Which Narnia Cover is the Best?: The Magician’s Nephew / The Last Battle
In this video episode, we launch a tournament to determine which Chronicles of Narnia book cover is the greatest of all-time! NarniaWebbers around the world voted to narrow it down to the top 32 covers, and now Glumpuddle and Gymfan will deliberate to crown a champion. First up, we are looking at the highest-rated covers for The Magician’s Nephew and The Last Battle.
Watch video: https://youtu.be/ISPdIVbaahE
Tune in every Saturday for the next few weeks:
- March 12 @ 11:00am EST
- The Horse and His Boy
- The Silver Chair
- March 19 @ 11:00am EST
- The Voyage of the Dawn Treader
- Prince Caspian
- March 26 @ 11:00am EST
- The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe
- Non-English covers
- April 2 @ 11:00am EST
- Final Four!
Bonus video: Discussing the worst Narnia covers according to NarniaWebbers.
Audio-only:
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Don’t read this comment before watching the video.
Number 8 is kind of an odd image for that story. But maybe the contrast between the peaceful picture and the word, battle, in the title is supposed to get people interested. Or maybe they just thought it would be more marketable to showcase Lucy and Tumnus together again. 😉 I don’t totally hate it.
It was hard for me to decide how to rate Number 7. I like that it’s different from most Magician’s Nephew covers. But the things that make it different also mean it doesn’t necessarily reflect the book that well. Why have the bird in the garden be so prominently featured? It’s a pretty minor part of the story.
I adore Number 4. It’s not just the blood on the horn. The sunset (sunrise?) in the background. The yellow grass. The whole thing has this great melancholy feel to it!
I don’t love the art style for Number 6. At least I don’t love it for Narnia; it might be better for other books. But I have to give it credit for trying to capture both parts of The Last Battle, the dark and the bright. Most covers only go with one or the other.
Number 2 might be my favorite Narnia book cover ever! I agree that it’s great how little it spoils while also telling you a lot about what The Magician’s Nephew is about. Kids exploring is such a Narnian thing. If I could pick a cover from a particular book to put on a complete set, it’d be this. I’m glad it won, but I wouldn’t have been too disappointed if Number 4 had been the winner. It’s great too.
I felt legitimate suspense watching this haha. I’m sad to see my personal favourite (number 4) get so close only to be knocked out in the last round before the final four, but Pauline Bayne’s illustrations are so influential on how I picture Narnia that I can’t be too upset. 🙂
They are all interesting covers. The only disadvantage of the first edition covers is that they are book jacket covers. Often book jackets get lost or are ripped and damaged in some way, I wish they were the actual front of the book. The fiftieth anniversary editions have some of the best covers by Pauline Baynes. They are definitely the best of the modern editions. But I can’t help loving the first editions’ covers, and I would like to see their illustrations reprinted on the front of modern paperbacks and hardcovers and not just as “blurbs”. 🙂
Hi everyone, greetings from UK. From my British perspective, the lack of Collins hardback covers from 70s-80s in the competition is noticeable. Were these whittled out? The Silver Chair Collins 1974 cover:
https://www.abebooks.co.uk/servlet/BookDetailsPL?bi=30870137003&searchurl=yrh%3D1975%26yrl%3D1974%26pn%3Dcollins%26xpod%3Doff%26bi%3D0%26ds%3D30%26bx%3Doff%26sortby%3D17%26kn%3Dsilver%2Bchair%26recentlyadded%3Dall&cm_sp=snippet-_-srp1-_-image1#&gid=1&pid=1
Number 4 does it for me. The dark mood of the picture sums up the whole story quite nicely. (It also breaks from the somewhat annoying stereotype of unicorns being simply friendly and magical).
But of course I like them all, etc!
This ended up the right way.
I like the first part of this series the most, the feeling is the same no matter how many times I watch cookie clicker it