Worlds Apart (The Subtle Knife - Philip Pullman)

Member Name: Puggers

Product:	The Subtle Knife - Philip Pullman
Date:	03/06/05 (105 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Continues the story thusfar, Expands on existing characters, Adds intriguing new ones

Disadvantages: Slows in the second half a little, No real conclusion, You really need to read Northern Lights first

The Subtle Knife is the second of Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials trilogy, a truly epic adventure embracing religion, science and classic adventure. The series is very much one story broken into three books, rather than a set of interlinked, but essentially stand-alone stories, such as those of Narnia, or to a lesser extent, Harry Potter; as such, you'd really want to read Northern Lights before moving on to this or the third book, The Amber Spyglass. My review of the first book outlines some of the basic concepts of the trilogy more fully than I will here.

~ A Recap ~

In Northern Lights, our protagonist Lyra, and her dæmon (a physical embodiment of one's soul, essentially, taking animal form) Pantalaimon, travel North with a band of Gyptians searching for a group of kidnapped children. For her own part, Lyra goes further, to Svalbard, where she finds her uncle, Lord Asriel, who has discovered a way to break through the Northern Lights into another world, in search of a mysterious substance known as Dust, which he believes to be a source of great evil. Intrigued, and feeling that Dust may in fact be a force for good, Lyra leaves her world (similar to, but different from ours) behind, and follows Lord Asriel through the sky.

This is, of course, only a basic representation of the movements of the main characters - the true complexity is something only the book itself can convey, but the above places us in a position from which to take up The Subtle Knife …

~ A Meeting of Worlds ~

The book opens a couple of days after the culmination of Northern Lights, and in a different world to that of the first installment - specifically ours. Will, a plucky, determined but undeniably afraid 12-year-old boy and his mother are being pursued by a pair of men who covet something in their possession. Entrusting the care of his mother to a friendly neighbour, Will bears the object away, inadvertently causing the death of one of his tormentors in the process.

Now a marked man, Will flees to Oxford, looking for a place to hide - and finds it, somewhere more perfect in this respect than he could have imagined; the world of Cittagazze, lying the other side of a window in the air. This strange world is seemingly inhabited solely by children, and it is here that Will meets Lyra.

United at first through convenience, it becomes clear that their respective missions; Will's to find his father, and Lyra's to uncover the truth about Dust, are more closely entwined than they might have initially thought. The importance of the two of them to higher matters begin to emerge, and are only intensified when Will comes into possession of Æsahætter, the eponymous blade of the title, whose capabilities exceed even those Will becomes aware of; the ability to cut through any substance, and forge gateways between worlds.

And so the children pursue their goals, whilst at the same time being themselves pursued as the objects of others' desires. What indeed is Dust? Who, and where is Will's father? Why are each of the children coveted by higher powers, and what is the true nature of Lord Asriel's plans?

~ Familiar faces; new tricks ~

The aspects which made Northern Lights so good return here; Pullman's incisive, powerful writing depicts wondrous worlds and breathes life into a range of characters; both old and new. The Subtle Knife introduces two principal innovations to the trilogy - the multiplicity of worlds, with travel between them enabled by the knife, and the bearer of that blade, Will. Not featured in the first book, it soon becomes clear that he has a vital role to play in events. Although it seems somewhat unconventional to bring in such a major character a third of the way through the series, the author quickly integrates him into the plot, and characterises him in such a distinctive, intriguing manner that he seems to belong in no time.

The multiple-world concept also comes off superbly. With the power of the knife, a seemingly infinite number of universes are open to the children, and Pullman makes the most of this, illustrating the similarities and differences between the Oxfords of Will's and Lyra's worlds, amongst other asymmetries. With a greater scope for variety, Pullman's descriptions of the locations used are especially impressive - as concise and evocative as before, he is able to paint a whole city before a reader's eyes without ever straying into over-long passages or excessive description. The dialogue is also particularly well written; each character speaks with a distinctive enough style and manner to often make "said X" suffixes redundant.

The rest of the new characters are generally of lesser importance - at least in this installment. The central players here are largely those familiar from the previous book; Lee Scoresby and Serafina Pekkala have expanded roles, and a number of other witches also figure. Iorek Byrnison, however, is absent from this book - sadly, for he was one of the strongest characters from Northern Lights. Still, he'll be back.

Like the first of the trilogy, this isn't a book with a great deal of humour in it - although often the interchanges between Will and Lyra can bring a smile to one's face, most often caused by the latter's outwardly pragmatic, but inwardly sensitive attitude. The subject matter isn't quite as dark or disturbing as in Northern Lights, but the tone as a whole is more hard-hitting, moving from a creepy, threatening atmosphere to a cold, hard reality - reflecting the flight from innocence that is, broadly speaking, the central theme of the trilogy. Deaths are very much the order of the day here, involving two semi-major characters as well as a number of lesser ones.

The main duo do not go unaffected here, either - Will in particular suffers (including a Skywalker-esque mishap), and both come to bear a heavy burden. The reader comes to see Lyra, who we have of course followed since the outset, as much less of child than she initially was - this seemed hard to imagine in the first book, but by giving her the responsibility of helping Will, Pullman moves her firmly towards adulthood. This is, then, not a light-hearted book, absent of the forced comedy or melodrama of other children's books (and I use the term loosely; this is very much an affair for all ages) - and it is all the more remarkable for it. The author keeps a sense of spectacle over the story, never letting the reader wholly forget the wider significance of the unfolding events, while also creating a wonderfully involving plot on a smaller scale. Rarely letting much slip in terms of the master-plan, the reader is often as in the dark as the characters are - and this makes for an intense, involving experience.

Foundation for the accusations of the series being a thinly-disguised polemic against the Church is more evident in this volume than the last; especially towards the end, some fairly controversial allegations are aired, and stated as fact by the characters. However, in a similar way to The Da Vinci Code (and even more obviously here), this is of course just a work of fiction - although much of what is straying well into blasphemy, it is only a point of view represented by the characters. Granted, there isn't much by way of a counter-argument; religion takes a fair old beating here - but this needn't spoil the excellence of the book. Even if it is strongly offensive to you, the themes aren't quite as dominant a part of the book as much of the criticism would have you believe.

~ Caught in the Middle ~

For all these considerable qualities, however, I didn't find myself enjoying this book as much as the first. In some ways, this is deliberate - the tone of the story is meant to be uncomfortable in places, and as previously referred to, we are meant to be aware that we are leaving innocence behind as we read. Nonetheless, I found Northern Lights to be that much more awe-inspiring and fantastical - part of this was of course its newness and freshness, but it was also a slightly better story.

As the middle book of three, perhaps this was inevitable. Often the plot seems purely to be a path to a point which is never quite reached, especially in the second half of the book, when the stronger chapters are left behind. If the final book justifies this build-up, as I'm sure it will, this slow-down will be easily forgiven, but here it makes for a slightly unsatisfying conclusion; albeit only by the exceptional standards of the series thusfar. Despite this, Pullman continues in the creation of his incredible world(s). Few other writers could depict a reality in which Witches, Angels, Spectres and windows between worlds seem wholly plausible, and lend what is in many ways a simple adventure story such a feeling of grand importance without having it descend it melodrama. For me, the first two books of His Dark Materials rank right up there with the best of children's fiction, and like the best, transcends genres and ages. The Amber Spyglass awaits …

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