SOURCE: "Books on the Box: The BBC Chronicles of Narnia," in Critical Survey, Vol. 3, No. 3,1991, pp. 313-23.

In the following essay, Reynolds centers on the BBC adaptation of C, S. Lewis's Chronicles of Íarnia in a broader examination of issues and assumptions about the translation of children's books into television.

It is rare to find parents and educators actively promoting a television series (other than the specifically didactic 'schools' broadcasts) and treating it as a cultural event. This reflects a deeply rooted ambivalence about television as entertainment which is directly linked to attitudes surrounding children's reading. Watching television is inevitably regarded as an activity less worthwhile than reading, and for long has been accused of seducing children away from books. Nevertheless, when in 1989 the BBC launched its three-year serialisation of C. S. Lewis's Chronicles of Narnia, families around the country regularly settled down to an early Sunday evening's...