First Year Seminar B51 Northern Lights Chapter 1 and 2 Presentation November 12 Suzuna Ogata
Basic information of The Author PHILIP PULLMAN and Northern Lights
・born in 1946 in Norwich in UK
・named one of the "50 greatest British writers since 1945" by The Times in 2008
・named the eleventh most influential person in British culture by BBC poll in 2004
・Northern Lights awarded Carnegie Medal and Guardian Award in 1996, CILIP Carnegie Medal in
2007
・Northern Lights is one of the trilogy of “His Dark Materials”
Other two are The Subtle Knife and The Amber Spyglass
・His Dark Materials trilogy ranked third in the BBC’s The Big Read in 2003
PHILIP PULLMAN His Dark Materials Northern Lights The Subtle Knife The Amber Spyglass
The demon
In a dictionary sense…
1. an evil spirit
2. a person who does sth very well or with a lot of energy
3. something that causes a person to worry and makes them unhappy
First Year Seminar B51 Northern Lights Chapter 1 and 2 Presentation November 12 Suzuna Ogata
(Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary)
In this story…
The physical manifestation of a person’s soul, or spirit
Takes the form of a creature
The demons of children have ability to change form from one creature to another
・Lyra and her demon Pantalaimon
At the beginning of Chapter 1…
“Her demon’s name was Pantalaimon, and he was currently in the form of a moth, a dark brown one so as not to show up in the darkness of the Hall.”
Pantalaimon was the form of a moth
At page five…
“It was the Master. As Lyra held her breath she saw the servant’s demon (a dog, like almost all servant’s demons) trot in and sit quietly at his feet, and then the Master’s feet became visible too, in the shabby black shoes he always wore.
→Dog implies that the person’s inner being of obedient
At page six…
“The Master had been a powerful man, but he was well over seventy now, and his movements were stiff
and slow. The Master’s demon had the form of a raven, and as soon as his robe was on, she jumped down from the wardrobe and settled in her accustomed place on his right shoulder.”
In The Old Testament, it is written that Noah released raven to confirm the water
First Year Seminar B51 Northern Lights Chapter 1 and 2 Presentation November 12 Suzuna Ogata
level from Noah’s Ark when the flood happened.
At Page seven…
“He was a servant, so she was a dog; but a superior servant, so a superior dog. In fact, she had the form of a red setter. The demon seemed suspicious, and cast around ….”
→This means that the demon reflects the person’s position
Also one of the first references to the ‘Setter’ or setting dog, in literature in Latine.
“They attend diligently upon their Master and frame their condition to such beckes,
motions and gestures, as it shall please him to exhibite and make, either going forward,
….”
The difference of the creature’s feature can tell us the person’s roll or character in this
story