet the ending sustains throughout the next two chapters.  The presentation of how Digory brings the apple to his mother and then hopes that she is healed, before she is healed is beautiful.  If I'm honest, the 'good news' that Digory's Uncle had died feels a bit cheesy and contrived to me - to simply bring Digory into his mansion sooner so that he can be in 'starting position' for the Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe.  Besides the fact that, 'good news you're Uncle has died - who cares about him - and now you are filthy rich!" has never felt comfortable to me.  I have inherited money when loved ones have died; I appreciate the money, but it does not remotely make up for the one who I lost.  I think most people love the mundane ending of Uncle Andrew enthusiastically telling people about his 'dem fine woman', but for me this is just a downer.

2. The Horse and His Boy: I don't care much about King Ram - I don't think he even gets a mention at the end of The Last Battle or any of the other Chronicles, but I do like how Cor and Aravis end up together - with the inclusion that they had real conflicts in their relationship that they had to work through together.  For some reason, it makes their ending feel happier, knowing that they did not have a fairytale marriage - but a good one that required real work.  The story's mundane final paragraph about Corin fighting a bear is great.  And Corin is a legend!  Beating up a bear with his bare fists, just brilliant - it sums up his character so well!

1. The Last Battle's ending was a complete surprise for me the first time I heard it.  I remember my twin brother saying "This is the first time I think I have ever looked forward to dying."  I wanted to swim up waterfalls, run faster than the arrow flies (and also fly through the sky like a bird, but they don't fly in The last Battle's ending).  All the characters we have come to love are present and are never going away.  Lewis is describing what is beyond our imaginations - it is so bold to even attempt it and he does an amazing job!  It is so joyful - it is the one true 'happily ever after' ending I have come across in any novel.  For me, this is the perfect ending to the series and it is my favourite ending.

Hmm, this is a tough one. I'm not sure where I would rank the endings. I mean, The Last Battle is the most logical ending to the series, but I wouldn't necessarily rank it as number 1. I'm just sure where.

I think my favorite ending would be The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, where they reached the world's end. We get a glimpse of what happened in Narnia after Edmund, Lucy, and Eustace are transported back to to our world- Caspian and his men finding the lords who have been asleep awaken, and he marries Ramandu's daughter, and she became his queen. And other kings followed after him. The ending is quite beautiful, as the children interact with Aslan, who tells them he has another name in our world, then they are transported back to our world, as well as seeing a glimpse of what happens in Narnia. 

Posted by: @davidd

 

4. Prince Caspian: I really like how walking through the doorway, they see the Narnian's and Aslan, but simultaneously the pacific Island and the Railway station all together - I do not think you could do it in film (they would probably do some cross-dissolve overlay effect that would look really cheap and cheesy if they tried).  It is simple and it works.  Edmund's anti-climatic 'oh bother, I left my new torch in Narnia' is funny too.  It oddly reminds me of Sam's "Well I'm back!" from the end of The Lord of the Rings.

I love his description there but I have a hard time actually visualizing it. So I think I see what you mean.

Thanks for starting this thread @Starlit! What a great new idea for a topic. I even recently mentioned elsewhere on this site that one of my big, picky things for whether or not I like a book has directly to do with how the author ends it. And Lewis has several great endings!
(Two things to note, I purposefully didn't read anyone else's post, so I won't accidentally be influenced. 😉 And also, my opinion of my favorite endings are heavily influenced by the fact that I first read them in the original published order, not the chronological order.)

7.The Last Battle -- I've never been a huge fan of any author attempting to portray heaven. I think Lewis gets closer than many other authors' attempts that I've read, but even so, it's not a favorite ending for me. And....I hate to even add this in here....I've never liked that Susan was left out. Easy last place because it's the only ending I don't care for.

6. The Voyage of the Dawn Treader -- From here on out it gets tough! And possibly not even accurate lol. In fact, I think the more I like the book overall, the higher it ranks, or perhaps I like a book more because I subconsciously like the ending more? I dunno! But I'm going with VDT here. Not because I dislike the ending. I actually REALLY like the bit with Reepicheep sailing on to the end of the world. But perhaps the sadness of the end of the Pevensies visiting Narnia brings this one down a notch. Or maybe it's because Lewis made Aslan a lamb for a brief bit which served no real purpose other than Christian imagery and it felt too forced. Anyways, I don't dislike this ending, but relative to the others, it comes in sixth.

5. The Horse and His Boy -- There are so many excellent moments throughout this book, that by the time we get to the end of the story, there's really not much to write about with this one. I liked the way Rabadash received his punishment. I liked the fact that Shasta became King Cor and married Aravis (take that all of you "Lewis is racist" crowd), but there wasn't much else for a big heartfelt finale. 

4. Prince Caspian -- I really waffled back and forth between this one and HHB, but this one comes in a touch higher than HHB for having the funniest ending "Bother, I left my new torch in Narnia." And saying goodbye to Peter and Susan worked better for me in this book than saying goodbye to Edmund and Lucy did in VDT. I THINK It's because Lewis left it unwritten and I like that better. Overall, 4th, 5th, and 6th places were almost tied.

3. The Silver Chair -- So now we get into the endings that I really, really like. I wish that Jill and Eustace had had the chance to say goodbye to Rilian. That's the only small negative for me that brings this one down to three. HOWEVER, of all the Christian imagery that Lewis put at the end of his books, this one I really like. I like seeing Caspian come back to life in Aslan's Country. I LOVE that Caspian at last gets his wish of seeing our world. I like that the bullies get what's coming to them. This is my favorite book in the Chronicles of Narnia and I fully approve of the ending. 

2. The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe -- Honestly, this very nearly took number 1. I like the storyline that the kids all came tumbling back out of the wardrobe and were suddenly kids again. I think this plot device has been overused now, but at the time I first read the book, it was a new concept to me. But the bigger thing I like about it is the way the Professor behaves at the end by BELIEVING the Pevensies that they've been in Narnia (because if you've read LWW first, you have no idea that the Professor has been to Narnia himself), and telling them there's no sense in trying to get back in through the Wardrobe to retrieve the coats. Logic! It's such a perfect nod to the rest of the series and a hint that there's more adventures to come. 

1. The Magician's Nephew -- Of all the books, I think the ending to this one is pretty much flawless. I love everything about it. Starting with King Frank and Queen Helen being pulled from the working class London to royalty in Narnia. Uncle Andrew gets what's coming to him, but in a very humorous way, not a horrible way. Digory finally gets things right and has faith in Aslan. And then because of that faith he gets an apple to bring home to his mother. She's healed and made well. And all of those ah-ha moments with the core that becomes the tree that turns into the Wardrobe. As well as the realization that Digory's the Professor in LWW. I have no criticisms here, it's such a fabulous ending!

I agree, this is a fascinating topic — thanks, @starlit! — and I have been reading everybody else's responses and marvelling at the way some people's thoughts on particular books and their endings are very close to how I feel, and others are the complete opposite. Takes all kinds to make a world, as they say.  

So without further ado, here are my own rankings. Some are extremely close — especially as there are no endings of the Narnia books that I outright dislike, just some that I enjoy a bit more than others...

7. The Silver Chair — While I've always been moved by the scene where Caspian is brought back to life in Aslan's country, and of course I appreciate the Christian symbolism of it, there is also something just a tiny bit... well, maybe not quite "forced" about it, let alone "artificial", but it does clash with what we later see of Lewis's take on death and the afterlife, Narnia style, in The Last Battle. Nobody in that later book arrives in Aslan's country as a corpse and gets resurrected with a drop of Aslan's blood, so why does that need to happen for Caspian?

And then the return to our world, with Aslan bringing the wall down (described in a way that's oddly hyperbolic and matter-of-fact at the same time: "Then Aslan roared so that the sun shook in the sky and thirty feet of the wall fell down before them") and our heroes getting their revenge on the school bullies — that's reasonable wish-fulfilment stuff for any of us who've ever been severely bullied, but it also seems a tad bit forced, if not quite farcical. It's not a bad ending, but it's the least compelling and moving for me.

And as somebody else here has already said, Lewis closing the story with "If ever you have the luck to go to Narnia yourself, do not forget to have a look at those caves" just comes across as rather strange, not least because this is quite late in Narnia's history — had Lewis not yet decided to end the series with (the mortal) Narnia being destroyed and his characters discovering heaven? (There's already a foreshadowing of it in Aslan's remark "When you meet me here again, you will have come to stay" earlier in the final chapter of SC.) But even without that, surely there are greater wonders in Narnia than "those caves" that are now all dark and flooded with an underground sea?

6. Prince Caspian — I also don't actually dislike this ending, just find it less compelling than most of the others apart from SC! It's just one of the least memorable and moving for me. Unlike at least one other NarniaWebber (I'm deliberately not looking back at previous posts now or naming names), I much prefer Edmund and Lucy's "not coming back to Narnia" moment (in VDT) to Peter and Susan's, which we're only told about afterwards by Peter, who doesn't go into any details, and it all seems rather odd and offhand, as does his attitude of "Come along... Our time's up" (echoed by Susan). Really quite sudden, when you consider how long they spent in Narnia the first time, and now they don't get much more than a couple of weeks there. I do enjoy the very British understatement-followed-by-bathos of the two closing lines, though:

"Well!" said Peter. "We have had a time."

"Bother!" said Edmund. "I've left my new torch in Narnia."

 

5. The Horse and His Boy — Now we're getting into the ones I find a lot harder to rank (this one and 4 are very close). It's now definitely a matter of this ending having absolutely nothing I could complain about (unlike the previous two), but also nothing much that really sets it apart and makes it strong and memorable. Except, of course, for that priceless remark about a certain two characters' developing relationship:

Aravis also had many quarrels (and, I'm afraid, even fights) with Cor, but they always made it up again: so that years later, when they were grown up, they were so used to quarrelling and making it up again that they got married so as to go on doing it more conveniently.

Even as a 7-year-old with absolutely zero interest in marriage at that point in my life, I "got" that the first time I read it and cracked up laughing!  

4. The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe — Almost a tie with HHB, but I'm putting this one higher because of my sheer sentimental attachment to the first-ever Narnia book, which (I'm grateful to say) was the first one I was introduced to. I know the Pevensies being adults and talking in old-fashioned "courtly" language and then suddenly becoming children again is strange and jarring to some, and I'm certainly glad Lewis didn't make that section of the book go on any longer than it does. But I've always felt it's meant to have a fairy-tale quality about it, in the way that young children can easily imagine themselves being kings or queens of their own fantasy land and reigning there for years and years, and yet still get home in time for dinner.

(And the whole question of "ugh, how weird and awful for them to have been adults and then be forced back into children's bodies and have to go through puberty again" — which plenty of critics have raised — is, I firmly believe, totally moot. As a first-time reader in the age group for which the books were intended, I certainly never thought of that (not having been through puberty myself, after all), and even as an adult reader, I still don't think of it and I don't believe Lewis intended us to. Otherwise he could have spent pages in this or the next book maundering on the psychological implications of it. Which he didn't.) 

But the thing that I love most about this particular ending is the way it all wraps up, with the Professor not only completely understanding the children's story, but dropping more than a hint that he's been to Narnia himself and presumably even met Aslan (how else would he know the "Once a king in Narnia..." line?). It's a lovely touch on Lewis's part to have most of the second-last paragraph in the Professor's words and his distinctive voice, with the children's own remarks implied rather than given directly. ("What's that? How will you know? Oh, you'll know all right....") Allowing this wise old character to dominate the ending just increases our sense that this is definitely someone who knows far more than he's letting on and gives us the hope that we'll eventually find out what he knows and how and why. Which, of course, we eventually do.

And in the meantime, there are those two closing sentences in fine storytelling style that gave not-yet-5-year-old me the rising hope that there might be more stories about Narnia (I didn't find out about the rest of the series until a couple of years later!):

And that is the very end of the adventure of the wardrobe. But if the Professor was right it was only the beginning of the adventures of Narnia.

3. The Magician's Nephew — I can see there are others who've put this right at the top of their list, or very nearly, for its happily-ever-after feeling, and that raises it very high for me too. The wonderful turn-around, after Digory had given up all hope, where his mother IS cured and everything in his life gets better and better still from there on in... well, I will admit that even the first time I read this book, I fully expected the happy ending (because it's a children's story, written in an era when children's stories were pretty much not allowed to have sad endings), but it's still a particularly joyous one. And yes, I too love the "Oh, so that's where the wardrobe came from!" moment. (Even though now, as an adult with no great knowledge of woodworking but apparently more than Lewis had, I'm all too aware that there's no way you could get sufficient "board feet" out of the trunk of a single apple tree — even a semi-magical one — to make one big wardrobe, or even one rather small one. )

And it's also pleasing to be assured that Uncle Andrew spent his later years as a genuinely nicer old fellow, with the amusing final touch of him still regaling guests with stories of a certain "dem fine woman" he once met. The main reason I rank this ending third is that, excellent though it is, it doesn't carry the feeling of awe that puts my last two entries where they are.

2. The Voyage of the Dawn Treader — Like many, I'm sure, I've always been moved by Reepicheep finally achieving his lifelong desire to sail to the very end of the world, and even if the series ended here (as Lewis apparently originally intended it to) and we never saw Reepicheep in Aslan's country, I think at this point we're left pretty much satisfied that he got there. As for what happens next... the setting is a little strange, and yet for me it works, and what has always stayed with me about this final scene is Aslan's final conversation with the children.

The revelation that Lucy and Edmund "will never come back to Narnia" isn't a shock, since we've already heard second hand about it happening with Peter and Susan, but for me it cuts much deeper here, hearing it directly from Aslan and being shown how the two children respond. Once again, remembering back to my first reading of it, Lucy's words — "It isn't Narnia, you know... It's you. We shan't meet you there. And how can we live, never meeting you?" — touched me to the heart, because, well, I knew what she meant. Narnia in and of itself is a wonderful idea, if only one could go there, which one can't, it being only imaginary. But I'd already sensed there was something more to these stories than just another imaginary magical land like Oz or Fantasia, and I knew deep down what (and Who) it was. There was something about Aslan that was somehow more wonderful to me, and somehow meant more, than any other character I'd ever encountered in a story.

And then when I read Aslan's reply — that he is in our world too, with a different name, and we need to learn to know him by that name — well, it all fell into place. I had already guessed, deep down, even though I was growing up in a totally non-religious family and I only knew about Christianity and God and Jesus and so on from RE classes at school and retellings of the Christmas and Easter stories for children. But that moment, right at the end of this book, finally confirmed that I was right, and it was a truly awe-filled realisation.

1. The Last Battle — I am somewhat tempted to swap the placings of these last two, because that ending of VDT means so much to me and I can still feel the wonder I felt when I first read it. And LB, for three quarters of the book (12 out of 16 chapters), is THE most excruciating and wrenching and hope-dashing and heart-breaking of all the Chronicles and I can hardly bear to re-read it in full from cover to cover, which is not something I would say about VDT or any of the other books. But Lewis's vision of heaven is, to me, just so compelling and so meaningful that it overwhelms all the darkness and horror of the previous chapters with more light and joy and goodness than I would have thought possible. And not just the wonderful reunion with so many old friends, and the assurance that they are now part of a "Great Story" that "goes on for ever; in which every chapter is better than the one before" — all of which could easily sound like empty words, but for me Lewis puts it so convincingly that there's no way I could pick at it.

What crowns it off for me is the concept that heaven is made up of all the "real" things, the originals of which all the things we see in the mortal world are at best a mere shadow or copy, whereas the real things, when we discover them, are more good and beautiful and amazing than the shadow-versions could ever be, and they always have existed and can never be destroyed. I was always absolutely awed by that idea, even as a kid. Then by coincidence (or was it???), when I rediscovered my faith as an adult (after years of agnosticism and often deep despair), it was through a theology that turned out to have a strikingly similar concept of heaven and ultimate reality. Thanks to that now being the basis of my whole life, the closing chapters of The Last Battle mean more to me than ever.

(And as for Susan, whom some here have understandably mentioned as the let-down in this book's ending — even as a child, I could understand why she rejected Narnia, and I never had any doubt that Aslan could still reach her in our world (even in the midst of her grief and horror at losing her whole family), and that she'd find her way back to Him eventually. I sensed that even before I found out that Lewis had reassured young readers of the same thing. And again, years later, I'm more convinced of that than ever.)

I'd love to share my ranking, but I'm find it hard to make one. 

I found it easier to rank the opening chapters than the closing chapters since the former are easier to take out of context. With an ending you have to think of everything that's come before. Here are a few thoughts of mine though.

• As far as what happens in them, I find the conclusions to all the Narnia books to be equally great. Some of them are probably better written than others but, like I said, I can't say which ones.
• It fascinates me how fans seem split on the ending of The Last Battle. Personally, I lean more towards the group that views it as the best ending. I didn't always like it. Longtime readers of this forum may remember that I didn't like it at first since I felt that ending with the characters dying and going to a happy afterlife was a copout. But I love the reunion of all the series' supporting characters in that last chapter and the writing is just so great! 

And for us this is the end of all the stories, and we can most truly say that they all lived happily ever after. But for
them it was only the beginning of the real story. All their life in this world and all their adventures in Narnia had only been the cover and the title page: now at last they were beginning Chapter One of the Great Story, which no one on earth has read: which goes on for ever: in which every chapter is better than the one before.

7. The Last Battle. The first time i read it, the fact that Susan was completely forgotten about took away any joy i might have gotten from the description of Heaven. It's not so much that she was left out as how the dismissive the discussion about her was, and that none of the party thought about her again. I don't think it was sexist or anything, but i didn't like it then, and i don't care for it now.

6. Prince Caspian. I'm not especially fond of this book overall. It just feels a little odd, after how intensely the Pevensies were involved in Narnia in the first book, for them to be there so briefly in the second, and in a supporting more than a starring role. 

5. The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe. The sudden switch to Shakespearen language was odd, and their return to the real world a bit abrupt. More to the point, i don't think there's really anything that mediates it.

4. The Silver Chair. The final meeting with Caspian in Aslan's Country is a little strange, but the return to Experiment House has some funny moments.

3. Voyage of the Dawn Treader. I really like the build up to reaching the end of the world, and Reepicheep's final voyage is excellent. I'm not sure if i prefer the "last trip to Narnia" conversation being directly discussed or held "offscreen" as it were, but if it had been "offpage" then we wouldn't have Aslan's line about finding Him in our world.

1/2 The Horse and His Boy/The Magician's Nephew. I don't know that i could pick. They both feel a bit more like endings, a bit more final and wrapped-up than some of the other books. Of course, with these ones he could be a bit more final than he could with the others besides The Last Battle, and, well.