Narnia Book Covers: New vs. Old | Talking Beasts
Watch the video: https://youtu.be/IvnNk65cXPY
On April 15, for the first time in 17 years, new Chronicles of Narnia cover art will be hitting bookshelves. In this episode, the podcasters zoom in and squint at every detail of the new artwork and discuss how it compares to the previous set released in 2007.
Thanks to everyone in the NarniaWeb Discord group for aiding this analysis!
This episode is a bit of a sequel to previous video series, Marsh-wiggle Madness, in which we looked at every Narnia cover ever made and crowned a champion:
Watch the post-show chatter in which Glumpuddle and Gymfan discuss more past Narnia covers and react to the Oscars.
Podcast: Play in new window | Embed
Thanks for the fun discussion. For the first cover, I appreciate the placement of Aslan, which for me speaks volumes.
I struggle with these new covers, and I don’t exactly know why.
At first, I thought they were too busy, but you could probably make that same argument about some of the full-color, collector’s edition Pauline Baynes covers, which are the ones I grew up with and will always be my all-time favorites.
I think I’m pretty turned off by the fact that so many of these covers depict scenes and things that are not book-accurate, from Lucy and Susan fighting the White Witch to Shasta holding the reins to whatever weirdness that is on the Magician’s Nephew cover. (Side note: that cover’s vibes, at least to me, feed into Glumpuddle’s whole idea that MN is the most sci-fi of the Chronicles!) But then, there are book inaccuracies in Baynes’ illustrations too — I know many people get hung up on her depictions of Lucy with dark hair. (As a brunette myself, I always rather liked that little change, but I digress.)
And then I thought, well, I don’t love that literally every cover in this new set has chosen a big action/battle scene to make this look as EPIC as possible, when that’s not all Narnia is about. And then I remembered that the Last Battle cover in the Baynes full-color editions literally has people getting stabbed.
Basically, all the concrete arguments I’ve been coming up with for why I don’t like the new covers have had holes in them … but I still just don’t like them! Maybe it’s just me being a stick-in-the-mud and clinging to my old versions. I have been known to be quite resistant to change. 🙂
In the end, I hope they continue to attract new readers to Narnia, and I hope there are folks out there that fall in love with them just as much as I fell in love with my Narnia books!
Cool topic! Older cover vs. newer cover.
The new cover for LWW is my second least favorite of the set and the old cover is my second favorite of that set so older cover wins this time. But I’m really not a fan of the older set on the whole so…faint praise. LOL. It’s an interesting choice of scene. It’s kind of weird that they chose a sad moment since I don’t necessarily think of the story as being that sad on the whole but, hey, it’s not lying. This is a big scene in the book. It bugs me that Aslan doesn’t look sad though. Shouldn’t all three characters in the scene be crying?
I much prefer the newer cover for Prince Caspian. It’s one of my favorites of the set. The older cover is so boring! And why is there fire in the background?
I don’t really like either of the covers for VDT.
Neither of the Silver Chair covers is great or terrible. I think I prefer the newer one though for the lighting. Also, the serpent on the older one…I guess it’s kind of scary. I mean, it’s a giant snake that’s attacking someone. But the art style makes it somehow appear vaguely cute. More on that below.
The newer HHB cover is definitely my favorite of the set. I understand Glumpuddle’s point about how Shasta shouldn’t be holding the reins but…I just like the colors better than those in the newer one. I know that darker coloring on the older cover is more accurate to the scene both covers depict in the book but the brighter colors of the new one evokes the book as a whole to me. Also, if it really is the chase scene where Shasta, Aravis, Bree and Hwin meet for the first time, maybe Shasta is holding the reins to fool Aravis. OK, that’s a dumb explanation but I had to try! LOL.
The older cover for The Magician’s Nephew is my favorite of that set, small praise though that may be. It’s cool the way you don’t notice Jadis in the background at first (well, I didn’t) and then she kind of jumps out at you. The newer cover for the book, on the other hand, is my least favorite. There’s just so much about it that bugs me! The giant goofy looking rings. Fledge flying down instead of up. Jadis’s coloring. And why does Polly look like she’s waving goodbye to Jadis? If it were Digory, we could say that was to symbolize him being tempted by the silver apple. But no.
I much prefer the newer cover for The Last Battle though the mishmash of images is confusing.
I’ve got to say watching this video and comparing Owen Richardson’s Narnia covers to David Wiesner’s has endeared the former to me somewhat. While I really enjoy a number of Wiesner’s picture books, his Narnia covers strike me as claustrophobic, the way they’re always a closeup of a single object or something or someone’s face. Theoretically, I’d say simplicity is best but not in practice. Also, Wiesner’s images of Narnia strike me as too…cute somehow. It’s hard to explain but the dragon and the unicorn are cases in point. It bugged me at first how action-oriented Richardson’s covers are but I’d rather people get the impression that Narnia is exciting than the impression that it’s cute. Also, the dramatic lighting in Richardson’s covers, even the ones I dislike, is wonderful. Maybe that’s because he used AI but it’s better to have great lighting because you used AI than not have great lighting at all, like in Wiesner’s covers.
When I first found out about the Planet Narnia references in the new series of covers, my reaction was negative since I find Planet Narnia irritating. In fact, my reaction was pretty similar to Courtenay and Coracle’s on the Narniaweb forum. (Maybe not as intense but along the same lines.) However, after I resigned myself to the idea, it actually kind of endeared the covers to me. I mean, my biggest problem with them is that they look like they were created by an automatic-fantasy-book-cover-generator and the Planet Narnia allusions do make it feel more like a specific human being created the covers. Well, that or they fed Planet Narnia to the algorithm. LOL.
One thing this video didn’t cover much (see what I did there?) is that a lot of the best stuff on the new covers in on the back. Like, I really wish I could have the image on the back cover of the LWW one on the front. What’s up with that? 🙂
1980s Collier covers: Bit of a tangent…. but respectfully, I never took the previous Marshwiggle Madness event seriously (as excited as I was for it) because it was claimed that all Narnia covers were included, when the classic/vintage 1980s Collier covers were not as much as even mentioned. Literally, all other Narnia covers are judged based on these covers in my book. And I know SEVERAL die-hard Narnia fans who agree. Would love if you guys did a “retraction” lol, or at least a special feature / poll on the 1980s Collier covers. Look them up! It’s actually a thing in Narnia fandom. Bit surprised they were omitted.
As far as the new ones… hey well, could be better, could be worse. If it helps up readership, I’m for it. I imagine we’ll be seeing an even newer MN cover in the not so distant future.
@Sarfight the Osprey, are the Colliers covers the ones where Jadis looks like she’s swinging Polly around by her hair and Rilian’s hair is green? I’m sorry. I don’t think they’re that great.
Sarfight, I really like a few of the Collier covers too! But after asking NarniaWebbers around the world to vote, none of those covers made the top 32.
Col Klink, yep, those are the ones. Fair enough. I’ve always found them to be otherworldly looking, as wacky and bold as they are. Glumpuddle, that’s wild. I guess the people have spoken. HHB is prob my favorite.
Sarfight the Osprey, Sorry but those are actually my least favorite set… but I’m glad that’s your covers. Good to have disagreements.
No answers the video’s question, they’re mostly good.