Two neighborhood children meet and become friends during a summer in London in the late 1800s. The two children, Digory Kirke and Polly Plummer, play together in the attic connecting the row of houses where they live. One day while attempting to enter an abandoned house through the attic, the two children take a wrong turn and surprise Digory’s mysterious uncle, who spends a great deal of time locked in his study. Uncle Andrew tricks Polly into touching a yellow ring which causes her to vanish. Uncle Andrew then explains to the horrified Digory that the rings are a device to travel between worlds. Uncle Andrew believes that the yellow rings carry people to other worlds, and the green rings carry people back to this world. Fearing for Polly’s safety, Digory touches another yellow ring (while taking two green ones with him) to bring Polly home.
The yellow ring transports Digory to a wood where he finds Polly. The two children discover many pools of water in the wood that allow people to enter different worlds. Digory and Polly decide to explore one of the pools and arrive at a desolate city called Charn. While exploring the abandoned castle in this new land, the children discover a series of waxworks of the past rulers of Charn as well as a bell with a hammer. Despite Polly’s protests, Digory strikes the bell which both shakes the castle and wakes Queen Jadis. As the children and Jadis leave the crumbling castle, the children realize that Jadis is evil. Although they attempt to escape her, Jadis follows the children back to London. Upon meeting Uncle Andrew, Jadis makes him her new slave and starts on her mission to conquer the earth, starting with London.
Polly and Digory make use of the rings to take Jadis back to the wood, with the plan to force her back into Charn; unfortunately, they accidentally bring along a cab-driver, his cab horse, and Uncle Andrew as well. All of them enter one of the pools, thinking it leads to Charn. However, they enter into a world not yet formed. They witness a lion called Aslan create a new world: Narnia. Jadis attempts to injure Aslan by hitting him with an iron bar, which she has ripped from a lamppost, but the bar rebounds and grows into a new lamppost. Aslan assigns Digory the task of protecting Narnia from Queen Jadis. To do this, Digory must travel to a far away garden to pluck an apple, from which Aslan will grow a protective tree.
When Digory reaches the apple tree he is tempted by Jadis (who has stolen and eaten an apple) to either eat an apple and become immortal or to steal an apple and bring it home to cure his deathly ill mother. Though very tempted, Digory resists. He returns back to Aslan and plants the apple to protect Narnia. Aslan rewards Digory by giving Digory permission to pluck an apple from the new apple tree to give to bring home to cure his mother. After returning back to England, Digory heals his mother by giving her the magic apple.
Digory plants the apple core in his backyard and it grows into a large tree. Many years later, when he is an old man, Digory uses the wood of the tree and has it made into a wardrobe in his new house.
