The Golden Compass, Pullman

The Golden Compass (USA)/Northern Lights (UK)

Philip Pullman

1995   

UK

“There is a curious prophecy about this child: she is destined to bring about the end of destiny. But she must do so without knowing what she is doing, as if it were her nature and not her destiny to do it.”

I’ve been talking like a crazy person lately. Ever since I started reading The Golden Compass, the first in the His Dark Materials series by Philip Pullman (thanks for the recommendation Turner and Josh!). Apparently, it’s fine to talk about quidditch, or Edward and Jacob or whoever, as though they’re real things, but start talking about Dust and daemons, and people start to look at you funny. Which is not fair, because The Golden Compass is a really good book, and definitely up there with Harry Potter in terms of depth of subject matter, if not description.

I’ll admit I had a little trouble getting into this book at first. I guess it started too “en medias res” for me, too much in the middle of things, because I didn’t know what a daemon was, or what the Retiring Room was, or tokay, or any of it. But soon I figured it out, and my engrossment progressed quickly from there. Like Rowling, Pullman explores ideas that should be of importance to everyone, from a 14 year old to a 49 year old. But he does so in a way that’s more subtle than Rowling’s, and thus open to more ambiguity and complexity. Whereas Rowling uses the figure of Dumbledore to give Harry hints about meanings of everything, all of the adult characters in Pullman’s text are fraught with moral complications; none can be completely trusted. This may be a fight between the forces of good and evil, but what is good and what is evil here is a lot harder to figure out – and that is precisely the dilemma for the rough-and-tumble female heroine, Lyra. While Lyra has to go through serious physical trauma in the novel, the moral dilemmas prove to be more troubling. There is no Dumbledore to tell Lyra that she really must trust the Master of her college, in spite of seeing him try to poison someone – she has to decide all of that on her own.

            

One can’t really talk about the novel without reference to two things – daemons, and Dust. First, a daemon is kind of like a spirit animal. I don’t know about you but there was a period of time in college when my friends and I liked nothing better than to discuss what our spirit animals might be. For some, it was easy – mine would be a cat, my friend Pfeif’s, a squirrel. For others it was a lot harder; many animals worked and we could imagine it going a lot of ways. A daemon is kind of like a spirit animal, except that it’s an actual animal that goes with you everywhere, speaks, and basically acts as your emotional support for life. It can change its form until you reach  puberty, at which time it takes the shape in which it will remain for the rest of your life. In The Golden Compass every human has a daemon; they are so crucial to being human, in fact, that they are referred to several times (by Lyra, in her own thoughts, it seems worth pointing out) as humans’ ‘souls’. Whether or not a person can remain a person, if separated from his or her daemon, is one of the central questions of the text.

The second major issue involves something referred to as “Dust.” Dust is far more mysterious, in the world of The Golden Compass, than daemons, because it is a new phenomenon. Neither readers nor Lyra really has any idea what it might be until the final third of the book, when its discovery is explained. In a fitting echo of Blake, Pullman has Lord Asriel, a scientist, and Lyra’s father, call Dust “a physical proof that something happen[s] when innocence change[s] into experience.” Asriel compares Dust to “original sin,” or “greed,” and yet it’s still not really clear what it is. It’s a physical substance that can only be seen through a scientific process, but which makes it possible to see into other worlds. Lord Asriel wants to use it to build a bridge through the Northern Lights to the alternate universe he can see on the other side. Whether this is a good idea – whether or not the price of knowledge is too high – is a question we continue to ask ourselves, and which continues to harbor grave and exciting consequences to this day. Questioning the meaning of life via the effects and benefits of science, i.e. human’s changes to the “natural” order of things - it doesn’t get much deeper than that.

What I loved about this book was the way the author used physical (albeit magical or fantastical) objects –daemons, Dust – to talk about metaphysical questions – is this the only world that exists? What is a soul? And more. One thing I did not love, though, was the times when Pullman seemed to get a teensy bit lazy in his imaginings. If he took the trouble to come up with something as cool as panserbjørne, or armored bears, it seems like he could come up with something better than simply switching “gypsies” to “gyptians.” “Svalbard” is a real place in the North, but “Bolvanger” is made up. WHY, Philip Pullman? Why?

Other than that, though, great book. I’ll definitely be picking up the next one.

The Hunger Games, Collins

The Hunger Games

Suzanne Collins

2008

USA

            Over Christmas break, I read The Hunger Games, by Suzanne Collins, because vacation means you are supposed to consume junk food, in this case in the form of a YA bestselling novel. I sought out this book for my vacation reading because I found the premise of it (which I learned of from friends and by seeing the preview for the upcoming film) intriguing: It’s some unspecified time in the future. The United States has endured a civil war and now the victors – The Capitol – lord it over the 12 surrounding Districts, hoarding food and goods for themselves and keeping the rest of the country in poverty to maintain the status quo. As a yearly reminder that rebellion against the Capitol doesn’t pay, two children between the ages of 12-18 are chosen from each district as "tributes," to compete in the Hunger Games, a fight to the death in which the last child alive “wins.” Of course, there are plenty of surprises to keep those pages turning. I couldn’t put it down and now, two days after finishing the book, all I can think about is buying the next one in the trilogy.

The best part, for me, was the richness and novelty of the descriptions both of the Districts and the Capitol. Anyone with a penchant for fantasy or science fiction knows what I’m talking about – the fancy machines that wash your hair for you, the plethora of food available at the push of the button, and outlandish costumes and fashion trends of the make-believe future and, in contrast, the brutal life in the poorest District, where hunting is illegal and workers must buy back the food and goods they produce at crippling prices. And then, of course, there’s the embedded social commentary.

I don’t know whether she intended it or not, but a lot of what goes on in the world of The Hunger Games might very well be taken as a critique of the issues facing our own society today. The Capitol taking wealth directly from the hands and mouths of the rest of the country seems strongly reminiscent of the claim that the 99% is being oppressed by the 1% in the U.S., which the recent “Occupy” movement has brought to our attention. And some of the discussions between Katniss and Rue, another Hunger Games tribute from a different district, call to mind Marx’s analysis of the worker who, because she lacks ownership or even the ability to purchase the goods and services she produces, becomes alienated from her work and her society. Here is a conversation between Katniss and Rue to explain what I mean: “‘I’d have thought, in District Eleven, you’d have a bit more to eat than us. You know, since you grow the food,’ I say. Rue’s eyes widen. ‘Oh, no, we’re not allowed to eat the crops.’ ‘They arrest you or something?’ I ask. ‘They whip you and make everyone else watch,’ says Rue. ‘The mayor’s very strict about it.’” Of course, we don’t whip people here for stealing or for entering the country illegally, but we do arrest and deport our own food workers on a daily basis, and you can’t tell me there isn’t an element of power and humiliation inherent in that punishment, too.

I could go on and on, making comparisons between the Capitol and the current United States. There’s plenty more to say about it. But in the interest of starting off 2012 with happy thoughts, I’ll end my analysis there.  The good news is that you don’t have to register any of this between the lines stuff to enjoy The Hunger Games. Regardless of your political ideology, you’re sure to feel both sympathy and admiration for Katniss Everdeen and many of her fellow tributes as they navigate the massive, manipulated, and deadly game they have no choice but to play.  

To Kill a Mockingbird, Lee

To Kill a Mockingbird

Harper Lee

1960

USA

“All the little man on the witness stand had that made him any better than his nearest neighbor was, that if scrubbed with lye soap in very hot water, his skin was white.”

I have to tell you something that might upset you: Until now, I had never read To Kill a Mockingbird. 

 Don’t stop reading! I know you might find my confession shocking, appalling even. Many do (though not so much as the news that, until very recently, I had also never seen Star Wars). But please, don’t hold it against me. As I often tell people, “I was never made to read a book in high school” - a true, if not altogether fair, statement.

            Now I have read the famous book thanks to my friend, Turner (find his excellent blog about being an “adjunct” librarian at deweysnotdead.blogspot.com) who bought it for me on one of our recent jaunts to a local organic – I mean independent – bookstore. (I said the Bay area had superior indie bookstores and Turner is attempting to prove me wrong, with lots of fun, if little success). So, for the past couple weeks I’ve been falling asleep with a chapter or two of Scout, Atticus, and Jem Finch’s adventures in Maycomb County.  Now that I’ve read the book I’m no longer surprised that it was not an assigned text in my hometown. It uses the “N word” a lot, for one thing. For another, I think most folks in my town would probably not appreciate the insinuation from the author that the Finches, due primarily to Atticus’s education, are better than the average, everyday Joe. I mean, they don’t even go to church.

            My take on the book, at least the one I feel most interested in pursuing right now, is that it is about class, much more so than race. Of course it is. “The thing about it is, our kind of folks don’t like the Cunninghams, the Cunninghams don’t like the Ewells, and the Ewells hate and despise the colored folks” (229). The problem is not just racial prejudice, it’s prejudice in general – How can her teacher hate Hitler for killing Jews when she herself despises the black people in her own town? Scout wants to know. This is a complex question without a simple answer or a happy ending for (most – the altruistic Finches, of course, being the exception) white people – not the kind of thing I was taught to think about in high school. In fact, many of Scout’s observations about education might well be applied to my own, and while her experience is presented with humor rather than overt criticism, it is by no means held up as a shining beacon of truth and tolerance. “Why [the teacher] frowned when a child recited from The Grit Paper I never knew, but in some way it was associated with liking fiddling, eating syrupy biscuits for lunch, being a holy-roller, singing Sweetly Sings the Donkey and pronouncing it dunkey, all of which the state paid teachers to discourage” (247) – an indictment of small-town social/moral indoctrination if I ever heard one.

            The problem with the book, for me, is that Atticus is too perfect. I found myself admiring him, as the author clearly wants me to, but grudgingly. He’s too calm, too heroic. He’s the Jesus figure of the novel, a secular Jesus for the bleeding heart liberals on the coasts (is what some people I know might have said). Scout is too smart, her eyes too keen. What child understands and notices as much about the paradoxes of humanity as Scout does? Even the mysterious shut-in, Boo Radley, is unrealistically selfless and caring. (Boy, I sure do sound cynical, don’t I?) In fact, everyone in the book is pretty damn wholesome, despite the author’s frequent protestations to the contrary. Everybody, that is, except Bob Ewell; the villain of the novel ultimately gets his just desserts by “falling on his knife” and dying (Did Boo kill him? Or was it really Jem? Am I supposed to know?), a reasonably satisfying ending, I suppose, and certainly one with a clear moral message: prejudices kill not only the victims, but the perpetrators, too.           

I enjoyed the novel, and getting to know the characters in it. I think it is a good book that raises important and interesting questions in a charming and unexpected way. These are all excellent accomplishments. But I can’t help thinking that I would have appreciated it more had I read it when I was younger, less informed, and more hopeful.

            Please don’t stop reading if by this post I’ve cut a tiny hole in one of your favorite literary memories. Instead, tell me why I’m wrong and what I’m missing here. Thanks for reading. :)