Courageous Joy

Magic
Jamin

The Lord of the Rings, Narnia, and crystal balls; are these one and the same? Are they completely different? If they’re different, where’s the line that separates ‘innocent magic’ from the point that is disturbing?


First, I believe it is important to define what magic is in context to writing. In a book, like The Lord of the Rings, magic is simply a way of expressing laws and authority in a make-believe world. “Other evils there are that may come; for Sauron is himself but a servant or emissary.” The Return of The King, p190. Gandalf said this when he was discussing Middle Earth’s arch enemy.


C.S Lewis, in The Chronicles of Narnia, also seems to understand magic as a natural thing that can be used or abused, under an authority. “I see what you are. You a little, peddling Magician who works by rules and books. There is no real Magic in your blood and heart.” Queen Jadis, The Magician’s Nephew, p83.


In these contexts, I believe that magic is positive reinforcement to the text. But not every writer puts magic in the same context. Magic takes its first step towards being immoral –or disturbing- when the story it is set in has no God-figure or sense of supreme existence. Magic, a person’s own resourcefulness or inner strengths, becomes the authority and supremely the god-figure of the make-believe world. Authority, in our world or in a fairy tale, turns corrupt when there is nothing to keep man and his corrupt nature in check.


Magic, whether good or bad, has the potential of radically affecting the text of a book. The way it is employed is only as good or bad as the theme of the work. Magic can be used to convey a worldview, add flash to the text with powerful characters, and make the reader more engrossed. After all, with magic anything is possible.


However, if a writer has no intention of conveying a worldview, he should abstain from magic, in my opinion. The only other time you can use magic without conveying a worldview is to spice up a book with action in a new dimension. This is an unsuitable use for magic, since when it is used in this way the writer has no imagination to convey except their version of what they’ve seen in the movie theaters.


In this context, magic is relied on too heavily to ‘spice up’ a document. Using magic too much in this sense is not immoral, but it enriches nothing and if it does convey a message, it usually conveys a bad one, such as “Believe in yourself.” Magic butchered in this way is like using a cocktail glass for changing oil in a car.


Magic is as good or bad as the theme of a work. It has the potential of enriching a document, or degrading it to the extent that it relies on action scenes. It’s important when evaluating a book in context to magic that we don’t become so engrossed in magic that we either overlook a Godly worldview, or see magic as the ultimate evil of the text. Magic is only a vehicle for the theme. You wouldn’t say a hammer was destructive if you knew it was being used to make a nuclear warhead.

*A project that Jamin's been working on in his spare time...defining for himself the proper use of magic in a work of fiction.