Read Ebook {PDF EPUB} Northern Lights Boxed Set by Philip Pullman ‘Northern Lights’ by Philip Pullman. The universe of Northern Lights by Philip Pullman is similar to our own but with additional magical elements. Although the first book in His Dark Materials trilogy is set in an intriguing world where humans have daemons, I didn’t fall in love with the storytelling and the characters. It deals with complex topics, such as class issues, desire and the original sin from the Bible. Nonetheless, the writing is sometimes too simplistic and superficial. I would have probably enjoyed it far more had I read it for the first time as a child. The protagonist of the story is Lyra, a fierce child with an adventurous spirit. She had been told that her parents were Count and Countess Belacqua and that they had both died in an aeronautical accident in the North. For that reason, she was living at Jordan College in Oxford. It was the richest college in the city and was dedicated to experimental theology. Lyra had no idea what that meant. She thought it had something to do with magic and the movements of the stars and planets. Despite knowing that she wasn’t allowed in the Retiring Room of the college, Lyra and her daemon, Pantalaimon, went there to see what it looked like. As she heard the Master coming, she hid inside a wardrobe. She heard him speaking with the Butler about the imminent arrival of Lord Asriel, her uncle. She believed that they were trying to poison him. Lord Asriel and the Master were both members of the Cabinet Council, an advisory body of the prime minister. Lyra remained hidden in the wardrobe for a while, time enough for the Master and the Butler to leave the room and for Lord Asriel to enter. She prevented her uncle from drinking a glass of wine to which the Master had added a powder. Before the Scholars entered the room, Lord Asriel ordered her to go back into the wardrobe, thus she had the opportunity to hear about his expedition North. He saw the Northern Lights, the Dust and the outline of a city in another world. The Scholars decided to give him money so he could return there. After the meeting, the Master and the Librarian had a conversation in private, which Lyra didn’t witness. They believed that she had a part to play in what was about to happen. There was some commotion in Lyra’s life at the time. Children were disappearing around the country, and one of them was her friend Roger. People believed that they were being taken by the Gobblers. The Master also decided that the time had come for her to leave Jordan College and have a teacher. She was to go with Mrs Coulter. Before she left, the Master gave her an alethiometer, one of six ever made, but he didn’t explain what it was for. She should keep it a secret. Lyra wasn’t sure about whom to trust, though. Mrs Coulter or the Master? He had tried to kill her uncle after all. Philip Pullman created an interesting world, particularly when it comes to daemons. Daemons are animal representations of their humans’ soul and are of the opposite sex of their owners. A person should never touch another’s daemon. While their humans are children, daemons change their appearance depending on the situation, because children are still discovering who they really are. Daemons stop changing as soon as they grow up and settle. Lyra didn’t want her daemon to remain permanently the same. Unfortunately, the characters feel underdeveloped. Except for Lyra, they don’t have a defined personality, and even her feelings could have been further explored. She made some discoveries about her past that should have had more consequences in her state of mind. Particularly after Lyra left Oxford, the book focuses too much on actions, despite feeling slow-paced at times. It almost never managed to be gripping. The style of narration is also inconsistent. At times the story is told from Lyra’s perspective in the third person, while at others the narrator seems to be omniscient. It appears to change in order to suit the situation. Moreover, at the beginning too much information is revealed all at once without context, which is slightly confusing. The first chapters start making more sense as the truth about what was happening is gradually disclosed. The dialogues are the most engaging part, seeing that strangely many times we are told about certain events through them. There are some striking visual descriptions of the northern lights, though. “The sight filled the northern sky; the immensity of it was scarcely conceivable. As if from Heaven itself, great curtains of delicate light hung and trembled. Pale green and rose-pink, and as transparent as the most fragile fabric, and at the bottom edge a profound and fiery crimson like the fires of Hell, they swung and shimmered loosely with more grace than the most skilful dancer.” Neither the plot nor the characters of Northern Lights effusively captivated me. Although the imagination put into the creation of this world is undeniable, I don’t think I’ll continue reading the rest of the series. Northern Lights by Philip Pullman. The first book in Philip Pullman’s His Dark Materials Trilogy, the Nothern Lights introduces the characters and begins the epic story of Lyra Belacqua, Daemons, and dust. Set in a world very much like ours, there are however some noticeable differences. One difference is that it seems to be set in a time without technology, and where men are the majority of academics with few women in this field. Religion also plays a part in this book, however, the churches’ influence is very different to that in modern society. The very noticeable difference, though, is the magical side of the novel from other worlds within the aurora (northern lights), dust and of course Deamons. The Daemons, in particular, are what make Pullman’s novel so unique and intriguing. Each human has a Deamon which is a person’s soul in the form of an animal. These animals can shape-shift into different creatures when a person is still a child but upon becoming an adult Daemons stick in one shape which in some way reflects the person they are linked to. The bond between a person and their Deamon is a brilliant exploration of identity, imagination, and magic in our every day lives. A beautifully written novel full of vivid descriptions some of which left me in awe for some time after reading them. One of my favourite passages painted a truly amazing image in my mind… “The moon had set by now, and the sky to the south was profoundly dark, though billions of stars lay on it like diamonds on velvet. They were outshone, though, by the aurora, outshone a hundred times. Never had Lyra seen it so brilliant and dramatic; with every twitch and shiver, new miracles of light danced across the sky. And behind the ever-changing gauze of light that other world, that sunlit city, was clear and solid.” It is not only the Daemons and stunning descriptions that make this novel a great read but the twists, turns and fast-paced nature of the plot which will keep you gripped throughout. With a cast of heroes, villains, and mystical helpers the story makes for a twisted fairytale-like fantasy which appeals to both young adults, teenagers, and adults. Not only this but the complex vocabulary, and themes of identity will also help teenage readers to develop as a reader and a person. Having finished this brilliant first book in this series I am looking forward to reading the following two books – The Subtle Knife and The Amber Spyglass. I hope they are both as well written and readable as Northern Lights. Note: A prequel to the His Dark Material series is now available – buy The Book of Dust (Volume One) La Belle Sauvage. Northern Lights (The Golden Compass) by Philip Pullman. Twelve-year-old Lyra Belacqua lives unparented and half-wild among the scholars of Jordan College. One day her uncle, Lord Asriel, an experimental theologian and explorer, arrives with terrifying news from the north. Impelled at first by her own curiosity, but soon pursued by appalling dangers, Lyra is drawn into a savage struggle among the armoured bears and witch-clans of the Arctic, where a scientific research station is carrying out experiments too horrible to speak about. In order to survive at all, she must leave her childhood behind and venture where no one has gone before – beyond the Northern Lights. First published: 1995. Confusingly, this novel, which is the first one in Philip Pullman’s His Dark Materials trilogy, has two names: in the United Kingdom it’s called Northern Lights , while in the United States and some other countries it’s called The Golden Compass . I’ve read the novel as Northern Lights , and this is also the name Philip Pullman gave the book, so that’s the name I’m sticking with! I had to read this novel for one of my courses, and hadn’t really heard about it before that. Apparently, it’s a very well-known trilogy (shame on me) and I can see why! I loved Northern Lights , and really want to read the rest of the trilogy as well. I’ve been ogling a gorgeous box set on the Book Depository, but my bank account won’t allow me to buy it for a while yet, I’m afraid… The thing I loved most about this novel is that so much happens in it, and it’s basically climax after climax. You’re thrown right into the action immediately upon starting the novel, and the pace rarely slows down. Lyra’s life inside the college is alread quite filled with action, and I was content just reading about everything that happens to her and her friends there, but then the mystery and intrigue starts and it becomes even more fascinating. Pullman is very good at providing tiny snippets of the overarching story at just the right moments to reel you in again. Lyra has no idea what is going on in her world, and what her role is. All she knows is that she’s been given a golden “compass”, which is called an alethiometer, and that she’s the only one who’s able to read it. Besides that, she knows her friend is in danger, as is her Uncle Asriel, and that’s enough for her to want to go up to the north and find them. In the meantime, the reader is aware that her role is much bigger, but knows nothing more about what that role is exactly, which was a brilliant way to keep me captivated. Lyra is a hugely interesting protagonist as well. She’s very young, and that’s noticeable throughout the story, but not in a bad way. She’s stubborn and wild and will not stop fighting until she has what she wants. Oh, and she lies. A lot . I kind of loved that about her. She’s just a very fierce twelve-year-old and the perfect narrator for this story. Her daemon, Pantalaimon, is amazing as well. The whole daemon thing was fascinating in itself, too; a person’s daemon is their soul personified in an animal that goes with them wherever they go, more or less. I loved the little moments between Lyra and Pantalaimon, and how much they love each other. The other characters are very interesting too. Some of them are absolutely horrible (such as Mrs Coulter), but others were lovely and I started to really care for most of them, which doesn’t always happen to me. It made me want to keep reading on and on and onto the next book. The thing that interested me most of all, however, was the idea of Dust, and how afraid of it everyone seems to be. It’s this mysterious power, and after this first book I still know hardly anything about it, except that the Church thinks it is evil and it should be eradicated. I am fascinated by this, and by the social commentary Pullman provides with it. I am really looking forward to finding out more about it in the rest of the trilogy. I’d recommend Northern Lights to anyone who likes a good (YA) fantasy novel. It’s really extraordinary, and I honestly have to say that I have never read anything like it. It’s definitely one of a kind! Reading Philip Pullman. Northern Lights, Chapters 1 and 2 (I can turn anything into a discussion about wine) Chapter 1: All Things Dæmon. Any discussion of Philip Pullman’s His Dark Materials series must begin with its brilliant opening line: “Lyra and her dæmon moved through the darkening Hall, taking care to keep to one side, out of sight of the kitchen.” Let’s start with the obvious: in any other situation, the description of a person accompanied by a dæmon would carry all sorts of negative weight. (Though, as we’ll soon see, that “a” in “dæmon” makes a pretty huge difference to one’s understanding of this line.) In contemporary culture, a person with a dæmon is one with serious troubles – this is clearly not the case in Northern Lights , which presents Lyra’s dæmon as neither good nor bad; her dæmon just is. One must also consider the spelling of the word “dæmon.” Pullman uses the Latin variant, as opposed to the Judeo-Christian “demon.” Given the central theme of His Dark Materials , it is fairly obvious that Pullman’s choice aligns with the religious references of each word – a “daemon” is an entity from classical mythology, usually aligned with good, whereas a “demon” is invariably an evil creature or spirit. As I stated above, this spelling difference is fundamental to the reading of the first line – a person accompanied by a daemon is certainly different than one accompanied by a demon, and Pullman did not want to mask his readers’ understanding of dæmons with any malignant connotations. Religious undertones notwithstanding, “demon” is also the spelling variant commonly found in our vernacular. Here, too, Pullman uses “dæmon” to distance his creatures from those of television and film. In popular culture, demons are no longer wholly evil and they aren’t necessarily related to Christianity (at least not consciously). Indeed, we now have many examples of secular demons aligned with good – or at the very least, superficially secular demons who reside within a decidedly opaque gray area. Given this, Pullman probably could have used the variant “demon” without any serious religio-connotative problems. However, while Pullman’s dæmons may be closer to Whedon’s demons in some respects, they are clearly another manner of being entirely and therefore warrant a name that is just slightly different. Finally, phonetics also come into play, as Pullman intentionally uses the grapheme “æ”, thus distinguishing his dæmon from both daemons and demons. The pronunciation of this character is the same as the “a” in bat or cat, and therefore Pullman’s “dæmon” is pronounced in a decidedly foreign way to most ears: dah-mon, not dee-mon (demon) or day-mon (daemon). As we will see in the coming pages, the demon / daemon / dæmon trichotomy is fundamental to the text’s overarching message about religion and spirituality (and probably to several other things I haven’t thought of yet), and I will certainly be exploring it at a later time. So what is a dæmon in the Pullman universe? One could argue that the answer to this question is precisely the point of the entire series. At this early stage, however, the reader can only begin to note characteristics about dæmons, and so I offer you the following summary of my observations: A dæmon is not the same as one’s conscience. Lyra states this expressly when admonishing her dæmon, Pantalaimon, that he “is supposed to know about conscience”. Dæmons appear to be a reflection of one’s social class. The servants’ dæmons are almost invariably loyal canines (or other submissive, domestic creatures, as we’ll see a bit later), while members of the upper classes have assertive, independent dæmons like Lord Asriel’s snow leopard. One’s physical appearance is mirrored by his or her dæmon. Lord Asriel resembles his dæmon, Stelmaria, in that “his movements [are] large and perfectly balanced, like those of a wild animal.” The Master has “hooded, clouded eyes” much like those of his raven dæmon. Dæmons respond to their humans’ mental state – Pan expresses physical and verbal discontent when Lyra is hurt or upset, and Lyra notes that though the Master himself appears impassive when learning of his foiled murder plot, his dæmon displays physical signs of uneasiness and worry. However, while dæmons may be very in tune with their humans’ mental state, dæmons cannot read their humans’ thoughts. Lyra notes that she should share her thoughts with Pan and ask for his counsel, but chooses not to do so. Dæmons are almost always the opposite sex of their human. As we’ll see later on, there are rare exceptions to this – the significance of which has been much debated. Children’s dæmons change shape, while adults’ dæmons do not. Chapter 1: The Decanter of Tokaji. And now I will allow myself a digression into wine, which happens to be wonderfully relevant as the first chapter of Northern Lights is entitled “The Decanter of Tokay.” I expect most readers are not familiar with Tokay, other than deducing from contextual clues that it must be some sort of wine. Indeed, Tokay is a type of wine found in our world as well as Lyra’s. When I first read this book, I assumed Pullman was using “Tokay” as the Anglicized version of “Tokaji” or “Tokaj,” which is a sweet Hungarian dessert wine. I later stumbled upon the Wikipedia entry on terminology in His Dark Materials , which states that this could also be a reference to Tokay d’Alsace – the name given to Pinot Gris in the Alsace region of France. However, the novel’s description of the wine as rich, golden and sweet directly contradicts this interpretation, as Alsatian Pinot Gris is pale and dry. Furthermore, the Tokay is decanted, which is usually only done to red and dessert wines, not white wine. (In looking over the Wikipedia entry again, I’m fairly certain the author mistakenly used the word “latter” instead of “former,” so it actually meant to confirm my opinion, not conflict with it.) Northern Lights doesn’t provide a definite reason behind this choice of wine in particular, though the history of Tokaji makes the answer fairly obvious. Tokaji is a very old wine that has been in regular production in Hungary since the seventeenth century. As I mentioned earlier, it is a sweet dessert wine, the result of noble rot – a fungus ( Botrytis cinerea ) attacks the grapes and sucks out all their water, leaving behind desiccated, fuzzy grey balls of concentrated sweet juice. It was discovered by accident that if you abandon all good sense and make wine from these icky-looking grapes, it ends up tasting stunningly good. For several hundred years, Tokaji was the most sought-after wine amongst eastern nobility (particularly in Russia, and of course Hungary). It gained a following throughout western Europe in the eighteenth century and became a favourite of the papacy as well. In the past, Tokaji has been referred to as the Wine of Kings, the King of Wines and the Elixir of the Tsars. Pullman therefore chose this wine for good reason. Its relevance to the papacy is particularly significant after learning about Pope John Calvin and the Magisterium in chapter two. It is certainly one of many subtle realities that Pullman included to ground Lyra’s world alongside our own. The fact that Pullman mentions a specific vintage, 1898, may also indicate that he is a fan of this wine himself, since this happened to be a fantastic year for Tokaji. (Not that I know from personal experience; there are precious few bottles left of this in our world – perhaps only three dozen, as in Northern Lights – and goodness knows how much money they would be worth. As Lord Asriel mentions, “all good things pass away.”) Chapter 2: The Idea of North. The first two chapters of Northern Lights presents several similarities with our own world, and the reader is quickly able to surmise that Lyra’s world appears to be set in a time period that roughly equates to turn of the century England. Geography appears to be fairly constant between the two worlds, with only a few minor differences in place names; Lyra lives in England and the first two chapters mention London, west Europe, the Baltic Sea, St. Petersburg, Berlin and Geneva – all of which appear to be in about the same place as they are in our world. There are also several similarities to our own world in the technology and science of Lyra’s world. Lord Asriel presents several photograms prepared with different emulsions, including one made from silver nitrate, the college is lit by anbaric light, the theory of light photons is mentioned in relation to the way Dust behaves and there are apparently a couple of renegade scientist/theologians attempting to find “mathematical arguments for the other-world theory.” But the extent of Pullman’s world-building does not hinge upon a simple re-naming of common items with antiquated monikers; throughout the first and especially the second chapters the reader gains a growing sense that this is definitely not merely our world, one hundred years ago. The similarities between common elements act as signposts to mark the way, but they contain subtle differences that mark Lyra’s world as unique and separate from our own. Certainly these differences are a key factor in building any fantasy world, though in His Dark Materials that unnerving sense of “not-quite-the-same” becomes especially significant in the second book, when we depart Lyra’s world and begin to explore others. The second chapter of Northern Lights , entitled “The Idea of North,” essentially charts the main elements of the rest of the novel (if not the entire series). At this point it seems a bit presumptuous to get into any significant textual analysis, since the reader only learns of these new things through Lyra’s eyes – and therefore we are as woefully ignorant (and oh-so-curious) as Lyra. I offer another set of observations to consider as the story progresses: Dust. Clearly this stuff is important. It behaves like light photons, is related to trepanning and is somehow related to children and their dæmons in a fundamental, inexplicable (and sinister) way. The North is inhabited by Panserbørne – armored bears headed by a king, Iofur Raknison, who has built himself a palace of imported marble and who desires a dæmon above all else. Lyra’s world used to be governed by a papacy that was officially abolished after the last Pope’s death; it is now controlled by the Magisterium, “a tangle of courts, colleges, and councils.” Of these, the recent Consistorial Court of Discipline is “the most active and the most feared of all the Church’s bodies.” Lyra is at the center of a prophecy foretold by the alethiometer (which we’ll learn of shortly), and part of her experience will involve “a great betrayal.” There are really so many other things to discuss in the first two chapters – after all, this is where Pullman lays the groundwork for the entire series. This post is long enough, however, so please share any other insights in the comments section. Philip Pullman / His Dark Materials 9LP coloured vinyl box signed by the author. Limited 9LP coloured vinyl box signed by Philip Pullman. By Paul Sinclair. Demon Music continue their passion for spoken word/comedy vinyl packages with what looks like another lavish presentation, this time of Phillip Pullman ‘s His Dark Materials trilogy, as adapted for BBC Radio back in 2003. The novels are back in the public consciousness thanks to HBO/BBC’s universally acclaimed series which covered the events of the first book, Northern Lights . That was published in 1995 and The Subtle Knife followed in 1997, with The Amber Spyglass completing the fantasy trilogy in 2000. The BBC Radio radio plays consisted of three two- and-a-half hour adaptations, each covering one book. The cast included no less than Terence Stamp as Lord Asriel and Lulu Popplewell as Lyra. These have been rebroadcast twice since the original airing, with the most recent being back in 2017. Click image to enlarge. This is a nine vinyl LP package with the audio pressed on ‘daemonic dustburst’ splatter vinyl and each comes housed in its own illustrated inner sleeve. As can be seen above, the gatefold sleeves feature dust-inspired illustrations, created with metallic copper ink. Anyone who has bought the recent Terry Pratchet Discworld set or perhaps one of the Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy packages will know what to expect of this. Most impressive of all is that 500 of these – the Amazon UK exclusive version – come with an art print signed by Philip Pullman himself, which one suspects really is a future collectible. This His Dark Materials 9LP vinyl box set will be released on 27 March 2020.