Reading Response 10

For this week’s post, I will be reacting to the selected readings of His Dark Materials chosen by Allyson-Chloe. I have not read this series before, but I was truly hooked by these passages and got a good idea of the plot, even with limited reading. The concept of “daemons” as these familiar-beings representing the soul is very intriguing and opens up a lot of possibilities for a discussion on bodies, free will/autonomy, freedom of emotion/expression, as well as religion. The dramatic irony/hidden mission bestowed upon Lyra also made me think of her level of autonomy/how she is manipulated by the adults around her, who has respect for her agency/access to knowledge, and what knowledge do they allow her to access (Mrs. Coulter? Lord Asriel?). Although there was not a lot of interactions with Pantalaimon and Lyra, I think that it would also be worth looking into Lyra’s relationship with her daemon/soul vs other characters in the story, or analyzing the body of her daemon as well as herself.