His Dark Materials

His Dark Materials is a trilogy of novels by the fantasy fiction author Philip Pullman, comprising Northern Lights (Released as The Golden Compass in the United States), The Subtle Knife and The Amber Spyglass.

Although ostensibly for children, the appeal of the novels is equally compelling for adults. Pullman himself describes the target range as 'young adult', and some say that the books are too intellectual in content for most children. Pullman's universe —or rather multiverse— like those of many other contemporary fantasy writers such as Michael Moorcock and Clive Barker, is multilayered and multifaceted, with possibilities for characters to slip between them.

The story begins in Northern Lights, initially as a typical fantasy. However, Pullman introduces ideas throughout the trilogy which have implications in many areas, such as metaphysics, religion, and philosophy. The third book, The Amber Spyglass, relies heavily on quantum physics and philosophy.

Because of the trilogy's allegorical meaning and purpose, told through the medium of a fantasy novel, the books appeal to all ages, and may indeed be, as they have been often called, 'life-changing', due to the profound implications of the story that the reader is forced to realise.

Whilst Northern Lights, set in a universe separate from our own, might justifiably be called 'fantasy', both The Subtle Knife and The Amber Spyglass contain a "heady brew of quantum physics" [1], and cross into our own world. The Amber Spyglass is a scientific, theoretical, philosophical, "metaphysical speculation" and exploration, whilst still remaining a compelling and gripping story.

Awards

The Amber Spyglass won the 2002 Whitbread Book of the Year award, a prestigious British literature award. This is the first time that such an award has been bestowed on a book from their "children's literature" category. The first volume Northern Lights (US:The Golden Compass) won the Carnegie Medal for children's fiction in the UK in 1995

The trilogy came third in the 2003 BBC's Big Read, a poll of viewers' favourite books.

Influences and reaction

The novels draw heavily on gnostic ideas. There are three major literary influences acknowledged by Pullman himself, such as the essay On the Marionette Theatre by Heinrich von Kleist and the works of William Blake. But the source that he gives for the basic idea is the war in heaven and hell of John Milton's Paradise Lost (from which the title of the trilogy is taken). Pullman's stated intention was to invert the story. He states that the work is no longer much read in Britain by schools and universities. And in his introduction, he adapts Blake's line to quip that he (Pullman) "is of the Devil's party and does know it."

His Dark Materials has been at the heart of controversy, especially with certain Christian groups. Pullman has, however, also found support from more liberal groups, and most notably Rowan Williams, the Archbishop of Canterbury. These say that Pullman's attacks are focused on the constraints of dogmatism and the use of religion to oppress, not Christianity itself.

The Books

The trilogy takes place across a multiverse. In other words, it goes between many alternate worlds. In Northern Lights the story takes place in a world much like our own, though with many differences. In The Subtle Knife, the story passes into our world (what we might define as a break into reality), and in The Amber Spyglass, it crosses through a large array of diverse worlds.

The trilogy has also been published as a single-volume omnibus in the UK, as simply His Dark Materials.

Plot Synopses

Brief and Introductory

Reading the following will not ruin the experience of reading the books, though it does contain spoilers.

• In Northern Lights, the heroine Lyra Belacqua, a young girl brought up in the cloistered world of Jordan College, Oxford, and her dæmon—an animal-shaped manifestation of her soul—journey to the icy wastelands of the far North to save their best friend Roger, and other kidnapped children from experimentation by evil scientists and a revisionist church in an alternate universe. This world is much like our own, but with many differences.
• In The Subtle Knife, Lyra journeys to another world, to a city called Cittàgazze (the "city of magpies"), where she meets Will Parry, a twelve-year-old boy from our own world who has recently killed a man to protect his ailing mother. Together they travel from world to world and discover the Subtle Knife of the novel's title—so called because it can cut through the barriers between the worlds—and begin to uncover the truth of their own destiny.
• In The Amber Spyglass, the series concludes with Will and Lyra visiting the Land of the Dead and releasing the dead souls from their captivity, the overthrow of The Authority, the destruction of the Subtle Knife, and the sealing of the passageways between the worlds by the angels.

In High Detail

Reading the following will severely reduce the enjoyment of then reading the books. This High Detail Synopsis written by alfakim

Northern Lights

The alternate world of Northern Lights is dominated by a revisionist Church, and the collective Magisterium holds a great deal of wealth and power. The world is less technologically advanced than ours, and seems reminiscent of a past age.

The story begins with Lyra Belacqua—a savage, rebellious little orphaned girl under the care of Jordan College, Oxford—secretly entering the Retiring Room in the evening. Her dæmon—an animal-formed, shape-shifting manifestation of her soul that cannot leave her—who is named Pantalaimon, tries to dissuade her (acting as her conscience), but her curiosity to enter this male-only part of the college overwhelms.

Within, she hides herself in a wardrobe, and eavesdrops as her Uncle, Lord Asriel—a man of great reverence and power—explains to the scholars his findings from his travels in the North. In short, he is asking for more funding so that he may return there.

He displays a photograph that when developed using a special emulsion reveals a spray of tiny golden particles being emitted from the characters depicted—but moreso from the adults than the children. When such an emulsion is used on a photograph of the Northern Lights—a fantastic natural light-display in the North of the world caused by the effect of cosmic rays on the atmosphere—the emulsion displays a fresco of the golden particles that together form a distinct image of a city in the sky. These golden particles are called Dust, not ordinary dust but something quite extraordinary which requires explanation. Lastly, Asriel shows the scholars the decapitated head of the murdered explorer Stanislaus Grumman, rather than simply telling them. Lyra hears all of this with intrigue.

Instantly a core theme of the trilogy is established: What is Dust?

There is a child's myth of a group of people called 'the Gobblers', who capture children and take them away. It is in fact true, though the details greatly vary. A Gobbler (a beautiful woman with a golden monkey for a dæmon) captures a young boy by tempting him with chocolate. She then uses her persuasive powers to passively make him want to get on board a ship that will sail him to the North with the other children she's captured.

This happens to Lyra's best friend, Roger, a kitchen-boy at Jordan College.

When Lyra realises Roger is missing, she determines to rescue him (assuming, as the child she is, that he has been caught by the worst demon imaginable—the Gobblers—and her assumption is, as we know, correct). In the meantime however, the woman with the golden monkey comes to Jordan College, revealing herself to be Mrs Coulter, a distinguished member of the Church. She offers to take Lyra away from the college to be an apprentice, and Lyra, enthralled by Mrs Coulter's incredible persuasive and charismatic powers, desperately assents.

Before Lyra leaves, she is entrusted by the Master of the college with a priceless golden 'compass' called the Alethiometer. It is an archaic device that can find the true answer to any question asked of it—though one must spend years studying it to learn how to use it. Why he gives this to Lyra, we do not know.

Life with Mrs Coulter is fun for Lyra for a time, but Mrs Coulter's cold heart beneath her rosy exterior is quickly apparent. At a cocktail party, she meets Lord Boreal, a sinister man with a snake-dæmon. She also discovers that Mrs Coulter is in fact the leader of the Gobblers, a name that actually derives from the acronym of 'General Oblation Board', a sinister sect of the Church. It also becomes apparent that Mrs Coulter's golden monkey-dæmon is searching for Lyra's alethiometer, and the monkey is as sinister as its human.

Lyra runs away, and is saved by the Gyptians, a group of water-friendly gypsy-people who know Lyra well, and whom she almost has a second home with. They explain that many of their children have also been taken by the Gobblers, and that an expedition will be sent to the North to rescue the children. The Gyptians are led by a powerful man called John Faa, who is advised by Farder Coram, and both these two take a liking to Lyra. Lyra is told that her real parents are in fact none other than Lord Asriel and Mrs Coulter.

In her time with the Gyptians, Lyra begins to play with the alethiometer, and, inexplicably, learns to use it and totally master it in a matter of weeks, when it usually takes a lifetime. She is henceforth able to know the answer to any question. Meanwhile, Mrs Coulter is scouring the lands for her runaway daughter.

The expedition begins, and comes to its first stop in Lapland, to see a man called Dr. Lanselius, the representative of the witch-clans of that land. Unbeknown to Lyra, he identifies her as the girl prophesied by the witches, the girl who will alter the fate of all worlds. Witches in Northern Lights are beautiful, cold-impervious, scantilly-clad, cloud-pine-flying, proud, wise, ever-young and long-lived females.

Lyra encounters two new characters: an armoured talking bear called Iorek Byrnison, and a Texan aeronaut called Lee Scorseby (an aeronaut is a man who can pilot a hot-air-balloon). These two characters are already friends. Lyra gains Iorek's friendship, and eventually strong affection, when she uses the alethiometer to find for him his armour, which had been stolen. These two characters join with the Gyptians (Lee under hire, Iorek under Lyra's request), and they continue to a place called Bolvangar—where the Gobblers reside.

On the way there, Lyra is given a hint by the alethiometer—which indeed seems to have a mind of its own—to inspect a nearby village. None want to go, so she goes there on the back of the armoured bear Iorek Byrnison. There, they find a child who has been disposed of by the Gobblers—and they discover what gruesome thing it is that the General Oblation Board does to the children it captures: they cut away children's dæmons—the equivalent of slicing away their souls—which renders the child they find a mere zombie. It is hard to express the horror that Lyra feels—seeing a person without a dæmon is like seeing a person without a head. She can't understand why anyone, even the Gobblers, would be so cruel.

On returning to the Gyptian expedition, it is attacked, and Lyra is captured by the Gobblers on their own turf. She is taken to Bolvangar, a scientific research compound where all the children go. Pantalaimon, Lyra's dæmon, is petrified here, because the thought of being cut away from Lyra is unbearable.

Within, she finds Roger, and begins to plot how to escape with all the captured children (she is a born leader, and they listen to her intently). The plot thickens when Mrs Coulter herself comes to inspect on her institute for incision (dæmon-cutting), and finds Lyra. Lyra berates her on the process, but Coulter's sweet voice explains that the process is healthy, and it is designed to stop children from coming to a state of 'impurity' at adolescence. At adolescence, a dæmon's ability to shape-shift ceases, and at this point, Dust begins to get attracted to them more readily. The General Oblation Board views this as a loss of innocence—like Eve's Original Sin, and the Dust is therefore evil. By cutting away the dæmon, that loss of innocence, they believe, will not occur—so it's 'for the good of the children'. Yet quite clearly this procedure is torturous and its effects are hellish. Mrs Coulter is motherly and kind to Lyra, but Lyra knows that Coulter has a bad heart, and has no emotions for her. Lyra is sent back to her dormitory.

The witch Serafina Pekkala sends her dæmon, Kaisa, to help Lyra and Roger. Together they free the separated dæmons from the cages they are stored in, and then help all the children to escape under the cover of a fire-alarm. At that point the Gyptians also arrive with the rescue attempt. Lee Scoresby comes down with his balloon, also carrying Iorek Byrnison the armoured bear, and Lyra and Roger escape from the ensuing battle in the balloon.

Lyra meets Kaisa's human, the witch-Queen Serafina Pekkala, a slender and beautiful woman. She is the Queen of a large clan of similar witches. Together they all travel to Svalbard, where Lyra's father, Lord Asriel, is being held prisoner by a host of other armoured bears. Lyra, of course, determines to save him as well.

On the way there, Lyra is knocked out of the balloon when it is attacked by cliff-ghasts. She lands safely in the snow, but is captured by armoured bears serving under the bear-King, Iofur Raknison. Iofur is a ruler who holds the throne that should rightfully be Iorek's. In Iofur's palace, Lyra manages to talk to Iofur, and using her incredible ability to form plausible lies, she tricks him into challenging Iorek to a duel, when he arrives in his rescue attempt on Lyra.

This duel indeed takes place, but it is a fact that bears cannot be tricked, and Iofur clearly has (for he is no longer acting like a bear)—Iorek picks up on this, and tricks him again, killing him in the duel. Iorek becomes the bear-King.

Roger came with Iorek, and together the three of them then set off for Svalbard where Lord Asriel is being held, and where the Northern Lights are the glory of the skies.

Asriel is not pleased to see Lyra, but relieved when he sees Roger. Due to his inimitable assertivity and power, Asriel has made himself a small comfortable home in his prison—a place where the bears have in fact been supplying him with everything he's needed for his experiments on Dust, the golden particles.

Asriel explains Dust to Lyra. With the help of the Adam and Eve story, he explains that the Church believes it is the physical evidence for Original Sin. That is why the Church wants to destroy it—by cutting of dæmons or by any other means—for it will destroy sin, and retain innocence. Dust furthermore is what makes the alethiometer work. Asriel says he wants to destroy it. (Yet it is clearly something that one would not want to get rid of.)

He also explains the existence of other worlds. There are millions of alternate worlds—like the one seen in the sky of the Northern Lights from the special emulsion photo at the beginning—each beyond the reach of the other. They get created after every quantum event takes place; one world for one way things could have happened, another for another. Asriel wants to be the first man ever to break into another world, to cross into a whole new universe.

Lyra realised early on that the Master of Jordan College may have given her the alethiometer so that she could deliver it to Lord Asriel, but he refuses it, and tells her that it was more likely that he gave it to her on purpose, knowing that she had an important fate.

Later on, when Lyra is asleep, Lord Asriel steals Roger and carries him off into the snowy distance. Lyra is woken by his butler, and she, with Iorek, chase. At the same time, Mrs Coulter's Church-provided battalion of soldiers arrives in a zeppelin. Immediately after that, Serafina Pekkala's witch-clan also arrive. A battle ensues, and Iorek carries Lyra through it to chase her father, who has taken Roger away.

Iorek is stopped from going all the way when they come to a shaky snow-bridge. Lyra parts with him, and continues alone. She finds Asriel with lots of equipment, hooking Roger's dæmon up to it. Asriel had mentioned earlier that when a dæmon was cut from a human, an immense amount of energy is released. They are standing beneath the Northern Lights, in which the Dust-emulsion-photo revealed a city in the sky. That city was one of the alternate worlds Asriel spoke of. He also mentioned that an immense amount of energy could create a bridge into another world.

Lord Asriel plans to kill Roger, take the released energy, and use it to fulfil his ambition to reach into another universe.

Lyra and Pantalaimon, her dæmon, attack. She and Roger break free, but at the last moment are knocked off a cliff, whilst Roger's dæmon is still securely inside the apparatus. The fall tears Roger and his dæmon apart, and kills him. In the same tear, the energy released flows into the sky and tears it apart. Then Mrs Coulter, Lord Asriel's long-ago lover, arrives.

Lyra's fall is stopped on a protruding ledge. She lies still, and hidden, with the dead Roger in her arms, and Pantalaimon quivering at her breast. Lord Asriel is crying above the wind, and he asks Mrs Coulter, who he calls Marisa, to come with him, to venture into the unknown of the universe he's opened up. She declines, though clearly, for the first time, her heart is open. They kiss, passionately. She leaves. Asriel enters the other world.

He has created a vast bridge to the stars, to a gaping hole in the vault of the sky, beyond which Lyra can see the sunny palm trees of an alien world. She and Pantalaimon decide that they don't want Dust to be destroyed—they think it is a force of Goodness, not Evil. She and Pantalaimon decide that they shall find the source of Dust themselves—for preservation, not destruction—and the gaping sky beckons to them.

They get up, and walk up into the stars.

The Subtle Knife

The book begins with a young boy named Will Parry, of the same age as Lyra—twelve. He lives in our universe—reality—in Oxford. He has an ill mother, who he looks after. He is a strong, independent character who will obviously one day grow into a powerful man. His father was an explorer who was lost, but he has always wanted to go to find him. Indeed, many sinister men often pester his mentally ill mother for information on his father (who was obviously doing something extremely significant before being lost), and on many occasions, Will has had to fend them off.

In doing this, one night, when they break into his house, he accidentally kills one of them. He knows what they are after: a small box of his father's that his mother keeps hidden. Earlier in the day he entrusted the care of his mother to his piano teacher, so now he escapes with this box. The box contains many letters from Will's father to his mother.

Knowing he has killed a man, and being extremely morally conscious, Will runs from his house, and chances to see a strange cat. He follows it through Oxford until it inexplicably disappears in mid air, at the centre of a roundabout. Inspecting this, he finds to his life-changing astonishment that, hidden in the middle of the roundabout, but clearly visible when looked at correctly, is a window in the air, and beyond it is another world.

Entering this other world—his perfect hideout—he finds it to be a Mediterranean-like deserted city by the sea. It is empty. He finds a place to stay, and here is set upon suddenly by a savage little girl of his age. Lyra.

Ascending into the stars at the end of Northern Lights, Lyra walked through a dense fog and, lost, at last found herself in this deserted city. She is frightened of Will, because, coming from our universe, he does not have a dæmon. However, he is not a zombie. Lyra concludes that Will's dæmon must be within him, hidden. Will is equally startled to see that Pantalaimon, Lyra's dæmon, is more than a pet, but is her soul, can shape-shift, and can talk. They don't take to liking each other immediately, both being extremely individual characters, and both being very headstrong and assertive, but Will is more practical than Lyra, and he knows how to cook and is sensible. Lyra finds herself listening to his advice, and does not leave him. Later on, she asks the alethiometer who he is, and it replies, "He is a murderer." "Good," she thinks—she can trust him. They go to bed.

Elsewhere, and back in Lyra's world, which has now been thrown into confusion and chaos because of Lord Asriel's actions, the witch-Queen Serafina Pekkala finds Mrs Coulter. Mrs Coulter is on a ship, and is protected by many guards, and is with several important men and women. She is also torturing a captured witch.

Serafina makes herself invisible, and watches. Coulter wants information on why the witches think Lyra, her daughter, is so special. Serafina kills the captured witch before she can say, and escapes before she is killed herself. She flies off to Svalbard, where she meets up with Lee Scoresby, the aeronaut. He explains, at a clan-gathering, that he wants to find out more about a certain Stanislaus Grumman. At the beginning of Northern Lights, this man's head was shown to the Jordan College scholars by Lord Asriel, but Lee does not think he is truly dead—he thinks Asriel showed the scholars the (false) head just to shock them (which it did).

The witches decide that they must help Lord Asriel in his task—for he has embarked on something great—and that most of all they must protect Lyra. The witch Ruta Skadi decides she will go to see Lord Asriel herself. The meeting is closed, and the actions taken.

Back with Lyra and Will, they meet two children in the deserted city. The two children have their dæmons inside them, like Will. They discover that the city is called Cittàgazze, and that it is in fact full of thousands of invisible beings called Spectres. Children (i.e. humans who do not attract Dust so well, and whose dæmons can shape-shift, i.e. pre-adolescents) cannot see the Spectres. However, adults can, and the Spectres kill anyone who can see them. They do this by sucking out their soul—their dæmon—leaving them as zombies. This has caused all adults to flee the city, for the Spectres cannot be killed, but only increase in number. There is no explanation for how the Spectres originally came about.

Lyra wants to find out more about Dust, and the best person to ask is a scholar of Jordan College (that being her home, she thinks it's the best). Will explains he is also form Oxford, and wants to find out more about his father. Thus, they both go back through the window Will found, and both come into our universe, into reality. Lyra cannot find Jordan College (because it doesn't exist), so she goes off to a museum. There, she sees some ancient human skulls, and the alethiometer tells her that they are in fact 33,000 years old (not what the plaque says). More interesting is that the older skulls—before humans had fully evolved—have very much less Dust around them than the skulls of more evolved, more recent humans. An overly kind gentleman, who reeks of being sinister and seems constantly to suggest an undertone of paedophilia, approaches her, and gives her his card after 'befriending' her. She leaves—but he saw the solid gold alethiometer before she does.

Lyra finds her 'scholar'—a physicist called Mary Malone, who is out of funding, and works on exploring Dark Matter. She is working on Dust, and is the only person apart from a few colleagues to know of its existence. This Dust is apparently omnipresent throughout the multiverse. On our Earth, Mary has christened Dust as Shadows, or Shadow-particles.

Mary Malone has a special device that vaguely lets her examine Shadow-particles and take readings of how dense they are around certain objects. Her astonishing findings seem to contravene science: Shadows cluster strongly around inanimate objects if they were made by humans, or in some way showed evidence of a conscious worker; the Shadow-particles know what objects are. They are conscious themselves.

Lyra comes to see her, and persuades Mary to hook her up to the machine. Lyra uses her skills as an alethiometrist (which is effectively communicating with Dust/Shadows) to make the machine's readings go astronomical: the most fantastic results Mary has ever seen. Lyra also consults the alethiometer which tells her that the alethiometer itself, Mary's machine, and even a Chinese divination device (a decoration) that Mary has on her wall, are all no more than elaborate methods of communicating with Dust. Mary is gobsmacked. Lyra leaves.

In the meantime, Will has been to a library and has discovered that his father (John Parry) went on an expedition into the Arctic, but never returned. He meets with Lyra, and eventually they return to the hidden world of Cittàgazze.

Will reads his father's letters, in the box that the men (one of which he killed) had so desperately wanted. The letters document John Parry's expedition. John Parry also found a window to another world. That was why he went missing.

Back in Lyra's world, Lee Scoresby is off in search of Stanislaus Grumman, who he discovers had become a leader, or holy man, among some of the Svalbard tribes; a shaman who went by the tribal name of Jopari. In finding all this information, and more, a secret representative of the Magisterium (the Church) tries to kill Lee, but Lee kills him.

Meanwhile, Ruta Skadi the witch flies off in search of Lord Asriel, and spots some flying angels in the sky. She joins them, for they are going to Lord Asriel. It appears that Lord Asriel has passed through many worlds now, and has found an empty one. On this world, he has created a fortress, and to this colossal fortress he is calling all beings from all worlds to join into an army under his command. The goal of this army will be to do one thing: destroy God.

Serafina learnt of this earlier in the book. Asriel, and indeed many races including many angels, all believe that 'God', 'The Authority', is a corrupt, oppressive force that the multiverse should be without. He is recalling the original rebellion of heaven. Originally, God triumphed and cast out the rebellious angels. This time round, all the cast out rebel angels are going to flock to Asriel's banner, along with millions of other beings, and together they shall make that rebellion against God's oppression a second time—with victory.

Serafina the witch-Queen leads her clan of witches through Lord Asriel's hole in the sky—a hole we now see is similar to the windows that John and Will Parry found—and they enter Cittàgazze as well, to search for and protect Lyra.

The alethiometer tells Lyra, when she is alone, that she must help Will find his father. However, the next morning, she returns to Will's Oxford alone, to see Mary Malone. There, she is trapped, for some policemen/officials are waiting for her—Mary couldn't help it. She accidentally gives away that she knows Will (who clearly they are after, in connection with his highly significant father, John Parry), and she scarpers. She is saved when the man she met at the museum turns up. She gets in him limousine.

The man's name is Sir Charles Latrom. He benignly takes Lyra where she wants to go, and she leaves him thinking he might be a nice person after all. However, after he disappears, she quickly discovers that he has stolen her alethiometer.

Devastated, tearful, she returns to Cittàgazze and tells Will. She is also sorrowful because the alethiometer told her to help Will find his father, but she didn't. As soon as she gets it back, she vows, she's devote herself to doing what it says: to helping Will. Will acknowledges that he is not alone anymore—he and Lyra, though both entirely independent, had by the unfolding events, become a "we." He goes with her to Charles Latrom's house, in his Oxford.

There, Charles lets them in, but is sly and slick, and will not give the alethiometer back. Will notices a snake peep out of his sleeve, and at this point we realise that this is actually Lord Boreal, from Lyra's world. He too must have found a window, and he has been living two lives: one in Lyra's world, and one in Will's, as Lord Boreal and Sir Charles Latrom respectively. Boreal tells them that they can have the alethiometer back on one condition.

He knows about Cittàgazze. He knows it contains a knife that many men across many worlds would kill to possess. The Subtle Knife. He cannot enter Cittàgazze because the Spectres will kill him. However, Will and Lyra, being 12 years old each, can. If they get him the Subtle Knife, they may have their golden 'compass'.

They are told that the Knife resides in the Torre degli Angeli, so they go there. Within, Will has to fight off an older boy who has already got the Knife. Will defeats the boy, but in the process, has two of his fingers sliced off. The knife, it appears, can cut through absolutely anything as clean as a laser, and Will's fingers bleed furiously. The old man (tied up) who the Knife originally belonged to gets up and helps Will bandage the wound. He then explains the Knife to Will.

Whoever holds the Knife is impervious to the Spectres. That is why the old man is alive here. However, the Knife must never fall into the wrong hands, so the bearer must always change. Will has been chosen by the Knife (every bearer is marked out by the 'accidental' removal of his two fingers by the Knife). Will must become the bearer, and it is a great responsibility. The Knife has the ability to cut into other worlds; in other words, it was the Knife that created the windows Will and Lyra had been walking through. Careless use of the Knife has led to many windows being left open all over the place. Knife-bearers should be responsible. The old man teaches Will how to open and close inter-world windows (a skill not unlike how Lyra reads the alethiometer), and then kills himself before the Spectres do something worse.

The Knife was created 300 years ago. That was when Spectres first appeared.

Will and Lyra leave, and realise that they can use the Knife to steal back the alethiometer, by cutting a window directly into where Boreal was keeping it. At night, they set about this plan. Will hides behind Lord Boreal/Charles Latrom's sofa, when Mrs Coulter walks in. Boreal is clearly being seduced and controlled by Marisa Coulter. She like him is after power. Will takes the alethiometer and escapes, though he is noticed, and the escape is close.

Back in Lyra's world, Lee finds Stanislaus Grumman, or as he is known to the tribe that Lee finds himself in, Jopari. When they meet, Lee asks Grumman why he is called 'Jopari'. In a staggering twist, he replies that 'Jopari' is no more than a mispronunciation of his true name: John Parry. Will's father. John Parry went through the window he found all that time ago, back when he was part of his own world, but never found it again. Stuck in this new world, he learnt many new things: shamanship, and he found his dæmon, brought it out from within himself. He explains to Lee that he desperately needs to find the bearer of the Subtle Knife (unbeknown to him, this is in fact now Will, his son). Lee agrees to help John Parry on a journey to where the Knife-bearer will eventually by fate arrive—John Parry knows this, because of the powers he has gained as a shaman (again, communication, via one of a billion methods, with Dust—an omnipresent, apparently omniscient consciousness of particles).

Back in Cittàgazze, Will and Lyra are attacked by a mob of children—the boy Will defeated for the Knife was subsequently killed by the Spectres—he got too old. Will and Lyra run for it. Will's fingers are still bleeding. Serafina Pekkala's witches arrive, and save them. With the company of witches, they continue.

Back in our Oxford, Mary Malone does what Lyra told her (which was told to Lyra by the alethiometer: i.e. by the mysterious consciousness). Mary was told to write a computer program that would make her Shadow-detecting machine turn the readings into words. She tries this out, and types in a question. Instantly, there is an answer. Her interrogation teaches her that the Shadows—Dust—are angels. Angels are structures, or complexifications, of Dust. The Shadows tire of her, and tell her her fate. They tell her to find her way to a specific point, and that she must begin an incredible journey. She will play the serpent. (Whatever that means).

This is all too much for Mary. Everything she's discovered on this Dark Matter project about Shadows has been too much for her: it all wasn't scientific—it was religious, or ethical, or metaphysical—and she wanted to be rid of that; she used to be a nun, and she became a physicist to escape that kind of thing. Now, her mind is blown. But she knows what she must do. She destroys all the equipment and all of her research, gathers up her Chinese divination device (the decoration on her wall), and begins on her journey.

The specific point she had to get to was the roundabout. There, she finds the window to another world. Into it, she enters.

Back with Will, Lyra and the witches, they travel on. Will's hand bleeds furiously. He grows weak. Ruta Skadi returns, and reports that, besides sleeping with Lord Asriel (for they used to be lovers, before Marisa Coulter came along), Asriel's fortress is beyond comprehension, it is so vast, likewise with his army. She also heard a group of cliff-ghasts mention that only 'Æsahættr' can defeat God. It is unclear whether Æsahættr is a man or a thing. Æsahættr in fact refers to the Subtle Knife. Later on, Ruta and Serafina talk whilst Will and Lyra sleep. They both acknowledge that Will is like Lord Asriel: incredibly powerful. Serafina hasn't even dared to look into his eyes. Before sleeping, Will was talking to Lyra's dæmon, Pantalaimon (though Lyra herself was asleep). He confides that he thinks Lyra is the best friend he's ever had. After Will sleeps, we realise that Lyra was awake all along, and her heart is pounding. Once both of them are asleep, late at night, Serafina sees a group of angels floating above them. These angels have made a pilgrimage to see Lyra, she is that important: they had travelled a thousand miles and waited a thousand years to see this one prophesied girl, who would change the fate of the multiverse.

Lee Scoresby and John Parry are together in his balloon, and they are now in Cittàgazze. They are travelling to the mountaintop that Will, Lyra and the witches are headed for. They are also being chased by the Magisterium—soldiers of the Church; among other things, Lee's murder of his Magisterial attacker earlier on drew attention to him. They speed ahead.

They are forced to abandon the balloon, and are being closed in on by the guardsmen of the Church. Scoresby agrees to let John Parry go on ahead whilst he stays here to fend them off—this will almost certainly bring about his death, so he forces John Parry to make a pact to protect Lyra. Parry leaves, and Scoresby is killed by the Church.

Back with Will, Lyra and the witches, a witch sees that there are people following behind them. She investigates. It is none other than Mrs Coulter and Lord Boreal. Coulter has found a way of controlling the Spectres: she lets them know that if they do not kill her, she will lead them to an even greater number to feed on; thus, she and Boreal walk freely. The witch makes herself invisible and goes into Boreal and Coulter's tent, where Boreal is being seduced beyond his control. However, Coulter slips him poison as soon as she gets what she wants to know from him: what the Subtle Knife is and does. She then uses a Spectre to capture the invisible witch—which she can in fact see—and Coulter tortures the witch like she did at the beginning. Except this time, there is no one to stop the witch from telling Coulter what she wants to know about her daughter.

The witch tells Mrs Coulter that Lyra's destiny is to become the second Eve. She again will fall from grace, commit a replication of the Original Sin, and will bring unending sin to the world. Coulter realises that Lyra must be destroyed. She also destroys the witch at hand.

It is night. Will cannot sleep. He goes up the mountain. In the impenetrable blackness three other things are happening: his father is also ascending the mountain, a witch who hates his father is flying towards it, and behind them all, Mrs Coulter with an army of Spectres is approaching.

At the top of the mountain, Will fights with the man he encounters, scared in the dark. The man is in fact old and sick, and soon stops moving altogether. He is still alive. He realises he is talking to the Knife-bearer when he feels Will's missing fingers. These he heals.

He tells Will that he must take the Knife to Lord Asriel. It will be the only thing that can destroy God, to end the Authority's reign of oppression. And before he leaves, he lights a lamp so that he can see the face of the Knife-bearer.

Then, for one second, both of them—boy and man—knew they were father and son. A second later, the hateful witch loosed an arrow, it passed through John Parry's heart, and he collapsed dead.

Will grabs the witch and holds the Knife to her neck. She is petrified, and he screams at her. When he lets her go, she kills herself. Will is too shocked to feel anything. He clambers back down the mountain.

When he arrives, he finds that Mrs Coulter has been and gone. The Spectres have killed all the witches, and Lyra has been stolen. There are only three things left there: Lyra's backpack in which the alethiometer is kept, and a pair of angels, who tell him that he must follow them to Lord Asriel.

Will looks from Lyra's backpack to the angels and back again, and does not know what to do.

The Amber Spyglass

Lyra has been taken by Mrs Coulter to a distant land and a recluse cave. Therein, Lyra is kept drugged, in an enchanted sleep. Coulter tends to her and cares for her (and keeps her dormant) like a true mother. There is some genuine motherly emotion in her. Coulter is controlling with lies a village of simple people below, who bring her food. The messenger for this food is a little girl named Ama, whom Mrs Coulter allows to see the sleeping Lyra.

Ama wants to please Mrs Coulter, so she gets a cure for afflictions of unending sleep, and brings it to the cave secretly. However, in doing this, she sees that Coulter is in fact keeping the girl asleep. She realises Coulter is not so wonderful.

In Lyra's dreams, a set of chapter-interspersed and highly dissected excerpts, she dreams that she is in the Land of the Dead, talking to her dead best friend, Roger. She promises to come to save him, and she knows she can do it because Will will help her. Roger asks her why she's so sure, and she replies, "Because he's Will."

In Cittàgazze, Will is being escorted by the two angels who found him, to Lord Asriel. The angels are named Balthamos and Baruch. They are lovers, extremely passionate lovers, but angels are asexual. Will says that he will not take any Knife to Lord Asriel until they've rescued Lyra, and they angels have to assent, for humans are in fact much more powerful creatures—having real flesh. Besides, Balthamos and Baruch are of a low order of angels.

Baruch locates Lyra, by flying. At that moment, they see in the sky, the Chariot. They are attacked by the archangel Metatron, the Authority's Regent. Metatron is the most powerful of all angels, and is now the effective ruler of heaven, for God is old and frail. They closely escape, cutting into another world to do so.

The angels explain Angels to Will. God is not a God. He is an angel. He was the first angel that ever existed. For a long time, the multiverse contained only unconscious matter, but then when matter began to understand itself, it condensed into Dust, and angels were born. Once the second angel was born, the first, 'God', told it that it had created everything, including the angel. This continued, and 'God' created his Authority. When some angels discovered the truth, they rebelled against God—the great rebellion—but God won, and the rebels were cast out. Now, Lord Asriel is reviving that rebellion against the lies and oppression of the first angel.

Baruch, the stronger of the two angels, must go to Lord Asriel right away. They have something vitally important to tell him. Balthamos will stay with Will to help him find Lyra. They part.

Balthamos takes the shape of Will's dæmon to disguise him, and they begin to walk through Lyra's world. The climate there is changing due to the rent in the sky made by Asriel. Iorek Byrnison the armoured bear has had to move his melting snow-kingdom.

Baruch reaches Asriel's fortress—though he has been attacked by angels loyal to God, and he is weak. Asriel brings him in, and Baruch explains that God no longer rules heaven, but Metatron. Instead, God is kept locked inside a crystal chamber, inside the Clouded Mountain—or the Chariot—a vast floating mountain that is the Authority's headquarters and governing point. It is a multidimensional airborne fortress that passes constantly through the multiverse.

Metatron, as ruler of heaven, thinks that humans are getting too independent—being conscious and all—and he wants to directly intervene—to set up a permanent Inquisition, to make heaven's oppression absolute.

Baruch finally tells Asriel where Lyra is being held by Mrs Coulter, and that Will Parry is journeying towards her to save her. Then he dies, with Balthamos' name the last on his lips, before he dissolves into the air.

A sect of the Magisterium (the Church), called the Consistorial Court, know where Lyra, the next Eve, is being held. They send out a small army to go to kill her. Alongside this, they know that there is also a woman who is playing serpent. Mary Malone. Just as the serpent in the Adam and Eve story tempted Eve into Original Sin, Mary's role as the serpent will be to tempt, and cause Lyra to commit her second Original Sin. Therefore, they also send an assassin called Father Gomez after Mary Malone; not to kill her, but to follow her, for her path must inexorably cross with Lyra's: then to kill Lyra.

Back in Lord Asriel's Adamant Tower, his huge fortress, he sends out a small army of gyropters to where Lyra is being held, to counterattack the army of zeppelins from the Consistorial Court. He also sends two Gallivespian spies specifically to Lyra. Gallivespians are tiny humans that fly on dragonflies and have deadly poisoned spurs in their heels. Because of their size, they are the best spies. The two spies that he sends are called the Chevalier Tialys, and the Lady Salmakia.

Meanwhile, Will and Balthamos disguised as his dæmon draw closer to Lyra's position. In a town, at the port, they see that a group of armoured bears are fighting with the men. Will takes initiative and, loudly, calls the whole thing to a standstill. Instead of fighting, he proposes, he himself shall challenge the head bear to a duel. The whole clearing is deadly silent. The head bear laughs, for he could crush Will with one blink of an eyelash. Will agrees it is an unfair fight, so he suggests that the bear hand over one piece of his armour to Will, to make it fair. The bear is enraged, and does so. However, Will takes out the Subtle Knife and shreds the rock-hard helmet to pieces, then looks the bear in the eye. The bear surrenders.

Of course, the bear is none other than Iorek Byrnison, fleeing with his race from his melting kingdom. When Will explains that he is a friend of Lyra's, the bear becomes friendly, because he is very affectionate towards Lyra (and Lyra only, of all humans, apart, perhaps, from his dead friend Lee Scoresby). Will travels with Iorek towards the Himalayas where Lyra is being held.

So Will, Iorek and Balthamos, Asriel's army, and the Church's army, are all coming towards where Mrs Coulter is holding Lyra asleep.

Amidst all this, Mary Malone steps through a window into another world, and finds herself, after much walking, in a strange land. The only conscious beings on the planet are strange elephantine creatures with diamond-shaped spines, called Mulefa. They travel by attaching round seed-pods to their feet, and then use them as wheels. These Mulefa have a complex culture, language, and a large village; in all ways, they are people.

Mary learns to communicate with the Mulefa, and on occasion consults her Chinese divination device, the I Ching, and it tells her to stay with them. She becomes particularly friendly with a female zalif (Mulefa word for a single Mulefa) called Atal. Atal explains that roughly 30,000 years ago, Mulefa were not conscious. Then, one day, in Mulefa legend, a serpent told a female zalif to try on a seedpod. When she did so, she became conscious, and could suddenly see Dust—though the Mulefa call Dust by the name of Sraf; they see it as golden flecks that fill the world. Once the Mulefa began to use the seed-pods for wheels, they began to see the sraf, and became conscious.

Meanwhile, Will reaches Lyra's cave. There, Will goes straight to see Mrs Coulter, and she is too much for him—she instantly asserts her female control. She explains she's keeping Lyra asleep to protect her from the Church; her claims are plausible, just, but Will does not believe her. She also mentions Will's mother—his sick mother whom he loves but has left behind in the care of his piano teacher—this comment was designed to throw him, and it does. He leaves. He will use the same method that he used to steal the alethiometer off Sir Charles Latrom. He will cut a window directly over to where Lyra is sleeping, and rescue her.

At night, he does this, and finds the cave empty. He has met with the girl Ama, and using her cure for unending sleep (a herb), they wake Lyra. Will is just cutting a window back into another world, when suddenly Mrs Coulter is there. She's holding a gun, and for a moment, Will sees the face of his own mother in hers. A tidal wave of emotion thrills across him as he slides the Knife into the air, and a moment later it seems to catch onto something, and cracks into seven pieces. The Knife is broken. He's at gunpoint.

The two Gallivespian spies, the Chevalier Tialys and the Lady Salmakia, fly into the cave, and hold Coulter and her monkey-dæmon at poisonous-spur-point. They are locked into an impossible stalemate. Outside, the forces have clashed, and a deadly battle is going on. The two Gallivespians break the stalemate, and Will and Lyra escape the cave with them. Balthamos flees in cowardice. Will cuts into another world, he and Lyra go through, the two spies follow, and they leave the battle behind.

The battle ends, and Mrs Coulter is captured by Lord Asriel's forces. She is taken back to Lord Asriel's Adamant Tower, where she meets Asriel. She tries to learn as much as she can of his blasphemous actions, but he is controlling her as much as she thinks she's controlling him. There is also a certain ambiguous warmth, or absence of coldness developing in her, though we don't know what to make of it.

Coulter however escapes by stealing a special craft, and flies of to tell the Consistorial Court of the Church about everything she's learnt. Asriel is quick; he sends his chief Gallivespian spy, Lord Roke, after her, and Lord Roke manages to get into her craft.

Back with Will and Lyra, the two Gallivespians want to take Will and Lyra to Lord Asriel, primarily to deliver the Subtle Knife, Æsahættr, to him. Will does not let them know that the scabbard at his side contains only shards; instead, he uses the assumption that he has the Knife, to do what they want to do. Instead, they want to mend the knife, and do something quite outstanding.

Thinking about things, Will and Lyra realise that humans are tripartite beings. They have a body, a soul, and a mind. The body is what dies at death, and so too does the soul—the dæmon—but the mind, which can think about both the soul and the body, does not. It goes to the land of the dead: in Lyra's dreams, she'd dreamt of the Land of the Dead, and Roger. Assuming it truly exists, and that their revelations are correct, they determine to go to the Land of the Dead: Lyra wants to say sorry to Roger for leading him to his death, and Will wants to see his father.

They find Iorek, who has resettled him kingdom where it is still cold. He is an expert with metal, and only because it is Lyra that is asking does he agree to mend the Knife. It is a tough process, but successful. Before they leave, Iorek warns Will that the Knife has a power of its own, and to be wary. Also, the sly Gallivespian spies become ever the more irritated with the two children, but gain a small respect for them too.

They begin cutting through worlds until they find the Land of the Dead—or the World of the Dead. Eventually they, quite astoundingly, find it, perhaps by fate—for Lyra's great fate indeed involves the World of the Dead. They find processions of ghosts in a colourless dull town roaming towards a port. In this town, the Suburbs of the Dead, many people are simply waiting around in dilapidated huts, to die. The strange thing, however, is that every person has an accompanying 'Death'—a physical embodiment of the end of their life. Apparently, these 'Deaths' are like Dæmons—they are always there, whether you can see them or not.

When Lyra becomes infuriated with the single-mindedness of the Chevalier Tialys, she passion drives her suicidal, and by this sudden emotion, her Death appears to her. It agrees to guide her to the true Land of the Dead. There they go.

They come to the port, where a Charon-like skeletal boatman awaits dead passengers. Lyra's Death leaves, and she knows that the next time she sees him, it'll be the end of her life, many many years in the future. For now, however, they get into the boat.

There's a problem. Dæmons cannot cross this metaphysical river; it is a law like gravity: insurmountable. Lyra must leave her beloved dæmon Pantalaimon, or just 'Pan', behind on the shore, and they cry out to each other as the boat draws away. The connection between human and dæmon gets wrenched on with unbearable pain, but eventually it snaps; this is different however, to the Gobblers' incision; it was consciously done, and represents a newer strength and freedom of soul. Nevertheless, it is torturous as the image of Pan disappears under the mist. Of course, at the same time, though it is invisible, Will, Tialys and Salmakia all have their dæmons torn out too; the boat ride to the Land of the Dead is as painful as any death itself may be.

Back with Mary Malone in the world of the Mulefa, she is taken to see Sattamax, the oldest and wisest Mulefa. He explains that 300 years ago, the seed-pod trees started to sicken and die. Without the seed-pods, the Mulefa would not be able to see the sraf, the Dust, and that would stop them from being conscious. It is imperative that they stop the seed-pod trees from dying, but they do not know how. Sattamax asks Mary to help them, and she agrees, though doesn't know how she will do it.

She does, however, make a device by which to see sraf. She noticed that there was a special lacquer in this world that had a polarising effect on light. She spends long hours creating two sheets of this lacquer, and then experimenting with them. She discovers that when they are just the right distance apart, looking through them, she can see the sraf, the Dust, the Shadows, the golden particles. To fix this distance, she fashions the whole thing into a telescope-like instrument, an amber spyglass.

She begins her investigations by climbing up one of the seed-pod trees to see what was going on up there. Using the amber spyglass she sees that there are vast Dust-streams in the air, all flying off into the distance. At the top of the trees, there are large flowers with open petals. It is clear that the Dust, the sraf, is meant to be caught by the flowers, so that the sraf may nourish the tree, and may in turn infuse the seed-pods with the sraf by which the Mulefa become conscious. However, the sraf is not falling into the flowers, but it being dragged off sideways by some unknown force, so that only the odd particle gets into the tree to keep it alive.

But what is it that is making all the Dust fly away?

Will and Lyra, with the Chevalier Tialys, and the Lady Salmakia, arrive at the Land of the Dead. They are outside its gates, and all around them, harpies fly and screech. As they try to enter, one particular harpy soars at them. It asks them questions, but when Lyra lies (her speciality), the Harpy can see straight through it. Every lie of hers makes it screech louder with more fury. They escape this and enter the Land of the Dead, a vast, dull, dark, forsaken valley, populated with the non-physical ghosts of every being that ever lived. There is no heaven or hell. On death, every single being ends up in this one dismal wasteland, to be haunted by harpies for eternity.

It is the job of the harpies to screech truth. They know every single bad thing everyone has ever done, and they make sure that every single ghost is reminded of all of their mistakes as often as possible. All in all, it's a thoroughly miserable place.

Like angels have lust for real flesh, and like witches revel in it, the ghosts immediately flock to the living forms of Will and Lyra, and the two Gallivespians. They are not hideous but piteous wisps of dead lives, many of them children. Lyra is overcome with compassion and pity. She does not just want to find Roger anymore. If she can, she wants to free every ghost from this hell.

A ghost who was once a religious zealot cries out that this valley is in fact heaven, and that Lyra is an agent of the Devil, breeding malcontent. More of the ghosts, however, are persuaded to follow Lyra and Will as they browse through the dead, with a grand purpose they don't even know.

And eventually Lyra finds Roger, and she apologises to him; he is overjoyed to see her. Will and the Gallivespians try to think about how to get the dead out of this place (for whenever they cut into another world, they are too deep underground for the window to lead anywhere). In the meantime, Lyra comforts the ghosts by telling them stories about her physical life (that all the ghosts wish they'd used better). She tells them about Jordan college and all her adventures. They, and the harpies, listen intently. When Lyra stops, the harpies want more: her outpouring of truth nourished and fed them, and they liked it.

Thus, the answer is struck upon. The harpies will lead Will and Lyra, and, indeed, all of the ghosts, to the highest point in the Land of the Dead. There, Will will cut into another world: an exit from the land. Finally, rather than tormenting people, the harpies will ask every entrant to the valley to tell them the story of their life: that will feed the harpies, and in return the harpies will guide those people out of the Land. In other words, people should live their lives to the absolute full, so that they have an excellent, true story to tell the harpies on death.

This is agreed on, and the guidance to the highest point begins.

Back in Lyra's world, Mrs Coulter reaches the Consistorial Court of the Church, where she is placed under arrest. She tells a certain Father MacPhail about Will and Lyra, and Asriel. That night, Lord Roke, who had hidden with her, reveals himself to her. They become allies of a sort.

The same night, a young priest comes in sneakily, and steals the locket that Mrs Coulter wears around her neck. He takes this back to Father MacPhail, followed by Lord Roke. Roke learns that the locket contains some of Lyra's hairs (a sentimental emblem not expected of Coulter), and that, using a special new type of quantum bomb, the hair will be used to kill Lyra. In short, they will blow up the hair, which they will link to where it has come from—Lyra—who will in turn be blown up, no matter where she is. The device also needs a lot of energy, in other words, it requires an incision, a separation of dæmon and human; and Mrs Coulter will be the victim. Of her own procedure.

They travel to a special place (Saint-Jean-les-Eaux) to detonate the bomb. There, Coulter and Roke manage to break free and begin to fight. There are witches there too. Pandemonium sets in. At the last moment, Father MacPhail puts his own self into the incision device, determined to sacrifice himself to kill Lyra, even though his own dæmon is pleading with him to stop.

He detonates the bomb.

Lord Roke is killed. Then Lord Asriel himself, in a powerful craft, descends, and rescues his former lover Mrs Coulter.

Back in the Land of the Dead, the ghosts of Lee Scorseby and John Parry suddenly appear beside Lyra and Will. There is no time for greetings. They quickly instruct Will to find on Lyra's hair a pair where a lock has been cut off. He is there to remove the frayed ends, and quickly put them into another world. He does this, and not a moment later, the bomb explodes, creating a vast abyss, a gaping hole of nothingness, an explosion of the gap between worlds. It is infinitely deep, and through the abyss lies the void, the nothingness beyond all worlds. It is a terrifying prospect, especially when Lyra nearly falls into it, but is rescued by a harpy.

And then it's time for greetings. Lee and John tell Will and Lyra that their dæmons have made their way to the world of Lord Asriel's fortress; that is where they await; that is where Will and Lyra must go.

At last, they reach the highest point, and Will cuts a large window into another world. The first ghost to ever be freed from the Land of the Dead is Roger, who, as his atoms dissolve into nature, giggles with glee, or relief. A happy goodbye. And so, the procession of ghosts, all prepared to face oblivion, begin to walk out of the Land of the Dead, to redistribute themselves across the multiverse they miss, once more.

Will and Lyra, exhausted, fall asleep.

Father Gomez, the assassin sent after Mary Malone, makes it into the world of the Mulefa. He's constantly on her tail, and both she and he are constantly drawing closer to Lyra; his assassination will be soon.

Lord Asriel takes Mrs Coulter back to his fortress, his Adamant Tower, and there they discover that the Clouded Mountain itself, the Chariot driven by Metatron, is drawing on their position—to attack. Asriel gathers his entire army. They have now, already, learnt of the incredible thing that Will and Lyra have done in the Land of the Dead: freed it. Will and Lyra are now the top priority. Asriel knows their dæmons are somewhere close, on this world, and he orders his army to protect them at all costs.

Asriel and Marisa talk. Asriel in fact wants to preserve Dust forever, not destroy it. He does not think 'sin' as the Church defines it is bad. Like the angels desire flesh, 'sin' is no more than enjoyment of life. Without such 'sin' there'd be no story to tell the harpies. It is not really 'sin', it is in fact freedom. If the Church destroys Dust, which they think is Original Sin, that freedom will be lost forever, and the Authority's oppression will dominate all worlds.

The great, final battle begins.

Some of the ghosts, including John Parry and Lee Scoresby, are not ready to meet oblivion. They will strain to hold themselves together, and join Asriel's army: for only a being without a dæmon, such as a ghost, can fight with a Spectre; and Spectres indeed shall be attacking Asriel's army.

Will opens a window into Asriel's world, where the battle is raging, and the army of ghosts charge. Will and Lyra run through as well. Tialys and Salmakia, who by now are dying, for the Gallivespians are short-lived creatures, also go through into this final battlefield.

Will and Lyra, to their horror, realise that they can now almost see the Spectres: they must be on the brink of 'growing up'. Once they can see the Spectres, they can be killed by them. They rush off to find their dæmons.

In the meantime, the angel Xaphania shows Lord Asriel where the abyss made by the bomb has blown a hole in the mountain. Within, Dust is visible in the air, and ghosts are parading past.

At the same time, Mrs Coulter sets off in a craft for the Clouded Mountain. Landing on it, she manages to trick the first angel guard she sees into bringing her directly before Metatron; God. She quickly learns she has a great power here, for all angels desire flesh greatly, and male angels desire the flesh of beautiful women particularly greatly. Metatron is a male angel.

Pretending to be in awe of his majesty and brilliance (which is in fact particularly good), Coulter explains to Metatron that she will take him to Asriel—to kill him. In the process of this, she makes sure her female powers take over him, so that he is overcome with desire. She puts every fibre of her being into this final ultimate lie of hers: to trick God.

She and Metatron fly to the abyss where Lord Asriel is. There, Coulter instructs Metatron to wait whilst she speaks to Asriel, to set him at ease, to prepare the ambush on him. However, she is indeed fooling Metatron. Coulter has been a cold and evil woman for three books, but love prevailed within her. Her emotions for Lyra were always genuine, though her actions strange. She had a black heart with a tiny mustard-seed of compassion in it, and with Lyra in her arms, that mustard-seed grew until is suffused her whole being. She and Asriel, lovers reunited, know what they must do. They must kill Metatron to save Lyra, even if it means their own deaths. And they know that only oblivion awaits them, but the final love that breaks through is the driving force of their greatest act.

Metatron comes round the corner, and both lovers attack him. The struggle is vicious, and Lord Asriel's skull is smashed to pieces. They drag Metatron over the infinite abyss, but Metatron's wings are too strong: he flies. Only Asriel is weighing him down. With a final call of her name, Marisa Coulter jumps and grabs onto Metatron's legs, and the three beings hurtle into the abyss.

Will and Lyra run. The Chevalier Tialys and the Lady Salmakia have died. High above, a group of angels (under attack by cliff-ghasts) is carrying a crystal chamber. The angels are killed, and the indestructible chamber falls to the ground, where Lyra and Will find it. Within it, they find an angel whose age is of such epic proportions so as to be indescribable. He can't even talk.

He is the first angel. God.

Will uses the knife to open the chamber, and then the slightest gust of wind blows against God's infinitely frail form, and he dissolves into the air, with a final look of relief.

The children had no idea who he was.

They continue. They see Iorek in battle, and he bids his final farewell to Lyra. They keep running, and at last come to where their dæmons are being protected from Spectres by the ghosts. Both of their dæmons are in the same form, so they don't know (peculiarly) which one is which. Will accidentally picks up Lyra's dæmon, and Lyra Will's, and in doing so they each feel the shock of another human touching your soul. There is no time to think of this though, for a divine battle is taking place.

Will cuts into another world, and he and Lyra jump through with their dæmons. At the last moment, Will is face to face with the ghost of his father, from one side of one world, to another. Previously, John Parry told his son to be a fighter, but Will says to him now that he isn't cut out for it. John Parry tells his son 'well done', and he and Lee Scoresby dissolve into the wind. Will closes the window.

He and Lyra immediately fall asleep.

They wake the next day, and their dæmons have gone again: they have become independent creatures now, and they are resentful at having been abandoned. However, Will and Lyra are not too bothered running around after them right now. Will exclaims that he feels like he's got about a year of dirt on him, so he and Lyra take it in turns to wash in the river.

And then some Mulefa arrive.

On the backs of the Mulefa, they travel across the land to meet Mary Malone. Will is introduced, and Lyra is overjoyed. They are still utterly exhausted at their three-book epic of an ordeal, so they fall asleep again. Mary in the meantime goes to check out something the Mulefa are alerting her to.

It is the opening into this world, that Will made, from the World of the Dead. An endless procession of ghosts is streaming out into the air, and dissolving. The Mulefa have made the are beautiful, declaring it the most sacred of all.

One ghost-woman approaches Mary and says, "Tell them stories." She is referring, of course, to the harpies. Then she dissolves, and Mary is confused, and awed. She returns to the children, now set to 'tell them stories'.

First, they tell her all about their entire story. Then, she begins her own. She gave up being a nun because she saw it as constricting. Love, for instance, was a place like China: it existed, but you didn't necessarily need to go there. However, there was once someone she loved, though she didn't even realise it. It was a young boy, when she too was very young, who fed her a small piece of marzipan one time at a party, and she never forgot it. She realised that China, or, love, was too good a place to miss out on, just to be a nun.

This had all come into perspective when abroad once she had met a man, and it had been incredibly easy to talk to him. He made her happy. That night by the beach, she chucked her crucifix into the sea. She could not throw away every pleasure of the world just to serve a God.

So Mary gave up her religion in favour of that memory of marzipan: of love. This whole story affects Lyra profoundly, and silently. She even feels the effects of it physically, and she blushes.

That night, Mary visits the seed-pod trees once more. Suddenly she realises that the wind, the moon, and every force of nature, is opposing the outflowing of the sraf. Nature is trying to stop the sraf from leaving. 300 years ago, when the seed-pod trees started dying, the Subtle Knife was first made, and Spectres were first seen. Before returning to the Mulefa village, Mary sees Father Gomez, the Church assassin. Luckily, he does not find Lyra and Will, for they are not sleeping where he looks. He leaves.

The next day, Will and Lyra go out over the hills and far away, to find their dæmons. Father Gomez follows them. They spot their dæmons hiding from them, but don't want to let them know they can see, so they keep on moving, looking for them in silly places. Eventually they come to a forest, which they are entering when Father Gomez high above lines up his sniper rifle for a shot to Lyra's head. At that precise moment, he is attacked by something invisible. When he called out 'who is there?', the reply is, "My name is Balthamos."

Balthamos drags Gomez far away, but is becoming weaker. Suddenly Gomez breaks free and punches wildly. However, Balthamos' weak angel-form provides no resistance to his swing; it throws Gomez to the ground instead, where his head smashes against a rock, and he dies. Then Balthamos calls his lover Baruch's name, and dissolves into the air.

Will and Lyra enter the luscious forest, safe. In a beautiful clearing, they sit down to eat the food that Mary has packed them. As they are sitting them, quiet and calm, Lyra hesitantly takes a piece of fruit in her hand, and then puts it up to Will's lips. Instantly, Will recognises the semblance to Mary's story of marzipan, and he knows precisely what Lyra has meant. He trembles at the thought of it, and Lyra trembles as well, as he puts his hand to hers to keep it steady.

Then, like two moths bumping together, as gentle as that, their lips touched. In a moment they find themselves passionately kissing, saying at last that they love each other.

And so the prophecy completes. Mary played serpent by telling them the story of marzipan, tempting Lyra to think about Will differently. She plays the second Eve, offering fruit to Will's lips, jumping from the innocence of her childhood, to adulthood when they realise the wholly adult notion of love. She again commits the Original Sin, but it is glorious.

And with this final ascension to full consciousness, enhanced by the sudden love infused within them, Dust begins to flock to them in such quantities, that, through Mary's amber spyglass, they would seem to glow like fire. If you had to divert a stream, but had only one pebble, where would you put it? Will and Lyra's sudden pull on the Dust-streams caused that redirection, and suddenly the Dust of the Mulefa world began to fall directly downwards once more, infusing all life, including the tree-pods, with its conscious essence.

That night, Lyra and Will's dæmons meet the witch-Queen Serafina Pekkala. She names Will's dæmon Kirjava. Serafina also meets with Mary, and tells her that she too has a dæmon, an alpine chough. The next day, Lyra and Will reunite with their dæmons. They are now both deeply in love, and spend every second of the day together.

They are told by Serafina that the Gyptians are coming. They have travelled far, and finally at the end of the story are coming to pick Lyra up and return her to her world. Will can of course go with her.

But therein lies a dilemma. They were told by Will's father's ghost that a human cannot stay apart from his home world for very long. John Parry had been away for maybe ten years, and it withered him away. If either Will or Lyra went to stay in the other's world, they die far too soon. Then, of course, Will has his mother to care about.

Lyra decides to ask the alethiometer, but to her horror, she can no longer work it. With her fall from grace, she's lost the negative capability, the unconscious innocence that enabled her to read it so easily originally. She cries, but Will comforts her.

What can they do then, to be together?

The alternative is to keep jumping between worlds to be together. At this point the angel Xaphania comes to them and explains that it was the windows between world created by the Subtle Knife that was causing the Dust to leak away. In the microscopic gap between each window lies the non-existence of the abyss, and into this, the Dust leaks. Every window open causes the all-essential Dust to deplete.

Furthermore, every single time the Knife cuts a hole into the worlds, a part of the void in between escapes into the word: that nothingness that escapes is a Spectre. For every cut, a Spectre is created.

In other words, they cannot keep opening and closing worlds, for they'd be throwing Spectres across the multiverse.

Instead then, keep just one window open. A secret one, that they could go through every now and then. To be together. This is also impossible because not enough Dust is made in the worlds to counterbalance the loss of any more than one open window; and there can only be one open window: the window that makes the exit from the Land of the Dead.

Will and Lyra, desperately in love, realise that their separation, which shall begin tomorrow, is inescapable. Xaphania tells them there is a way to cross between worlds without the Knife, but she does not tell them.

Will shows Xaphania how to close a window. The angels will henceforth go around until every single one is closed, apart from the one in the Land of the Dead. This will also realign the multiverse, which had been slipping apart.

What must Will and Lyra—and people in general—do? Dust leaves the world at the Land of the Dead, but it is made through consciousness. By living full lives, teaching others about love and compassion and morals, and wisdom, the essential Dust of the multiverse can carry on to let life be aware of itself.

But Will and Lyra cannot be together.

The angel leaves, and Will and Lyra, and Pantalaimon and Kirjava, are left on the beach under the sky, to spend their last hours together. Will places his hand on Pantalaimon, momentously, and Lyra does the same to Kirjava. And they know, that from that moment on, their dæmons would never change form again, fixing at last into the forms of a pine marten (Pan), and a cat (Kirjava).

The next day, the Gyptians arrive, and Lyra is set to go back to her world. Will is set to go back to his. Briefly, Lyra comes into Will's Oxford, and there they visit the Botanic Garden. Within, there is a bench, and it exists in both Lyra's world and in Will's. Will and Lyra make a pact. Every year, at precisely the same time and day—midsummer's day at noon—they will both go to sit on this bench, for an hour. That way they will know that somehow they are still together. They agree, and they will do it every single year for the remainder of their lives.

Then they part.

Will and Mary remain in our world, reality. The Knife must be destroyed. By thinking of Lyra, Will's emotions overflow in the way they did the last time the Knife broke, and again this time it shatters. The Subtle Knife is destroyed.

Mary has been taught how to see her dæmon by Serafina, and she and Will are now the only two people in our universe to have dæmons. Will accepts Mary's offer to stay with her, and help him out. His prospects of future are bright, even though he has lost Lyra. "Being cheerful starts now," he tells himself. He assents with a cheerful "Yeah!"

Back in Lyra's world, three weeks later, Lyra, a changed girl, is back in Jordan College. She relates her story to the Master and Dame Hannah, in part, on the condition that they believe her, accepting that she's been a liar before.

At the last, she agrees to dedicate her career to alethiometry; she wants to learn it again, if, this time round, the hard way. She will study with Dame Hannah.

The trilogy concludes with Lyra upon the bench in the Botanic Gardens. She and Pan speculate on things. There was something they had now to build. It was for what their parents sacrificed themselves. For what this was all about. And they know the answer:

"The Republic of Heaven."

Esoteric Renaming

To enhance the feeling of being in a parallel universe, whilst Pullman is in Lyra's world, he renames various common objects of our world with alternatives, creating a distinct atmosphere of slight dissimilarity. The alternative names he chooses often utilise alternate etymologies, but in most cases make it possible to guess what everyday object or person he is referring to. Lyra's world is highly church-based, and is more traditional, and somehow lagged in development compared to our own.

The following are translations of some of the words he uses:

• Anbaric: Electric.
• Naphtha: Oil (as in oil-lamp, rather than naphtha-lamp).
• Chthonic Railway Station: The Tube-station.
• Muscovite: A Russian, from Moscow.
• Skraeling: A person of Greenland.
• Gyptian: A Gypsy.
• Coal-silk: Carbon-fibre (coal as in carbon, silk as in soft, like carbon-fibre coats). An artificial fibre similar to rayon, which was once known as art-silk in our world.
• Chocolatl: Chocolate.
• Cigarillo: A Cigarette/Cigar.
• Bryton, Corea, etc: Phonetically identical respellings of countries. (Britain, Korea).

Adaptations

On radio

His Dark Materials has been made into a radio drama on BBC Radio Four starring Terence Stamp as Lord Asriel and Lulu Popplewell as Lyra. The play was broadcast in 2003 and is now published by the BBC on CD and cassette. In the same year a radio drama of Northern Lights was made by RTE (Irish public radio).

Theatre

A theatrical version of the books has been produced by Nicholas Hytner as a two-part, 6 hour performance for London's Royal National Theatre in Q1 of 2004. All 126 performances at the 1110-seat Olivier Theatre sold out before the opening day. The play returned for a second run between November 2004 and April 2005.

On film

A film adaptation, titled His Dark Materials: The Golden Compass, is slated for release in 2007 by New Line Cinema, the company behind the The Lord of the Rings movies. The latest information can be found on the Internet Movie Database, [2]. The original director, Chris Weitz, announced his resignation on December 15, 2004. Prior to resigning he rejected a script by Tom Stoppard and controversially indicated that the film would make no direct mention of religion due to the viewpoint the books suggest. This however may not still be the case. It is likely that the film shall take the UK title of Northern Lights in the UK.

Related books

In the autumn of 2003, Pullman published Lyra's Oxford, which consists of a short story called "Lyra and the Birds," focusing on Lyra at sixteen years old, and a collection of materials from all over the HDM (His Dark Materials) universes, including a map of the Oxford of Lyra's world. Lyra's Oxford is a precursor to Pullman's forthcoming The Book of Dust, which will focus on the trilogy's secondary characters.

Other authors have also written books based on the topic of HDM, such as Claire Squire's A Reader's Guide, Mary and John Gribbin's The Science of Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials, Carole Scott's His Dark Materials Illuminated, and Glen Yeffeth's Navigating the Golden Compass.

External links

• Randomhouse His Dark Materials official site
• His Dark Materials .org fansite
• His Dark Materials – BridgetotheStars.Net fansite
• The BBC's "His Dark Materials" pages
• His Dark Materials at the National Theatre, London
• The Archbishop of Canterbury and Philip Pullman in conversation in The Telegraph
• BridgetotheStars.net interview with Chris Weitz and a report on this interview from The Times, December, 2004.
• The Fiction of Ceres Wunderkind Fan fiction and articles