This is a very complicated book. On the one hand it's a wonderful adventure story, very thrilling, very engaging. It also has great epic themes, like the struggle between good and evil, and the fate of the world. But on the other hand, there's a very subtle message or series of messages that I'm really not comfortable with.
Okay, so if you read this book, the first thing you'll encounter is a Daemon. The story's main character, Lyra has one. In fact, every human character in this book has one. It's in the shape of an animal and it can talk. The daemon is actually the person's soul, except it's outside of the body. That's okay. Plus, it works. Pullman does a very good job of this and writes it so well that it doesn't pose a problem at all. The daemon is like a separate person, but it's also the same person; what the daemon feels or thinks or knows is known to its person and vice versa. The daemon often manifests how its person is feeling, so you would read someone's emotions or body language, not by looking at them but by looking at their daemon. And Pullman actually makes this work really well in this story.
One minor thing I didn't like so much about the whole daemon thing is that a person's job or station in life seems to determine the form of that person's daemon. For example, it is mentioned that servants, as a rule, have daemons in the form of dogs but the higher station of servitude you're at, the higher kind of dog you get; for example, the steward at Jordan college is an important servant so his daemon is an Irish Setter. Whereas, in real life, your job doesn't determine what kind of person you're like at all. But that's just a minor thing.
One of the giant themes in this book is separation from one's daemon or soul. The first hint of this I got was at the very beginning when Lyra is exploring her home, Jordan College. She finds the crypt where all the important college people are buried and notices that their daemons are buried with them in the form of a gold coin, engraved with the daemon's shape and name, placed inside the cadaver's mouth. She decides to play a trick on them and switches two of the cadaver's daemon-coins. Lyra's daemon begins to behave as if something terrible has happened and panics, but Lyra is pleased with her trick. That night, however, she is visited by the ghosts of the men whose daemons she switched and she realizes the gravity of the offense that she has committed and corrects it.
A little later on, Lyra meets a character, a polar bear named Iorek Byrnison who is enslaved by the people of a small town. She asks him why he doesn't just break free because he is obviously strong enough. He replies that the people of the town have tricked him and stolen his armour and are keeping it hidden. This doesn't seem like such a big deal...but it turns out that a bear's armour is like his soul and the bear can't stand to be separated from it.
Also, when Lyra first meets Iorek, she is very afraid of him and hides behind a fence but her daemon pulls her out of her hiding place by widening the distance between them. A person cannot be separated from their daemon by more than a few meters, and when one or the other pulls on that distance they both feel a strong physical and emotional pain because they cannot bear to be separated from one another.
Later on, we discover that the antagonists of this story are experimenting on children by physically and permanently separating them from their daemons. The children then become soulless, some of them die right away, others live for a little while longer but while they live they seem to have very little personality left. Of course, in the story, to separate a person from their daemon is a very wicked thing to do, almost like murder or worse.
It turns out that the wicked antagonists who are doing that belong to the Church (ostensibly, the Roman Catholic Church, in this story the Church is the all-powerful governing body of the whole world) and they believe that they can cure a person of original sin by separating them from their daemon before original sin comes on them. It seems as if, in this story, children are completely innocent, untouched by original sin until they reach puberty.
The messages of the story are extremely subtle. The book is so well written that its messages appear as little hints here and there. Almost as though you can't really be sure that what your reading is a message put there by the author or if it's just a part of the story... and that's kind of unsettling. If I were to write an academic essay on this book I would argue that Pullman is trying to write a kind of subtle allegory. But it would take a tremendous amount of work to argue it effectively.
Okay, so if you read this book, the first thing you'll encounter is a Daemon. The story's main character, Lyra has one. In fact, every human character in this book has one. It's in the shape of an animal and it can talk. The daemon is actually the person's soul, except it's outside of the body. That's okay. Plus, it works. Pullman does a very good job of this and writes it so well that it doesn't pose a problem at all. The daemon is like a separate person, but it's also the same person; what the daemon feels or thinks or knows is known to its person and vice versa. The daemon often manifests how its person is feeling, so you would read someone's emotions or body language, not by looking at them but by looking at their daemon. And Pullman actually makes this work really well in this story.
One minor thing I didn't like so much about the whole daemon thing is that a person's job or station in life seems to determine the form of that person's daemon. For example, it is mentioned that servants, as a rule, have daemons in the form of dogs but the higher station of servitude you're at, the higher kind of dog you get; for example, the steward at Jordan college is an important servant so his daemon is an Irish Setter. Whereas, in real life, your job doesn't determine what kind of person you're like at all. But that's just a minor thing.
One of the giant themes in this book is separation from one's daemon or soul. The first hint of this I got was at the very beginning when Lyra is exploring her home, Jordan College. She finds the crypt where all the important college people are buried and notices that their daemons are buried with them in the form of a gold coin, engraved with the daemon's shape and name, placed inside the cadaver's mouth. She decides to play a trick on them and switches two of the cadaver's daemon-coins. Lyra's daemon begins to behave as if something terrible has happened and panics, but Lyra is pleased with her trick. That night, however, she is visited by the ghosts of the men whose daemons she switched and she realizes the gravity of the offense that she has committed and corrects it.
A little later on, Lyra meets a character, a polar bear named Iorek Byrnison who is enslaved by the people of a small town. She asks him why he doesn't just break free because he is obviously strong enough. He replies that the people of the town have tricked him and stolen his armour and are keeping it hidden. This doesn't seem like such a big deal...but it turns out that a bear's armour is like his soul and the bear can't stand to be separated from it.
Also, when Lyra first meets Iorek, she is very afraid of him and hides behind a fence but her daemon pulls her out of her hiding place by widening the distance between them. A person cannot be separated from their daemon by more than a few meters, and when one or the other pulls on that distance they both feel a strong physical and emotional pain because they cannot bear to be separated from one another.
Later on, we discover that the antagonists of this story are experimenting on children by physically and permanently separating them from their daemons. The children then become soulless, some of them die right away, others live for a little while longer but while they live they seem to have very little personality left. Of course, in the story, to separate a person from their daemon is a very wicked thing to do, almost like murder or worse.
It turns out that the wicked antagonists who are doing that belong to the Church (ostensibly, the Roman Catholic Church, in this story the Church is the all-powerful governing body of the whole world) and they believe that they can cure a person of original sin by separating them from their daemon before original sin comes on them. It seems as if, in this story, children are completely innocent, untouched by original sin until they reach puberty.
The messages of the story are extremely subtle. The book is so well written that its messages appear as little hints here and there. Almost as though you can't really be sure that what your reading is a message put there by the author or if it's just a part of the story... and that's kind of unsettling. If I were to write an academic essay on this book I would argue that Pullman is trying to write a kind of subtle allegory. But it would take a tremendous amount of work to argue it effectively.
hello dear Patrick;
ReplyDeleteLast year, at about this time, Mr. Clark called Dad in regards to this book (or movie) as it was being presented to the public in the form of film and his children wanted to have it so badly.
Dad had never heard about this and didn't have much knowledge about it but as it turned out, we found out through Christian Radio that this movie has evil intentions. What would you say to parents like Uncle Louis and Mr. Clark and maybe even other Christian parents who are trying to guard their children in this evil day about movies such as The Golden Compass?
i would say to exercise discernment... maybe read the book or rent and watch the movie before letting your children read/watch it.
ReplyDeleteif you feel comfortable letting your children read the book or watch the movie, discuss it with them.
if you don't feel comfortable with it, encourage them to make good decisions about what they read/watch, to look into these kinds of things, read reviews, find out about the author. you want to teach your children to be discerning on their own and not just accept your decisions because you say so.
you can steer your children towards other media of the same genre with a positive message, like cs lewis' the chronicles of narnia ... and i'm sure that there are others as well.
in the end, if your children want to see this movie or read this book, they probably will. parents only have a limited amount of control over their children. so you just have to ask yourself, would you rather they read the book or watch the movie with or without your guidance?
Thank you for your input Patrick.
ReplyDeleteMuch appreciate it.
Love your advice, Patrick. You will make a great Dad. It's important to remember that our children are more than just little beings we can control and mold into "little me" - they are individual human beings who need to learn how to think and how to make their own decisions!! Certainly easier to say than to practice. I think you hit the nail on the head with this advice!
ReplyDeleteSounds like a very sophisticated and appealing plot (which, considering my current cynicism towards a lot of fantasy, is saying a lot).
ReplyDeleteHowever, I wonder why you feel that it's a subtle allegory (and that it would require an academic essay in order to demonstrate that.) I saw ads for the movie last year, and the symbolism seemed extremely clear (about the Church). I mean, you`re right that WHAT exactly it is saying is debatable, but the bias is fairly clear.
Without even having read it, I would guess that it is trying to foster a spirit of independence in the youth that are watching/reading, and particularly in revolt to traditional belief systems. Am I close?
Oh, and good response on your mom's question. Well said.
vince, i think you're right, entirely. one of the ambitions of this book is to foster a spirit of independence in the youth, particularly in revolt to traditional belief systems...
ReplyDeletei don't think it would necessarily take an academic essay to prove the allegory in the novel, just that if i were to write an academic essay, that would be the topic.
the story portrays the roman catholic church as an evil, oppressive system obsessed with power. while this is not altogether inaccurate, the church seems to be set up in the book as a kind of straw man for all traditional belief systems.
so while there is a lot of good in this book, there is also that subtle clumping together of all faith/traditional beliefs into pullman's portrayal of the church, using dogma to control and oppress people.