A Journey Into Prydain- Part Two

A Journey into Prydain
Part Two

(Go here if you haven't read the first installment of this review)

So much for the history behind The Prydain Chronicles. But there is another issue, however sensitive, that I feel the need to cover. What about the magic in these books? Magic is a very delicate subject. If you look at the Old Testament you will notice that seers, prophets, diviners, angels, evil spirits and supernatural miracles are all there. They are there because they actually existed- and still do today. And it sure makes for an exciting read. Now, are they all wrong? Of course not. For example, certain men, prophets and angels had supernatural power or shall we say 'magic' bestowed upon them from God, himself. However, God forbade anyone to seek power from a source other than Himself. Certain witches and false prophets in Biblical times received their power from another source and they were condemned by God. Remember, ALL power originated from God, even the Enemy used to be on God's side, was created by God as one of his glorious angels, AND RECEIVED HIS POWER FROM GOD. But overcome with pride, wanted more glory and so rebelled against God, using this power for evil purposes. But God will not allow his glory to be stolen without consequence. This, I believe is why 'magic' or power from any secondary source besides God is not good.

By the way, a major theme in The Chronicles of Narnia and The Lord of the Rings is the RECLAIMING of this God-given power that the enemy has stolen and perverted. (That is why the mythological creatures are submitted to Aslan, the Christ figure.) I don't believe these works are flawless, but they are definitely worthy reads. It saddens me that some people see anything magic in stories and immediately condemn them without carefully studying God's Word and 'rightly dividing the truth.' I am sad for them because they miss out on the power of Story. God has given us Story to help us see the invisible and inspire us in the great battle between good and evil that is still going on today. I draw much of my inspiration to fight for truth by reading about the flawed characters of the Bible as well as characters from legend and history.

If you have read The Prydain Chronicles, you will understand that the story's theme is the classic Good vs. Evil and for that reason appeals to all kinds of writers. But the question is this? Did Lloyd Alexander's characters receive their power from the Source of all good or from elsewhere?

Even though he kept a defined sense of light and darkness, the source of 'power' or 'magic' was not always clearly defined in his stories. For example, there are three enchantresses (who I mentioned above as the Three Norns) who are not depicted as evil. They are not depicted as good either. A quote from The Black Cauldron:

"You still don't understand, do you? We aren't evil!"

"I should hardly call this good."

"Of course not. We're neither good nor evil. We're simply interested in things as they are."

Often, in ancient mythology, characters were 'neutral' and it is obvious Mr. Lloyd did the same in writing his stories. But we know from the Scriptures that there is no such thing as neutrality. We are either on the side of Good or Evil. So I think that this passage can be very confusing, even dangerous, especially for young readers. I think there are also a few other places where he stepped over the line.

But just because we disagree with a certain aspect of a book does not always mean that we have to condemn the whole book, but if such errors are prevalent, our conscience often lets us know that certain books just don't honor God - they honor another source and are not worthy of our time. (That is one of the reasons why I don't care for the Harry Potter Books.)

I have mentioned some faults of The Prydain Chronicles, but it does have a lot of good messages about courage, failure and sacrifice, all of which were very cleverly woven into the story. Even though the plot sounds very intense and serious - that is what I expected before I read the story - it is nothing of the kind. It is very humorous, maybe a little too much, but still very inspiring, very tender at times and sometimes made me cry. A good book always makes you laugh and cry before you are finished with it.

Although I can't say these books are superb literature, they are very good and I think a careful reader grounded in the truth, can enjoy these books as light reading.

Raora