Narnia In what order should the Chronicles of Narnia be read?

The Chronicles of Narnia
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Is it best to read them in Publication Order or Chronological Order?

Publication Order
  1. The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe
  2. Prince Caspian
  3. The Voyage of the Dawn Treader
  4. The Silver Chair
  5. The Horse and His Boy
  6. The Magician's Nephew
  7. The Last Battle
Chronological Order
  1. The Magician's Nephew
  2. The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe
  3. The Horse and His Boy
  4. Prince Caspian
  5. The Voyage of the Dawn Treader
  6. The Silver Chair
  7. The Last Battle
 
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I do whichever floats my boat when I start my reread. If I was encouraging someone to read the series for the first time, though, I'd push for publication order, if only because LWW absolutely should be the first introduction to Narnia.
 
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The Pevensie trilogy should be read first. The last two books last. TMN and H&HB can be floated anywhere in there in either order with H&HB easily fitting after LWW.

MrBob
 
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ShastaoftheNineRealms said:
At least either way you know you're reading The Last Battle last, which feels appropriate.
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Exactly. And it really is. You do run into some odd things when reading The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe after The Magician's Nephew.

There are things the narrator says about how you wouldn't know who Aslan is, as the reader.
 
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It may be because I was already familiar with Narnia somewhat, but I didn't really run into that problem. The only question I had when I read The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe afterwards was "Is the old guy they live with supposed to be Diggory?" everything else did not really confuse me too much.
 
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Just a side note, there is a scene in Silver Chair that makes reference to the events of Horse and His Boy. You can either read Silver Chair first and then read H&HB or read H&HB where you will understand the reference made. It is not plot important, just a blind poet telling the story of H&HB (actually named as such). However, there is a bit of a spoiler to H&HB in that TSC reference.

MrBob
 
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MrBob said:
Just a side note, there is a scene in Silver Chair that makes reference to the events of Horse and His Boy. You can either read Silver Chair first and then read H&HB or read H&HB where you will understand the reference made. It is not plot important, just a blind poet telling the story of H&HB (actually named as such). However, there is a bit of a spoiler to H&HB in that TSC reference.

MrBob
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But TH&HB was written after TSC! How come there is a reference....?
 
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According to the wiki's CoN book page, the CS Lewis biography states that H&HB was written right after VotDT. About a year later, he wrote TSC. H&HB and TSC were simply published in reverse order. Basically, all of the Pevensie books bar the final one, were written consecutively.

MrBob
 
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