Hamish’s Blog

This is my fourth 8808 (NCEA) book reviewing entry.

Title:               Northern Lights

Author:          Philip Pullman

Genre:                        Narrative

Cultural Perspective:

Gender Perspective:  Male

Pullman’s novel “Northern Lights” has become world renown because of its rich fantasy, high drama and intense emotion and, though slightly different, it relates to our world and own lives.

A character that had impact on me was Mrs Coulter and the way she is presented in Part One of the novel. She is described as “a beautiful young lady” whom seems to be taking children, for their own safety, on a journey to the North. Pullman portrays her as a deceitful person, tricking others into loving her for her appearance when she really plans to harm them. She asked the children to write letters to their family to tell them where they were going and after “she bade them farewell and saw them in the care of the bold captain” she “threw the little bundle of letters into the furnace.” My first reaction was that of anger towards her but the strong resentment I felt was not justified as I did not know, at the time, for what purpose she was doing these horrible deeds of stealing children.

She seems very sly and has a well practiced facade which she displays; this is reiterated when Lyra meets her, and though normally she would see past a person who is a “fake”, she looks up to Mrs Coulter as being “not like any female Scholar” that she had met. The way in which she welcomes Lyra to help her is perplexing because though it seems she has real interest in Lyra’s potential, though previous description of her evil ways provoked a thought in me that there may be more to this than at first glance.

Mrs Coulter is very persuasive and I felt she was a strong figure as she had control over Lyra who is normally described as a “wild child.” Lyra’s dæmon Pantalaimon questions whether Mrs Coulter is really going to help them get to the North, but Lyra, who seems to be fully under Coulter’s charm, disagrees, putting it down to him not liking her. Mrs Coulter’s true side is aggressively shown when Lyra refuses to wear the dress that she was provided. Mrs Coulter’s dæmon attacks Pantalaimon and though “Lyra sobbed in terror. ‘Don’t! Please! Stop hurting us!’” Mrs Coulter barely noticed, casually “looking up from her flowers.” When the problem was resolved Coulter asks Lyra to be well behaved and when she agrees Mrs Coulter replies, almost as if the previous incident had never happened, “Then kiss me.”

I felt that Pullman’s character of Mrs Coulter had impact on me because I felt negatively towards her horrible evil side and they way she carelessly treats those who love and trust her and believe and in her care. The way she is portrayed in the novel effectively creates tension between the main characters as well as suspense in the plot, which I found captivating to read.