I never knew that this was an Author Tract against Christianity until reading this page. I'm not surprised, though. When I read these books for the first time, I was already doubting and this was sort of the final nail in the coffin for my Christian beliefs.
I'm a bit confused about the reference to the Alpine Chough, which was one character's Daemon, being a reference to Satan's final form in Paradise Lost.
Now that would be fitting, but I've read Paradise Lost, and I don't remember this at all. Satan's final form was definitely a snake! (as expected) throughout the book he became an angel, a cormorant(type of bird, is this what they were thinking?) and possibly a toad, but when I google "Satan Alpine Chough" all I find are articles claiming relating to His Dark Materials that make this connection without a source.
The claim shows up on wikipedia too, but the word "chough" does not even appear in Paradise Lost's text. Where does this assertion come from?
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Both the cormorant and the alpine chough are birds with black feathers and a yellow beak, with the cough being considerably smaller. I'm pretty sure Pullman screwed this up. An alternate interpretation would be that Malone is the "little devil" who quieted subverted, in comparison to Asriel's more ostentatious rebellion.
So climb this first grand thief into God's fold; So since into his church lewd hirelings climb. Thence up he flew, and on the tree of life, The middle tree and highest there that grew, Sat like a cormorant; yet not true life Thereby regained, but sat devising death To them who lived; nor on the virtue thought Of that life-giving plant, but only used For prospect, what well used had been the pledge Of immortality. Paradise Lost book 4:190-199
Edited by Gemmabeta
Did he himself say that the chough was taken from one of Lucifer's transformations? Although that quote does sound quite fitting when one considers Mary's climb.
Is the church really a Corrupt Church? As I remember it, the church is evil in the same way as their God is, which makes it a Religion of Evil.
The filidh that cam frae Skye
Writer On Board - Quite a few readers find that the third book dispenses with the pleasantries to rail against Christianity. In particular, the character of Dr. Mary Malone, physicist, explains why she quit being a nun and decided there was no God.
According to Word of God, that rant was actually Mary's own opinion.
In my opinion, if you have to look at interviews and secondary writings and web sites to get a full understanding of the book, that's a problem (at first I liked Donnie Darko, but when I saw the internet response to it, Richard Kelly's website making up a whole mythology to go along with the story made me hate the movie. It became a pretentious piece of crap. Southland Tales confirmed this assertion for me). I think the books don't need the author's interviews to stand on their own.
He had a special place in the stories for Mary. I wouldn't be surprised if she was an author avatar because of her frankness and the fact that her stories came during the denouement tying everything together.
That said, her story was extremely important to the plot in that it helped Lyra grow up and do what she needed to do to save the Dust.
If Lyra is the new Eve then Mary is the Satan figure; herself a "fallen angel" in that she was a servant of God but renounced the position. Her crucial role is to tempt Lyra, which she does through her telling of the Marzipan story during which (unless you are reading one of the expurgated American editions iun which case the point is lost) Lyra has an orgasm.
"Powered by a forsaken child" needs to be changed. Asriel opened the portal to Cittagazze - not Will's world. He and Lyra met in Cittagazze (Will got there due to a crazy fucked-up coincidence) and THEN went to his world.
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"Certainly one of the most compelling works of fiction of the new millennium" Really? I couldn't stand the things.
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I finished the trilogy, but didn't think it was that great. (I have a friend who loved the first book, then kept reading in a desperate quest to get that feeling back.) It's probably just better to cut it.
I know some people who didn't like either the portrayal of the Church and some people who don't like fantasy and so didn't care for the daemons and the talking animals but I don't see how you can dispute the quality of the writing.
If you compare how Pullman establishes his characters to the writing of Meyer or even Suzanne Collins of Hunger Games fame it is far superior.
I also liked that Pullman doesn't underestimate or patronise his teenage audience. People suffer, people die and they fall in love. Even the darker characters have redeeming features and complicated motivations.
Also Pullman doesn't kill God off. The entity who calls himself God is just a powerful and aged angel. Another angel named Sophia actually points out the thing that calls itself God in these books wasn't the creator at all.
Can we get some context on the "set out to kill Christianity in the minds of children" comment?
Deleted - this is an artwork/animation trope, isn't it?
- Animesque - Kid Heroes, Minovsky Particles, Weird religious symbolism, Mons... what would you call it?
Seems to be. Also bear in mind that children, very detailed Applied Phlebotinum, religion and monsters all existed long before anime got it's start.
Cut this natter from Yaoi Guys. I'm pretty sure that Baruch is clearly spelled out as having always been male within TAS.