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Endings: A Farewell to Many Worlds
Even though I have finished my thirty days of books, I suppose you can count this as a bonus epilogue to that. That’s why I picked this day, really. See, I have a confession to make. I read several series when I was a boy, but my readings all had one thing in common: I rarely finished the last book in the series until many years later. There. I’ve let my secret out. Hoo boy, what a burden I’ve released. Yes, The Prydain Chronicles I wrote about? I read most in 4th grade and finished it many years later. I was an adult by the time I read The Last Battle, last of the Narnia books. I just couldn’t finish that last book.
I suspect it’s because on some subconscious level, I understood something: the ending of this last book would change the series setting forever. It would never be the same. Narnia changes a lot in the series, but The Last Battle goes several steps beyond that. The High King (of The Prydain Chronicles) ends with magic departing and the world changing with it. The Lord of the Rings builds up to the retreat of the elves, and the Age of Man. These remained great changes that for some reason my young mind just wouldn’t deal with.
I loved these created worlds, and once the last book is read, that world is gone. In the sense of the narrative, enough has happened to change that world for good (or sometimes ill). It’s not the familiar place I grew comfortable reading about. In a real sense, that meant there was no more. I could re-read, but I would now know what was coming. I would always know that ending was inevitable. As boy perhaps this was just too much to take. Or perhaps in my immaturity I just wanted it to never end.
But things do end. Some series I’ve read end but the world is preserved in one manner or another. But the strength of the kind I’ve avoided is that they present a reality: all things come to an end so that something new might arise from the former. An end means goodbyes to those we have grown to love, but that love is preserved even if the presence is not. Childhood must end so that new and greater things can be realized. Each end can create a new beginning. If I were to tell my younger self something, it would be that: don’t fear an end, as what follows can be new and wonderful.
Published in Group Writing, Literature
I have to agree with all of this, except to say that I did read both The Last Battle and Return of the King.
Now that I think about it, I remember when I was a kid reading about stars in the encyclopedia and learning that even stars die. That seriously freaked me out for a while until I realized I probably wouldn’t have to worry about it.
A feeling of sadness came with the last of the Asimov Robot and Foundation novels and follow-ups that RushBabe and I read together (I can’t remember how long it took me to get through reading all the novels out loud but it had to be more than a year) as it became evident that the story itself could not continue. Asimov had painted himself into a corner in his last novel after which even he could not continue the story. It was along the lines of the universe became one collective consciousness, which to me proved that as a political philosophy, Asimov’s view of the world is a dead end.
But along the way I was to discover the wonderfulness of not only the robot Daneel Olivah, but his tragic psychic accomplice robot Giscard. Those sure were memorable characters.
I’m torn between this and also wanting to know how it all comes out. I’ll race through to the end and then wish there was more.
CU, great great series. I’m so glad you didn’t want it to end!
The Last Battle meant a lot more to me as an adult than it did as a kid – I just could not understand it then.
The end of The Return of the King was wonderful, and I thought by missing the clearing of the shire that Peter Jackson lost what was needed in that telling.
What a wonderful insight you’ve had! I read entire series, but must never had read one that offered the final book. So I just read like crazy.
Anyway, endings do open the space for new beginnings, a wise thing to remember. Thanks, CU.
I have to agree there. It caused a few things that made me cringe like friends telling me how Jackson should have just focused on Aragorn because really he was the hero of the story. Jackson made an epic that works in many ways, but we lost something of the original. The Hobbits were always the stars of the story, and the Scouring of the Shire was showing how they changed in their travels.
It also produced the effect of the movie ending over and over again. They sucked out all of the interesting parts from the end of the war to the end.
Still haven’t read through Chronicles of Narnia. Guess I’ll have to start again now. For me it’s my ADD-nature losing the thread and starting on something else.
Thanks for the post!
This conversation is part of a Group Writing series with the theme “Endings”, planned for the whole month of March. If you follow this link, there’s more information about Group Writing. The schedule is updated to include links to the other conversations for the month as they are posted. Please sign up for an open date!
I’ve enjoyed your postings; they have inspired me to start reading again. Thank you.
I agree that the Hobbits are the heroes of the story, but as far as it goes when I read the books I tended to focus on the parts with battles in them, so I can also see where your friends are coming from with that.