CS Lewis' Storytelling Techniques

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Re: CS Lewis' Storytelling Techniques

Post by marmota-b » Tue Jul 14, 2015 6:08 am

Prince Caspian is particularly challenging that way, yes, what with its narrative-inside-a-narrative.
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Re: CS Lewis' Storytelling Techniques

Post by hobbit_of_narnia » Wed Jul 15, 2015 2:21 am

I remember my older sister telling me how much PC confused her when she first read it. :P
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Re: CS Lewis' Storytelling Techniques

Post by marmota-b » Wed Jul 15, 2015 9:33 am

That's funny, I loved it as a child! I guess it was the lingering writer inside me appreciating the trick. :D
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Re: CS Lewis' Storytelling Techniques

Post by hobbit_of_narnia » Thu Jul 16, 2015 12:03 am

I liked it, too, but for some reason the reference made in Aslan's How about Trumpkin going "to his death" when he had just led the Pevensies there confused my sister. :P
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Re: CS Lewis' Storytelling Techniques

Post by hansgeorg » Sat Jul 18, 2015 6:52 pm

I never had problems with a story set within a story (so far, not sure how homelessness for ten years would act on my capability of getting it in a story I didn't already know).

It comes quite a lot in Arabian Nights - though that is for other reasons not a work I can totally from all points of view recommend. I highly liked it in my teens, except for some passages which made me squirm. And those were not about setting a story within a story or even a story within a story within a story.

Have you noted that chapters in LotR are much longer than those in Narnia?

Is it just that scenes are described in more detail? Or are there also more scenes per chapter? I don't really know. I guess it is both. And dividing chapters in scenes is subjective anyway. One can see a division which another fails to see. But I think the comparison is useful.

EDIT : teens = more like preteens and very early teens.
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Re: CS Lewis' Storytelling Techniques

Post by marmota-b » Sat Jul 18, 2015 7:50 pm

I think more detail must play a role in it; Tolkien may go for more description than Lewis does in Narnia. Also, comparing it with The Hobbit may be more useful? It is, in a way, a different genre.
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Re: CS Lewis' Storytelling Techniques

Post by Ariel.of.Narnia » Sat Jul 18, 2015 10:37 pm

Narnia and TH were written for younger readers, hence shorter chapters, but yes, I do think detail plays a part in that. With Narnia, Lewis kept the descriptions pretty sparse, allowing readers to envision the story as they saw fit; whereas Tolkien wanted to project his vision of Middle-earth to the readers.
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Re: CS Lewis' Storytelling Techniques

Post by marmota-b » Sun Jul 19, 2015 6:46 am

Precisely. Narnia can take on the reader's own experiences (Lewis even kind of leads the readers to do that with some of his descriptions).
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Re: CS Lewis' Storytelling Techniques

Post by hansgeorg » Tue Jul 21, 2015 10:36 am

Now, that is true.

I would say The Hobbit is intermediate between Narnia and LotR as far as story-telling is concerned. On the other hand, Silmarillion is even more sparse in detail, a chapter is often like the equivalent of a whole Narnia book.
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Re: CS Lewis' Storytelling Techniques

Post by Lucy Took » Tue Jul 21, 2015 8:58 pm

The Silmarillion I wouldn't really use as an example of storytelling in general. Tolkien had massively thought out outlines and his son tried to put them in some sort of order, it's almost more like a history textbook than a story. But that's my opinion :P
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