Aslan's death was the biggest tearjerker for me. I knew it was coming. I knew what would happen. I had already seen the Walden movie and read the book once, both when I was a bit younger. I think the moment in the movie when I first saw it was more scary than sad to me, and when I read the book in fifth grade, I was too young and so much of it went over my head. Rereading it when I was older, however, I was able to fully comprehend that Aslan was trading his life for Edmund personally- Edmund, who had to betrayed Aslan, his own family, and all the good Narnians. Not only the sorrow of Aslan's death, but the beauty of his boundless love overpowered me with strong emotions. Knowing Aslan would defy death and come back provided enough comfort for me to (with a great exercise of willpower) keep from crying, though only barely.

Some other moments I remember really affecting me and nearly bringing me to tears are Reepicheep going to Aslan's kingdom in VDT (it was really a bittersweet moment), Caspian's death in SC (it was too quick and shocking to make me cry, though), and the 'last battle' in LB (particularly when the dwarfs shoot the talking horses and when Eustace dies, especially Jill's reaction).

@jasmine_tarkheena 

All of the scenes mentioned here are emotionally moving, and I think there is one more. It was very sad for me to read that the talking trees were being cut down in The Last Battle. It reminded me of how insensitive developers will destroy endangered wildlife in our world (and sometimes it is only to make money). I think Lewis was saying that we should always have respect for the natural world. If Lewis were living today I think he would certainly have been an environmentalist. 🙂

Posted by: @narnian78

@jasmine_tarkheena 

All of the scenes mentioned here are emotionally moving, and I think there is one more. It was very sad for me to read that the talking trees were being cut down in The Last Battle. It reminded me of how insensitive developers will destroy endangered wildlife in our world (and sometimes it is only to make money). I think Lewis was saying that we should always have respect for the natural world. If Lewis were living today I think he would certainly have been an environmentalist. 🙂

I actually didn't think about that. I am not an environmentalist but I do have respect for nature. As a Christian, I'm sure God feels sad about how His creation is being treated. As you've mentioned, I think the Calormenes cut down the trees to help Shift gain power by selling the logs. It almost makes me think of movies like Ferngully: The Last Rainforest and Pocahontas, where it touches on destruction of nature. Both The Last Battle and Pocahontas have a theme about destroying forests and a greedy leader conquering the world and seeking to gain more power.

@jasmine_tarkheena 

I think people should become environmentalists as much as possible if they are Christians. Sometimes the choices in protecting Nature are difficult to make, but I have seen too much of the natural world lost to greed. Even in C.S. Lewis’ home The Kilns there are only about one and a half acres saved of the house and the surrounding woods.  I learned this from the online tour a few months ago. I have never been there in person, but I took the online tour.  It seems regrettable that more of the woods which inspired Narnia weren’t saved.  Lewis passed away many years ago, but he would be very sad if he knew how much forest and natural areas were lost in England since his death.  We have the same problem here in America in that the natural world is disappearing very fast.  So I would encourage people to join the National Audubon Society, Nature Conservancy, National Wildlife Federation, and local conservation groups to protect wildlife and natural areas.  By helping those organizations one is being an environmentalist. I think Lewis himself was an environmentalist in writing the Narnia books since he always had respect for Nature in his stories.

@narnian78 

We had wild fires in the State of Oregon about a year ago or two, and it destroyed a lot of forests. Sometimes I wonder if the stable in The Last Battle was made from the trees where the dryads lived that the Calormenes cut down.

In talking about tear jerking, as I've mentioned, the moment where Caspian is reunited briefly with his son Rilian then dies then is brought back to life in Aslan's country has me emotionally drained. The plot is about that Caspian was about to die without an heir after having lost his son who had vanished over ten years ago, and they've lost many Narnians trying to find the prince. It is a touching moment to read about Caspian seeing his son for the last time before he dies. Eustace and Jill are mourning the death of Caspian... even Aslan mourns for him. Yet Aslan brings Caspian back to life in His country. It's like saying death is not the end of the story. Having a great uncle who died last February, I can't deny what happened. Knowing where he is at, I have the hope that I will see him again. So that's the idea that it's sad that Caspian dies, but when Aslan's brings him back to life in His country, he is in a better place. As @gp often likes to talk about, it emphasis on despair and hope.

The ending of the Last Battle always gets me. All the reunions, Reepicheep being there to greet them, Aslan's closing monologue. 

It's just a perfect ending. 

I think the partings are more tear-jerking than the reunions. Perhaps this is an age-group thing for me, having said goodbye to a few people who I might not see again in this life.
But there are consolations: Lucy and Edmund say goodbye to Aslan at the end of VDT - and Aslan tells them it is not goodbye. 

Like Jasmine, I found the moment of Aslan sharing Digory's grief to be a huge tear-jerker.

      It's possibly the heaviest moment in the Chronicles. Seeing this desperate child on the verge of losing his mother begging for one last chance to save her life is one cause for tears in itself, but the moment that he sees the most powerful being in the world weeping with him is huge. It says so much about the love of God, the problem of why suffering exists,  and the weight of grief. For those who know about Lewis losing his own mother at the age of 5, this hits with double impact- it's like he's saying what he wishes he could have told himself back then. 

Posted by: @the-mad-poet

Like Jasmine, I found the moment of Aslan sharing Digory's grief to be a huge tear-jerker.

      It's possibly the heaviest moment in the Chronicles. Seeing this desperate child on the verge of losing his mother begging for one last chance to save her life is one cause for tears in itself, but the moment that he sees the most powerful being in the world weeping with him is huge. It says so much about the love of God, the problem of why suffering exists,  and the weight of grief. For those who know about Lewis losing his own mother at the age of 5, this hits with double impact- it's like he's saying what he wishes he could have told himself back then. 

We've talked about in our Sunday School class when we did The Magician's Nephew, how it connects with the shortest verse, "Jesus wept." Douglas Gresham even said in the introduction of the Focus On The Family Radio Theatre adaption of The Magician's Nephew that both C.S. Lewis and Douglas Gresham have each lost a mother when they were young.

I don't think any scene in the Chronicles has ever quite literally brought me to tears (I don't cry that easily... except when I do), but for me the closest — certainly the most wrenching — is the climax of The Magician's Nephew, beginning with the scene where Jadis, having failed to persuade Digory to eat the apple for himself and become immortal, tempts him to take it home and use it to heal his mother instead:

"Oh!" gasped Digory as if he had been hurt, and put his hand to his head. For he knew now that the most terrible choice lay before him.

It's strong stuff for a children's book — I don't think I appreciated quite how strong when I first read this as a 7-year-old. Digory is being given the choice of disobeying Aslan and saving his mother's life — the thing he wants most in the world — or obeying Aslan and losing his mother. And as the Witch herself puts it:

"What has the Lion ever done for you that you should be his slave?... And what would your Mother think if she knew that you could have taken her pain away and given her back her life and saved your Father's heart from being broken, and that you wouldn't — that you'd rather run messages for a wild animal in a strange world that is no business of yours?"

The Witch then accuses Aslan further of making Digory "heartless" and "cruel" and "pitiless": "That is what he does to everyone who listens to him" — and really, her brutal logic is almost impeccable. Digory barely knows Aslan — and almost certainly doesn't know yet who Aslan is in our world — and the only things that save him from making the wrong choice here are his knowledge that the Witch is evil and her misstep in suggesting he could leave Polly behind, along with (as we're reminded later in the chapter) the memory of "the shining tears in Aslan's eyes" that assures him afterwards that he did do the right thing. But it is nevertheless truly a horrifying moment and a genuine heart-wrenching struggle. Of course on a deeper level Lewis is getting at the heart of what it means to be a follower of Christ, in ways that are hard to put into words, but he does it so perfectly in this one striking scene that I'm not going to try to make further comments about it.

This is followed by one of the biggest eucatastrophes (to borrow Tolkien's term!) in the Chronicles, when in the next chapter Aslan explains that it would have brought no joy if Digory had taken the apple for his mother (this goes against Aslan's twice previously stated rule that no-one is ever told what would have happened, but never mind!)...

And Digory could say nothing, for tears choked him and he gave up all hopes of saving his Mother's life; but at the same time he knew that the Lion knew what would have happened, and that there might be things more terrible even than losing someone you love by death. But now Aslan was speaking again, almost in a whisper:

"That is what would have happened, child, with a stolen apple. It is not what will happen now. What I give you now will bring joy. It will not, in your world, give endless life, but it will heal. Go. Pluck her an apple from the Tree."

I'm pretty sure there have been critics — especially anti-religious ones — who've pilloried this as a magical turn-around of events that isn't fair on children in the real world who've seen loved ones die and who weren't given any fairy-tale cure-all to save them. All I can say to that is: C.S. Lewis himself lost his own mother when he was only 9 years old, and it was undoubtedly one of the most devastating events of his life. (I've never forgotten his simple summing-up of how that felt to him, in Surprised by Joy: "It was all sea and islands now; the great continent had sunk like Atlantis.") That tragic loss was probably one of the key factors that contributed to him becoming an atheist from his teens to his early 30s. And yet, when writing a story in which another young boy's mother is dying, Lewis made the decision to give Digory the happy ending that he himself didn't get. Regardless of why he chose to write that part of the plot the way he did, he can't be accused of writing about something he had no knowledge of...

(Sorry to have gone slightly off topic here, but this scene does at least bring me pretty close to tears!)

@courtenay I actually haven't thought of that one. Digory has been wanting to save his mother's life, but he knew well that if he stole it and take it back to her, it wouldn't be the right way to do it. It will be interesting how Netflix will pull this off. I think where Jadis tempts Digory to steal the apple is the climax of the story. It's like what choice is he going have to make. Should he give in to her temptations or should he obey Aslan's instructions?

Upon my re-reading of The Magician's Nephew, one scene really touched me and tugged at my heartstrings like it never did before. That is, when Digory was pleading for something that could save his mother, and he saw tears in Aslan's eyes. That just really got to me this time. Especially when its referenced again on his adventure to retrieve the silver apple, and he remembered Aslan's tears and knowing they were genuine. To see that this great Lion seems to feel and understand his pain, and feel so sorry for what Digory has to go through. It also makes the moment when he's allowed to take an apple home so satisfying. It was a great way to show our pain does not go unnoticed.

Another tear-jerking moment I thought could be where in The Silver Chair, in a backstory, where Rilian and his mother, along with other courtiers, are out on a picnic in the Northern woods. Then when his mother gets killed by the snake, you feel that same sadness he feels. It's that unbreakable bond between a parent and a child.

At the end of The Last Battle, when Aslan asks, "Have you not guessed?"

Also, towards the end of Prince Caspian, when we the old Dwarf women who is near death, but, perhaps by Aslan's magic, lives long enough to be reunited with Caspian.