His Dark Materials

I just finished the His Dark Materials series by Philip Pullman (a series I'd been putting off reading because I thought it was a "children's" series—psh), and loved it. Anyone else read them?

Me! I think I even tried to start a discussion here on LT somewhere. Let me see if I can find it.

Well, I can't find it, but I did find this:
http://www.librarything.com/topic/22892

****Spoiler Alert****
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I read it because someone told me or I read somewhere that it was to atheism what The Chronicles of Narnia is to Christian allegory. I read it and thought how can that be so? The series had real live angels and even God had an appearance. A little while later I realise *face palm* that it was symbolic and/or metaphorical. Kinda all fell into place after that lol.

All in all though, great series. Definitely one I'd like to read to my kids alongside The Chronicles of Narnia (or suggest they read) if I ever have 'em...I mean kids, not the books. I'll definitely own the books eventually.

I can't help but wonder if reading a story about a talking lion coming back from the dead would hit a child over the head about how silly the whole Jesus thing sounds once they understood the allegory.

I know I never realised the allegory in Narnia as a child. I was fine with a talking Lion and didn't see any need to complicate things by imagining what else it could be. Mind you I was raised athiest, but even so I don't think children really look for deep metaphors when reading enjoyable books.

HDM is way more explicit. You can't really miss that Pullman doens't like god that much. But I don't think it really does a good job of saying don't believe in any god that doesn't exist.

I got the impression he was more anti-organized religion, especially massive religions that run states/countries.

Some people maybe equate atheism with disbelief about or disapproval of the Christian gods. In that sense, HDM would come across as atheist, in spite of all the angels and godlike beings and Pullman's approval of some gods. Pullman may well be an atheist, but this series isn't atheist propaganda.

I liked it on the whole, though it's weak in parts.

I read an interview with Pullman, in which he says openly that HDM was a stab at Christianity as an institution, but that it is his next book that is going to be putting forth the atheist argument/worldview. I don't know when the interview took place, nor whether such book has yet been published, but HDM was a pretty good read. Any religion that can't stand up to some legitimate criticism isn't worth pursuing, IMHO (and the acts of Christianity as an institution at times need criticism). I would read Pullman again.

(Warning - post contains HDM and Narnia spoilers, for those who care about that type of thing.)

My belief has always been that if god existed in any form even vaguely resembling the depiction of god in major religions it would be a hideous tyrant that all thinking beings would need to oppose, and that is exactly the picture Pullman paints in His Dark Materials. I really enjoyed the whole series.

I also loved the Narnia books as a child but the symbolism does become rather overbearing, especially in the later books.

I read in an interview that Pullman was particularly appalled by the end of the Narnia series, where all the children die in a horrible accident but is okay because they go to live in Aslan's country. Pullman saw this as a tantamount to a life-rejecting death cult mentality, and wanted to write something life affirming.

I think he also disliked the way the children in the Narnia books make it through hardships on luck and magic and wanted to write books were the children were really challenged and succeed based on their wits and hard work, because he believes children have far more potential to do so than most adults give them credit for.

> "life-rejecting death cult mentality" Pretty much, yup.

Add to that the racism in the caricature "Calormen," and the vilification of non-Christian religions synthesized into the goofy Tash cult, and The Last Battle is really a book most of us would be happier without.

I read Narnia for the first time when I was in high school, and I was appalled by The Last Battle. Certainly one of the most overbearing, obnoxious, hit-you-in-the-face-with-the-message books I've ever read.

I love HDM, though, start to finish...

I read The Last Battle in grade school, and didn't get the references. Well, I knew it was about the end of the world, but that was about it. At that time, I had only read the The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe and The Magician's Nephew. So that's where my familiarity with the series ended.

After the movie came out a few years ago, I bought the series bound in one volume. Out of curiosity, I skimmed the Last Battle a few months ago. Despite being Christian and in a church-related profession, I must confess I was pretty appalled by the racism, etc. Not sure if I can stomach a complete re-read, as was my intention.

I've read only the first Narnia book, many decades after childhood, to see what all the fuss was about. I was appalled by the "crucifixion" scene. They talk about violent tv and video games, and give that book to little children?! I didn't see Mel Gibson's famously gory flick, but based on what I've read & heard, I think of the The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe as "The Passion of the Lion." And it's not even very well written, IMO. I had tried Lewis's SF books some years ago, but there is so much SF that is so much better that I gave up on his trilogy.

HDM SPOILER ALERT - last book
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HDM wasn't uniformly wonderful, but Pullman had some ideas that I hadn't encountered before. For example, I was blown away by the scene that had people interacting with their deaths. Intriguing notion, especially in our culture where death is the ultimate taboo.

I saw the movie and didnt read the book.

My wife read the book and reports that the movie possibly watered down the tone a bit but made no major omissions.

At least a far as the movie version of "Compass" goes I have to agree with other posters that the movie is more anti clerical than atheistic.

Yet another spoiler alert, for HDM and CoN:

When the movie version of the Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe came out, I mentioned to my husband that the book was a Christian allegory (which I hadn't known until high school; I'd always read it as a Pagan allegory-it was very big on care of nature to me)-and he said "Oh, so Aslan is suppose to be the Lion of Judah." I was raised Catholic and he was raised in a dispinsationalist cult-I guess it makes sense that I'd never heard the term before.

As for HDM, I'd heard it was suppose to be some awful atheist book (honestly, I'd had it on my shelf for YEARS and didn't read it until I got emails telling me to boycott it), so I had that view going in to reading it. It seemed more like a retelling of Paradise Lost to me, and heavily influenced by William Blake (hence the quotes at the beginning), but certainly not atheist. In fact, I'd heard ahead of time that he "killed God" in the book. I was almost done with book three when I realized I completely missed that point-it was such a minor part of the book (especially because he wasn't the real god, he was just an angel that said he was god, which is essentially what Satan was suppose to do).

To be frank, if these books (much as I enjoy them) interfere with anyone's faith, they had pretty weak faith to begin with.

It seemed more like a retelling of Paradise Lost to me

Yeah, that was the author's intent. The same author has also done a commentary edition of Paradise Lost (Oxford World's Classics) himself.

To be honest,i got bored with both serieses after the first hundred pages.but who knows,maybe ill reattempt it in the future after i finish the books on my already extensive list of course-soit could be awhile:D