I am often reminded of a passage from T.H. White, another British writer. He did not like the grown-ups who talked down to him, but the ones who went on talking in their usual way, leaving him to leap along in their wake, jumping at meanings, guessing, clutching at known words, and chuckling at complicated jokes as they suddenly dawned. He had the glee of the porpoise then, pouring and leaping through strange seas. Of course, the adult language needs to be worth the leaping. Miller alludes to that language which draws children into a story, even if the child misses some of the deeper meaning.
Children understand that the world is a complicated and often scary place.
What they want to know is how to navigate it. Marylisa Kostaneski O verall, I would have to agree with Laura Miller's comparison of the Oz and Narnia series. Perhaps, as a U.S. citizen, she does not have the cultural background to see it. This single item is, I believe, an explanation of the failure of the Narnia series to achieve the kind of status that the Oz books have, and it has nothing to do with Lewis' religion. I read the Narnia chronicles as a child as they came out, from age 6 to age 13 or so.