His Dark Materials

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The trilogy (U.K. versions), in order of succession from left to right.

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The trilogy (North American versions)

His Dark Materials is a trilogy of fantasy fiction novels by Philip Pullman, comprising Northern Lights (1995 - released as The Golden Compass in North America), The Subtle Knife (1997) and The Amber Spyglass (2000). The trilogy follows the coming of age of two children, Lyra Belacqua and Will Parry, as they wander through a series of parallel universes against a backdrop of epic events. The story involves fantasy elements such as witches and armoured polar bears, but alludes to a broad range of ideas from fields such as physics, philosophy, and theology.

The series is primarily marketed to young adults, but is also intended to speak to adults, and it has also appeared as a single-volume omnibus in the United Kingdom and North America, titled His Dark Materials (2007).

In terms of popularity, the trilogy is sometimes compared with fantasy books like A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L'Engle, the Harry Potter series by J. K. Rowling and The Chronicles of Narnia.

Title

An early proposal from Pullman for the name of the series was The Golden Compasses. This term is taken from Paradise Lost, where it poetically refers to the "compasses" with which God shaped the world, an idea depicted in William Blake's painting The Ancient of Days. Due to confusion with the other common meaning of compass, the navigational instrument, this phrase in the singular was used to title the American edition of Northern Lights (which prominently features a device that might be called a "golden compass").

Setting

The trilogy takes place across a multiverse, moving between many alternate worlds. In Northern Lights, the story takes place in a world with some similarities to our own; dress style is similar to our Victorian era, and technology has not evolved to include automobiles or planes; zeppelins are a notable mode of transport. It appears that in this world The Reformation never took place; John Calvin is referred to as a Pope. The church (often referred to as the "Magisterium") controls all of the western world and probably the entire planet. In The Subtle Knife, the story takes place in our world and the world of Cittàgazze, and in The Amber Spyglass it crosses through an array of diverse worlds.

One defining aspect of Pullman's story is his concept of dæmons. In several universes in the trilogy's world, including that where the story's protagonist Lyra Belacqua is born, the human soul is manifested throughout life as an animal-shaped dæmon that always stays near its human counterpart. Witches and some humans have entered areas where dæmons cannot physically enter; as such, their dæmons can move as far away from their humans as desired. Dæmons will usually only talk to their humans, but they can communicate with other humans and dæmons autonomously. During childhood, the dæmon can change its shape at will, but upon adolescence it settles into one form. The final form reveals the person's true nature and personality, implying that these stabilize after adolescence. Spectres, in some of the universes, prey upon the dæmons of adolescents and adults, consuming them and rendering said dæmon's human essentially catatonic; they lose all thought and eventually fade away and die. Dæmons and their humans can also be separated by intercision, a process involving cutting the dæmon away from the human. This process can be conducted in a medical setting, such as the titanium and manganese guillotine used at Bolvangar, or as a form of torture used by the Skraelings. This separation has a high mortality rate and renders both human and dæmon little more than obedient zombies. Severing the link using the silver guillotine method releases tremendous amounts of unnamed energy which can be converted to anbaric, or electric, power.

The universe of Northern Lights has interesting technology; at a glance, it appears to be considerably behind our own world, but in many fields it is equal or superior to ours. As evidence, it is revealed that Lyra's world has the same knowledge of particle physics, referred to as experimental theology, as we do. In The Amber Spyglass, an advanced interdimensional weapon is discussed which, when aimed using a sample of the target's DNA, can track the target to any universe and disrupt the very fabric of space-time to form a bottomless abyss into nothing, forcing the target to suffer a fate far worse than normal death. Other advanced devices include the Intention Craft, which carries an extremely potent energy weapon amongst other things. (Though this craft is first seen and used outside Lyra's universe, and may be the invention of engineers from other universes.)

Plot summary

Northern Lights/The Golden Compass

Main article: Northern Lights (novel)

In Northern Lights (released in the United States and Canada as The Golden Compass), the heroine, Lyra Belacqua, a young girl brought up in the cloistered world of Jordan College, Oxford, and her dæmon Pantalaimon learn of the existence of Dust, a strange elementary particle believed by the Magisterium to be evidence for Original Sin. Dust appears to be less attracted to the innocence of children, and this gives rise to grisly experiments being carried out by Magisterium-controlled scientists on kidnapped children in the icy wastelands of the distant North. Lyra and Pantalaimon journey to save their best friend Roger Parslow and other kidnapped children from this peril, with the aid of the Panserbjørne (armoured bear) Iorek Byrnison, John Faa and Farder Coram, leaders of the Gyptians, the aeronaut Lee Scoresby, and the witch Serafina Pekkala. After dealings with armoured bears and witches and success in many arenas, Roger is killed by Lyra's father Lord Asriel in his own successful experiment to create a bridge into another world. Lord Asriel, followed by Lyra and Pantalaimon, journey through it separately in search of the source of Dust, unaware that they both mean to prevent the Magisterium from destroying it.

The Subtle Knife

Main article: The Subtle Knife

In The Subtle Knife, Lyra journeys through the Aurora to Cittàgazze, an otherworldly city whose denizens have discovered a clean path between worlds at a far earlier point in time than others in the storyline. Cittàgazze's reckless use of the technology has released soul-eating Spectres, rendering the world incapable of transit by post-adolescents. Here, Lyra meets Will Parry, a twelve-year-old boy from our own world who has stumbled into Cittàgazze after recently killing a man to protect his ailing mother in an effort to locate his long-lost father. Will becomes the bearer of the titular Subtle Knife, a tool forged 300 years ago by Cittàgazze's scientists of the same materials as the silver guillotine. One edge of the knife is capable of creating portals between worlds and the other edge easily cuts through any form of matter. After meeting with witches from Lyra's world, they journey on. Will finds his father, who has been lost in Lyra's world under the assumed name of Stanislaus Grumman, only to watch him murdered almost immediately, and Lyra is kidnapped by her mother, Mrs. Coulter, an agent of the Magisterium who has learned of the prophecy that Lyra is to be the next Eve. Will is then instructed by a pair of angelic lovers, Balthamos and Baruch, that he must travel with them to give the Subtle Knife to Lyra's father, Lord Asriel, as a weapon against The Authority.

The Amber Spyglass

Main article: The Amber Spyglass

In The Amber Spyglass, Will ignores the angels and with the help of a local girl named Ama, the Bear King Iorek Byrnison, and Lord Asriel's Gallivespian spies, the Chevalier Tialys and the Lady Salmakia, rescues Lyra from the cave she has been hidden in. They journey to the Land of the Dead, temporarily parting with their dæmons to release the ghosts from their captivity imposed by the oppressive Authority. Mary Malone, a scientist of our world interested in Dust (or Shadows, as she knows them), travels to a land populated by strange sentient creatures called Mulefa. There she learns of the true nature of Dust, existing as panpsychic particles of self-awareness. Lord Asriel and a reformed Mrs. Coulter team up to destroy The Authority's Regent, Metatron, but are killed in the process, taking Metatron down with them. The Authority himself dies of his own frailty amongst a massive battle between the rebels and his servants. The book ends with Will and Lyra falling in love but realising they cannot live together in the same world as all windows must be closed to prevent the flow of Dust.

Character histories

See Characters of His Dark Materials

• Lyra Belacqua is a wild, tomboyish 12-year-old girl who was brought up in the fictional Jordan College, Oxford. She prides herself on her capacity for mischief, especially her ability to lie with "bare-faced conviction". Because of this ability, she was given the surname Silvertongue by Iorek Byrnison. Her constant companion is her dæmon Pantalaimon, who settles upon a pine marten as his final form at the series' conclusion.

• Will Parry is a sensible, morally conscious, highly assertive 12-year-old boy from our world who serves as the bearer of the Subtle Knife. He is very independent and responsible for his age, having looked after his mentally unstable mother for many years. He is strong for his age, and knows how to remain inconspicuous. At the end of his adventures he discovers the name and form of his dæmon, Kirjava, a cat.

• Lord Asriel is known to Lyra as her uncle at first, but later she learns that he is in fact her father. He opens a rift between the worlds in his pursuit of Dust. His dream of establishing a Republic of Heaven to rival The Authority's Kingdom leads him to use his considerable power and force of will to raise a grand army from across the multiverse to rise up in rebellion. Stelmaria the snow leopard is his dæmon.

• Marisa Coulter is the coldly beautiful, highly manipulative mother of Lyra and former lover of Lord Asriel, who serves the Church in kidnapping children for research into the nature of Dust. She has black hair, a thin build, and looks younger than she is. She later captures Lyra and secludes her away, perhaps seeking to protect her. Later in the story, Mrs. Coulter switches sides regularly between the Authority and Lord Asriel's Republic. Her maternal instincts finally win out in the end, as she uses her duplicitous core to deceive the Regent Metatron, working together with her former lover to pull him down into the abyss. Her dæmon (named Ozymandias in the BBC Radio adaptations but never named in the books), is a golden monkey with a cruel, abusive streak. Though he often communicates with Mrs. Coulter, he is rarely heard to speak.

• Mary Malone is a physicist and former nun from the same world as Will whose studies of Dust (referred to as Shadows, shadow particles or dark matter in her world) draw her into Lyra's adventures. She lives for a time amongst the mulefa, and constructs the Amber Spyglass in an effort to discern why Dust appears to be leaving the universe. Mary relates a story of a lost love to Will and Lyra, serving as the catalyst for their coming of age and the halting of Dust's exodus. With effort, she discovers that she too has a dæmon, which, though unnamed, takes the shape of an Alpine Chough. It is found out that Mary is to play the part as the tempter (the snake).

• Iorek Byrnison is a massive armoured bear who regains his armour, his dignity, and his kingship over the Panserbjørne with Lyra's help. In gratitude, and impressed by her cunning, he dubs her "Lyra Silvertongue". A powerful warrior and armoursmith, Iorek repairs the Subtle Knife when it shatters and goes to war against The Authority when Lyra and Will are threatened. As a bear instead of a human, he has no dæmon; instead, his soul constitutes his armour, which he himself shapes.

• John Faa and Farder Coram are leaders of the community of river gyptians. When the gyptians' children are kidnapped by the Church to serve as experiments in the frozen outpost of Bolvangar, they mount a rescue expedition, bringing Lyra along. John Faa is also the name of several historical Gypsies and a romantic hero in a ballad about Gypsies.

• Lee Scoresby is a rangy Texan aeronaut who pilots a balloon for Lyra and the gyptians in their expedition North; he is also a friend of Iorek Byrnison, and comes to aid Lyra in a number of her battles. His loyal dæmon Hester takes the form of a hare. He dies while fending off enemy soldiers in an effort to save Stanislaus Grumman.

• Stanislaus Grumman, also known as John Parry, or Jopari, is Will Parry's father, an explorer, and a former officer in the Royal Marines. He leaves our world on an expedition into the far North, in which he finds one of the many trans-dimensional windows, leading to the world from which Lyra Belacqua originates. When he gets there, he becomes a shaman, and receives a ceremonial hole in his skull. Though not born in the world of external dæmons, he somehow acquires one: a female osprey named Sayan Kötör, who disappears when he dies. Lee Scoresby gives his life to save him, and eventually he meets up with his son, but he is shot down by a vengeful witch whose love he once spurned. Grumman's pseudonym is a possible allusion to Stanislaw Ulam, the renowned nuclear physicist.

• Serafina Pekkala is the beautiful queen of a clan of Northern witches. As with all witches, her snow goose dæmon Kaisa can travel much farther apart from her than the dæmons of normal humans. She comes to the aid of Lyra and her friends on a number of occasions. She is several hundred years old but, because she is not a human, she will live many hundreds more.

• Roger Parslow is a young boy, Lyra's best friend and loyal compatriot at Jordan College. His death at the hands of Lord Asriel tears open a bridge between the worlds, through which Lyra and Asriel travel in a search for the origins of Dust. Guilt-stricken over Roger's death, Lyra determines to travel through the Land of Dead to apologize and release him; in doing so, she and Will succeed in liberating the lost souls of the dead, allowing their essence to merge with the particles of Dust that permeate the universe. His dæmon was Salcilia, who frequently took the form of a terrier.

• The Authority The Authority is the first angel to have emerged from Dust. He is not God the Creator, but posed as such to subsequently formed angels. At the time of the trilogy, the Authority is quite weak, having given most of his power to his regent, Metatron, and has spent most of his existence retired to "comprehend deeper mysteries". He is extremely aged, and is shown as fragile, kind, and naїve, unlike his bitter and thoroughly malicious underling. He eventually dies by being exposed to a gust of wind, his weak form unable to resist it, but appears to find death a release.

Awards

The Amber Spyglass won the 2001 Whitbread Book of the Year award, a prestigious British literature award. This is the first time that such an award has been bestowed on a book from their "children's literature" category.

The first volume, Northern Lights, won the Carnegie Medal for children's fiction in the UK in 1995. In 2007 it was selected by judges of the CILIP Carnegie Medal for children's literature as one of the ten most important children's novels of the past 70 years. In June 2007 it was voted, in an online poll, as the best Carnegie Medal winner in the seventy year history of the award, the Carnegie of Carnegies

The Observer cites it as one of the 100 best novels.[1]

On May 19, 2005, Pullman was invited to the British Library in London to be formally congratulated for his work by culture secretary Tessa Jowell "on behalf of the government"; and shortly afterwards received the Swedish government's Astrid Lindgren Memorial Award for children's and youth literature (sharing it with Japanese illustrator Ryôji Arai). In Sweden, the prize is second only to the Nobel Prize in Literature and is worth 5 million Swedish Kronor or approximately £385,000.

The trilogy came third in the 2003 BBC's Big Read, a national poll of viewers' favourite books, after The Lord of the Rings and Pride and Prejudice. It was one of only two books in the top five not to have had a screen adaptation at that time (the film version of Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, which came fifth, was not released until 2005), and those two books were the only entries in the top ten to have been written in the last twenty-five years.

Influences

Pullman has named three major literary influences on His Dark Materials: the essay On the Marionette Theatre by Heinrich von Kleist (which can be found at southerncrossreview.org), the works of William Blake, and, most importantly, John Milton's Paradise Lost, from which the trilogy derives its title. The verse from Paradise Lost in which the phrase "his dark materials" occurs is as follows:

…Into this wilde Abyss,

The Womb of nature and perhaps her Grave,
Of neither Sea, nor Shore, nor Air, nor Fire,
But all these in their pregnant causes mix't
Confus'dly, and which thus must ever fight,
Unless th' Almighty Maker them ordain
His dark materials to create more Worlds,
Into this wilde Abyss the warie fiend
Stood on the brink of Hell and look'd a while,

Pondering his Voyage... (2.910-919)

Pullman's stated intention was to invert Milton's story of a war between heaven and hell, such that the devil would appear to be the hero. In his introduction, he adapts a famous description of Milton by Blake to quip that he (Pullman) "is of the Devil's party and does know it."

The novels also draw heavily on gnostic ideas.

The Chronicles of Narnia, a heptology by C. S. Lewis, appears to be a negative influence on Pullman's trilogy. Pullman has accused C. S. Lewis's series of being "blatantly racist," "monumentally disparaging of women," "immoral," and "evil".

Controversies

His Dark Materials has been a subject of some controversy, especially with Christian groups. "I've been surprised by how little criticism I've got. Harry Potter's been taking all the flak...Meanwhile, I've been flying under the radar, saying things that are far more subversive than anything poor old Harry has said. My books are about killing God."

Institutional religion is criticized by some of the characters. For example, Ruta Skadi, a witch and friend of Lyra's calling for war against the Magisterium in Lyra's world, says that "For all of [the Church's] history...it's tried to suppress and control every natural impulse. And when it can't control them, it cuts them out." (see intercision). Skadi later extends her criticism to all organized religion: "That's what the Church does, and every church is the same: control, destroy, obliterate every good feeling." (By this part of the book, the witches have made reference to how they are treated criminally by the church in their worlds.) Mary Malone, one of Pullman's main characters, states that "the Christian religion…is a very powerful and convincing mistake, that's all." She was formerly a Catholic nun, but gave up her vows when the experience of being in love caused her to doubt her faith.

He has written that his negative sentiments about organized religion arise from his observation of abuses that followers of those religions have historically inflicted on the world. "In the name of their god, they have burned, hanged, tortured, maimed, robbed, violated, and enslaved millions of their fellow-creatures, and done so with the happy conviction that they were doing the will of God, and they would go to Heaven for it." Further, he has stated that he is an outspoken opponent of religion that condones those abuses.

Pullman portrays the Christian heaven to be a lie. In the third book, the real afterlife is depicted as a place where people are tormented by harpies until Lyra and Will descend into the land of the dead. Through their intercession, the harpies agree to stop tormenting the dead souls, and instead receive the true stories of the dead in exchange for leading them again to the upper world. When the dead souls emerge, they dissolve as they become one with the universe.

Pullman's "Authority" is worshipped on Lyra's earth as God, but he turns out to be the first creature to evolve, instead. It is explicitly stated that the Authority was in fact not the creator of worlds. Pullman's trilogy does not speculate on who or what might have created worlds. Members of the Church are typically displayed as zealots. Two characters who once belonged to the Church, Mary Malone and Marisa Coulter, are both displayed in a positive light only insofar as they have rebelled against the Church.

Cynthia Grenier, in the Catholic Culture, has said: "In the world of Pullman, God Himself (the Authority) is a merciless tyrant, His Church is an instrument of oppression, and true heroism consists of overthrowing both." William Donahue of the Catholic League has described Pullman's trilogy as "atheism for kids." Pullman has said of Donohue's call for a boycott, "Why don't we trust readers? ... Oh, it causes me to shake my head with sorrow that such nitwits could be loose in the world."

Pullman has, however, found support from other Christians, most notably Rowan Williams, the Archbishop of Canterbury, who argues that Pullman's attacks are focused on the constraints and dangers of dogmatism and the use of religion to oppress, not on Christianity itself. Pullman himself has said in interviews and appearances that his argument can be extended to all religions. Nevertheless, Pullman's antagonism toward religion appears to be focused upon Christianity in particular. "I suppose technically, you'd have to put me down as an agnostic. But if there is a God, and he is as the Christians describe him, then he deserves to be put down and rebelled against."

Adaptations

His Dark Materials has been adapted for radio, theatre and film. It was made into a radio drama on BBC Radio 4 starring Terence Stamp as Lord Asriel and Lulu Popplewell as Lyra. The play was broadcast in 2003 and is now published by the BBC on CD and cassette. In the same year, a radio drama of Northern Lights was made by RTÉ (Irish public radio).

A theatrical version of the books was directed by Nicholas Hytner as a two-part, six-hour performance for London's Royal National Theatre in December 2003, running until March 2004. It starred Anna Maxwell-Martin as Lyra, Dominic Cooper as Will, Timothy Dalton as Lord Asriel and Patricia Hodge as Mrs Coulter with dæmon puppets designed by Michael Curry. The play was enormously successful and was revived (with a different cast and a revised script) for a second run between November 2004 and April 2005. It has since been staged by several less known theatres in the UK, notably at the Playbox Theatre in Warwick (a major youth theatre company in the West Midlands). The play had its Irish Premiere at the O'Reilly Theatre in Dublin when it was staged by the dramatic society of Belvedere College.

A film adaptation, titled The Golden Compass, was released on December 7 2007 by New Line Cinema. It was directed by Chris Weitz The production hopes to stay as true to the book as possible. Weitz suggested that its film treatment might minimize the explicitly religious character of The Authority so as to avoid offending some viewers in the first installment. "Whereas The Golden Compass had to be introduced to the public carefully, the religious themes in the second and third books can't be minimized without destroying the spirit of these books. ... I will not be involved with any 'watering down' of books two and three, since what I have been working towards the whole time in the first film is to be able to deliver on the second and third films." Pullman has since stated that "All the important scenes are there and will have their full value."

The Golden Compass stars Dakota Blue Richards as Lyra. Nicole Kidman plays Mrs. Coulter, Daniel Craig is Lord Asriel, and Eva Green will play Serafina Pekkala throughout the trilogy. Iorek Byrnison is voiced by Ian McKellen. Reception to the film has been mixed.

Terminology

Main article: His Dark Materials terminology

Further reading

• Gribbin, John and Mary (2005). The Science of Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials. Knopf Books for Young Readers. ISBN 0-375-83144-4.
• Lenz, Millicent (2005). His Dark Materials Illuminated: Critical Essays on Phillip Pullman's Trilogy. Wayne State University Press. ISBN 0-8143-3207-2.
• Squires, Claire (2003). Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials Trilogy: A Reader's Guide. Continuum International Publishing Group. ISBN 0-8264-1479-6.
• Yeffeth, Glenn (2005). Navigating the Golden Compass: Religion, Science and Daemonology in Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials. Benbella Books. ISBN 1-932100-52-0.
• Frost, Laurie (2006). The Elements of His Dark Materials: A Guide to Phillip Pullman's trilogy. Fell Press. ISBN 0-9759430-1-4.
• Squires, Claire. Philip Pullman, Master Storyteller - A Guide to the Worlds of His Dark Materials
• Wheat, Leonard F. Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials - A Multiple Allegory: Attacking Religious Superstition in The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe and Paradise Lost

References

23. Catherine Donaldson-Evans. http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,305487,00.html

External links

• Philip Pullman, author's website
• BridgetotheStars.net, a His Dark Materials fansite
• ALCDMfan, a His Dark Materials fansite
• HisDarkMaterials.org, a His Dark Materials fansite
• DaemonNet.com, a His Dark Materials fansite
• Scholastic: His Dark Materials, the UK publisher's website
• Randomhouse: His Dark Materials, the U.S. publisher's website
• The BBC's His Dark Materials pages
• The Archbishop of Canterbury and Philip Pullman in conversation, from "The Daily Telegraph"
• BBC Oxford interview with Philip Pullman about His Dark Materials, from "BBC Oxford Online", December 2007
• BridgetotheStars' Interview with Chris Weitz and a report on this interview from "The Times", December 2004
• Production images from the 2003-4 National Theatre stage adaptation
• [2] Parchment & Pen blog with annotated list of twenty book and web resources on His Dark Materials
• Pullman Watch - some responses from an independent group of Roman Catholics