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I have not previously heard of or read any of the analysis, but it does look very negative and unlikely to be a fair handling of the series.

Just having a look through the first part of that and a few other bits, I'm not interested in reading the rest. This critic bore obviously has a pre-set agenda and is doing this solely for the purpose of ripping the entire series to shreds, chapter by chapter, deliberately landing on every single thing that she (or he?) can possibly find a reason to pick at, no matter how petty, and sneering and moaning all the way.

Even if Narnia wasn't my favourite fantasy series for young readers and probably dearest to my heart out of all the fiction I've ever read, I'd find this "deconstruction" an absolute pain to read and, frankly, completely boring. From what I can see, there's no real nuance or balance, just pretty much a string of (approximately) 1001 Reasons Why I Hate These Books. I doubt I'd enjoy reading it even if it was attacking books that I also don't like — and while there certainly are books out there that I don't like, I can't think of any I detest so overpoweringly that I could be bothered reading, let alone writing, a whole series of chapter-by-chapter essays on absolutely everything that's terrible about them.

The fact that this critic felt driven to do so about Narnia quite possibly says more about the critic her(?)self than it does about Narnia. Which is sad, but there it is. It's not going to change my own views of, and love for, the books that mean so much to me and to many others. And for haters like this, all I can think of to say is: if you don't like it, well then don't read it!  

The decision to read a book depends largely on one’s tastes. My feeling is that people who are constantly finding fault with a book should probably do something better with their time.  They can find something else to read that they like better.  Philip Pullman criticized the Narnia series too for Lewis not telling us whether Susan was saved, and he found other things he thought were wrong with the Narnia series. But his criticism is very biased, and although it may be worth reading for information the criticism may be flawed. If it is just a collection of fault finding statements it seems like it doesn’t achieve much that is positive. And you could ask the question “Is the criticism worth reading?” I wouldn’t take Ana Mardoll too seriously, but her views may be worth reading for general information.  I realize that Lewis was not infallible, but Ana Mardoll may not always be perfect in her own criticism.

Deconstruction of a book or books, with the explicit intention of criticising every particle, is of no interest to me. Even if Narnia were not the victim, I doubt I'd read it. 

It's destruction, not deconstruction, and Lewis already dealt with that in the 7th book.

This review is a bit wild, I must say. Criticism is all well and good, but taking the fact that Lewis mixed up whether Eustace had the arm-ring on his left or right arm in VODT as a sign of Lewis' patriarchal privilege overriding any editorial input (because his work is apparently only regarded as great literature because he was a white male, according to this reviewer) and then launching into a multi-paragraph rant about said privilege puts this pretty far beyond the bounds of deserving any serious consideration. 

And excessively negative reviews (especially from a cynical postmodern perspective) have very little weight to them in general, as @coracle just pointed out. 

Complete bosh from beginning to end, as Polly would say. 

If you want to read the extremely negative criticism of a non-Narnia lover, then it's worth reading. Otherwise, it's kind of depressing, it's so negative. I read about five pages in to the Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe one, and stopped because she didn't say a single positive thing. I'm not going to be overly critical of the criticism, so I'm not going to say more.

I have read some of Anna Mardoll's 'deconstructions' of Narnia and would not recommend them in the slightest. In fact I felt as if I had been transported into a parallel universe where the normal rules of logic and common sense had been suspended.

Mardoll is convinced the Pevensies must have been tyrannical rulers in the Golden Age, because white English schoolchildren brought in to rule a 'foreign' country must, in her eyes, be evil racist colonialist oppressors. And she will twist just about any detail Lewis gives on the Pevensie's rule to support that supposition.

Her 'deconstructions' have little value to anyone, except perhaps students of abnormal psychology

Posted by: @hermit

Mardoll is convinced the Pevensies must have been tyrannical rulers in the Golden Age, because white English schoolchildren brought in to rule a 'foreign' country must, in her eyes, be evil racist colonialist oppressors.

Aren't most of the native Narnians implied to be white too?  

Well, maybe that's not true. Fauns are described as having reddish skin. (Or was that just Mr. Tumnus?) Red dwarfs too and black dwarfs have dark skin. So maybe that part of Mardoll's critique carries some weight. But I'd argue that, looking at the books' cultural context, the fact that it was specifically pointed out those characters had non-white pigmentation indicates the majority of them are white. 

BTW, has Mardoll written about any books besides Narnia on the internet? Maybe ones she likes? Sometimes I find it interesting to see what books are considered great by people who hate books I love. Like just what is their idea of good writing?  

@col-klink Did Red Dwarfs have red skin and Black Dwarfs black skin? As far as I can remember that just refers to the colour of their beards.

@hermit It's definitely only the colour of their hair and beards that is either red or black respectively — Lewis doesn't ever make any references to their skin colour. I think we can assume he thought of them as light-skinned, since dwarfs (or dwarves, if you're Tolkien) have their origins in Nordic mythology, which is something that both Lewis and Tolkien loved and drew on extensively in their fantasy writing.

If Lewis had explicitly stated that Black Dwarfs had black skin, he'd get blasted even more for racism than he already does, since both the Black Dwarfs we meet as main characters — Nikabrik (PC) and Griffle (LB) — are unrelenting baddies. On the other hand, the Dwarfs in LB (led by Griffle) themselves use an undeniable racial slur, "Darkies", when referring to the Calormenes, which clearly implies that the Dwarfs themselves are not dark-skinned.

(Incidentally, there's an excellent essay reprinted here on NarniaWeb, "Are the Chronicles of Narnia Sexist and Racist?" by Dr Devin Brown, which points out that these Dwarfs are the only characters who are portrayed as using racist epithets, and clearly their behaviour is not meant to be admired or copied. There are also plenty of other insights in there that would serve as good rebuttals — or antidotes — to some of Ana Mardoll's claims about Narnia and Lewis.)

Meanwhile, @nightmare, if you don't mind me asking — have you read any or all of Mardoll's analysis yourself, and if so, what do you think of it?

Posted by: @courtenay

@hermit It's definitely only the colour of their hair and beards that is either red or black respectively — Lewis doesn't ever make any references to their skin colour. I think we can assume he thought of them as light-skinned, since dwarfs (or dwarves, if you're Tolkien) have their origins in Nordic mythology, which is something that both Lewis and Tolkien loved and drew on extensively in their fantasy writing.

If Lewis had explicitly stated that Black Dwarfs had black skin, he'd get blasted even more for racism than he already does, since both the Black Dwarfs we meet as main characters — Nikabrik (PC) and Griffle (LB) — are unrelenting baddies. On the other hand, the Dwarfs in LB (led by Griffle) themselves use an undeniable racial slur, "Darkies", when referring to the Calormenes, which clearly implies that the Dwarfs themselves are not dark-skinned.

 

Excellent point courtenay.

@courtenay Well i haven't read most of it, i've read some chapters of the first three books (since im currently on SC). Thant's kind of the reason why i wanted to ask this since i'm new to Narnia and i found this by accident while reading another blog by another Narnia critic. Like i just wanted to know if this blog is well known here since it was made 13 years ago and i assumed at least some people in the community had read it.

@nightmare I hadn't heard of it until now and I get the impression most other people here hadn't seen it before — probably because it's not something that has been written and promoted by a professional author. We're more likely all familiar with the criticisms of Narnia from well-known authors like Philip Pullman and J.K. Rowling (both of whom are cited in the essay by Devin Brown that I linked to earlier).

And as pretty much everyone in this discussion has said, the style of "criticism" Ana Mardoll is doing — pulling apart every little detail of the books with the predetermined aim of finding everything "wrong" with them, often on very shaky grounds — is not a fair or valuable kind of analysis, whether it's being done to Narnia or any other books. It's really more a case of the critic indulging and flaunting his or her own beliefs and prejudices, rather than giving any worthwhile insights into the books and their genuine strong or weak points.

In short, I don't think anyone is likely to find Mardoll's analysis useful except for people who already intensely dislike the Narnia books and would like to find even more reasons (however flimsy) for hating them.

If you're new to Narnia and want to read more balanced and thoughtful commentaries on the series, there are plenty of those available by more reputable authors — I can't remember if we have a discussion thread here on any of those specifically, but I'm sure lots of people here in the NarniaWeb community can recommend ones they've found helpful.

But from what you say, it sounds like you're still on your first reading of the Narnia books and haven't read them all yet — am I right? — and if that's true, I honestly would recommend you just read the books themselves first, and focus on them and what you think of them as you read, without reading any critics' opinions alongside them the first time. Just give yourself a chance to experience these stories in their own right, rather than being influenced by what someone else is telling you to think about them.

By the way, I notice from your profile that you're in Poland (though obviously you're an English speaker)! My grandfather was Polish — I don't speak the language, but my mum does. If you'd like to share a bit more about yourself with the community here, there's a "Getting to Know You" discussion thread in the Spare Oom section.  

Mardoll made one point that was interesting: Nikabrik probably was right that the dwarves got the brunt of everything, and they went into battle on the advice of an astrologer. So maybe what he did was more understandable than people assume, even if it was wrong.