More on "His Dark Materials"

[asterroc]

Here's a review of the series in the Boston Globe. It definitely contains spoilers, and I'm not sure I agree with the final punchline about exactly what Dust is, but it's worth reading. It focuses on just what about the series mainstream Christianity finds so subversive, and why, in fact, those things are actually pro-religion. Of course, entirely dismissing the fact that Pullman is a self-proclaimed atheist in the process, but still intriguing.

Comments

[zandperl.livejournal.com]

The part I wanted to know about was near the end of book 3 when Xaphania the angel says that Lyra was only able to read the aleitheometer by "grace". Was that "grace" or "Grace"? Another person told me it was lowercase.

Spoiling everything is common in book reviews.

every religious character was on the villain's side,

Waitasec, which side were the villains? I never really felt there were any good guys, so I can't really say who the villains were. Neither Azriel nor Coulter was a sympathetic character.

[freakylynx.livejournal.com]

No, neither of those two were very sympathetic but they did sacrifice themselves to take down Metatron. And it was stated that if Metatron (or his successor on the side of the Authority) won, they'd tighten control over humanity and such through the church. So, the battle against "God" was a battle between freedom and slavery - so although I thought Asriel was going to be a villain at the end of the first book, his goal turned out to be unquestionably noble; plus souls were kept as a power source for the authority in a hellish limbo, hard to sympathize with the authority or metatron by the end. So, the good guys might have been a little fuzzy but the villains were pointed out fairly clearly.

[zandperl.livejournal.com]

Oh right! I guess I didn't feel like they were villains b/c I didn't feel like they were people, more forces of nature, or an established governmental system without any individual in charge of it. To me it was bad guys vs. body of power, which doesn't have any good guys or real villains in it... :-P