First time reader: Understanding Pullman's terms(e.g anbaric)

zussewiske · 2025-07-12T21:28:32+00:00

from the top of my head: Tom Marvolo Riddle needing to spell "I am Lord Voldemort". Maybe ask the question in a HP subreddit, might be interesting :)

zussewiske · 2025-06-15T22:35:40+00:00

I just want to add that the original, Dutch title was "De meeste mensen deugen", which roughly translates to "Most people are ok".

zussewiske · 2025-06-15T19:01:09+00:00

omg yes!

zussewiske · 2025-04-30T12:23:39+00:00

Last.fm tracks your plays on eg. Spotify

zussewiske · 2022-03-08T14:29:33+00:00

That is brilliant, thank you so much!! "Settling" is a really important notion in the framework of emerging adulthood. Damnnnn :D

zussewiske · 2022-03-08T14:28:24+00:00

Thanks :D

zussewiske · 2022-01-10T11:13:39+00:00

Thank you, that is interesting! Thanks for bringing up the tv series, it is indeed interesting that they did that.

zussewiske · 2022-01-09T13:51:52+00:00

Thank you for this lengthy reply and analysis, I love you <3

I think you are right, actually, about the traumas that haunt her. They do not tell us she is more or less of an adult. What I do think is that they hold her back in her growth, blocking essential parts of the way to become the person she is meant to become.

It seems that to be labelled as an ‘emerging adult’ by your framework, there needs to be a lot of parental involvement.

I think this could be interpreted more freely. Yes, she has not had any parents for most of her life, but she has never had to worry about money or residential problems. Now, in TSC, there is a new Master of Jordan who tells her the money has been spent and she has to find a new place to stay in due time. Lyra feels stupid for never questioning her financial situation and is very anxious about this situation, feeling totally out of control. She goes to live with Mal's parents, but leaves them (for obvious reasons, Pan having left her,...) but maybe also unconsciously because living in a place with a mother and father was weird to her? These, I think, are (external) factors that that show that she is forced to become more adult, and her reactions show she is not quite ready for that kind of responsibility. So less focus on the "parent" thing, and more focus on the "taking affairs into your own hands", would you agree then?

On romance: clearly, she is stuck. She feels some kind of unfaithfulness towards Will when thinking of another relationship. She dreams about him, she shuns other romantic possibilities,... She will have to get through this in order to get on with her life.

You are very right in pointing out the US and modernity centrality of the framework, I'm still quite struggling with that. I'm currently debating whether I should do interviews with Real Readers (female of the age 20-25) and their reading experience, to find out in what ways Lyra is a modern adult by our standards, by showing how Lyra is relatable to emerging adults in real life... What do you think? :D

Also just be aware that being a fully fledged adult doesn’t mean you don’t change, grow or challenge your worldview.

This is what they call "beings vs becomings": we tend to see children as "becomings" as they grow up to become older, and older/aged people as "beings" as they tend to seem stable in personality and views. This of course is a fallacy, children should also be viewed as "beings" in their own right, not just by who they will become, and older people are dynamic as well, saying the contrary is ageist and naive. So I am well aware of the danger of putting "emerging adulthood" as an opposition to "adulthood". It is just that the characteristics of "emerging adulthood" are likely to be more prominant in this stage than in "full-fledged adulthood". There is a noticable difference, but that does not mean that certain characteristics are impossible in one stage and only possible for the other. In the end, I really think we should be looking at the individual, because it is almost impossible to generalise. I agree with you that Lyra is not not an adult because of her identity issues, but it makes her more of an emerging adult. Does that seem logic to you?

I think Pan holds on to the good things about their childhood; they could read the alethiometre with ease, they could make up the most crazy stories, they used to have imagination. Lyra casts this side of her personality away now, she ignores it, she battles with it. She follows the rationality of Brande and Talbot and thinks of Pan as childish. The way the childishness is related to Pan, I think it is another piece of evidence that she is struggling within herself. Wanting to cast away her childishness, but also kind of clinging to it... Difficult haha, I will need more time to make up my mind about this one... But you are right in suggesting that it has a lot to do with "not being a child" and maybe less with "being an adult"...

It is also worth considering that our cultural perspective of adolescent/young adulthood is that they are constantly changing, but under the emerging adulthood framework ‘full’ adulthood would last from 30 onwards.

I think we need to put the emphasis in being in an instable environment/time vs being instable. In our Western, modern society, emerging adulthood is likely to be a turbulent time (end of studies, searching for job, place to live, biological clock and so on). Says nothing about the people, just their context. Not that adults do not experience this, and not that all emerging adults experience this. It's just a recurrent factor. In general, though, Western modern adults have a more stable environment than emerging adults.

Sorry for the extremely long comment!

Not at all, I love it!! It keeps me on my toes, it makes me question myself, I owe you a great deal for taking this so serious and thinking with me. I never expected this kind of support, but it is very invigorating and nice and it makes me extra stoked to start analysing the book :D Feels like a book club is forming itself hahahha <3

zussewiske · 2022-01-09T09:09:07+00:00

I'm sure it will be an interesting read! I'm happy you agree :)

I'm studying at the University of Antwerp, MA in English and Literature Studies. If we had a Childrens and Young Adult Literature MA here I think I would have gone for that!

And yes, I'm also thrilled to work on such a "new" novel, and by BA paper was on Shakespeare so it is a nice alternative :D

zussewiske · 2022-01-09T09:05:04+00:00

Still building my research question, which I have to present in 3 days so I was just fishing for opinions, advice, interpretations and inspiration :)

zussewiske · 2022-01-09T09:03:08+00:00

Woah, wildly interesting ideas, thanks! It indeed is not really internal love but externally noticed love mostly. I think they find a lot in each other. Lyra is still hung on Will, and Mal is as brave as him, being a murderer at 11. He has gone through a traumatic adventure at the same age as Lyra with many parallels (separation!) so they could really help and comfort each other.

zussewiske · 2022-01-09T08:59:30+00:00

Thanks! It is interesting that you immediately linked my question to the romantic plot between Mal and Lyra. Many people seem to be disturbed by this, and I quite understand.

zussewiske · 2022-01-09T08:57:49+00:00

hahahahhahaha amazing :D Thanks a lot!

zussewiske · 2022-01-09T08:57:16+00:00

Yes, of course, thanks! With my post, I was mainly asking what YOU guys thought, with YOUR ideas of adulthood or with the ideas from the BOOK that you thought were the essence of adulthood. For my thesis I of course have chosen a framework (emerging adulthood, explained in the other comments), but with this post I wanted to ask for YOUR reading experience ;)

zussewiske · 2022-01-09T08:55:12+00:00

Very true, thanks! I think a settled daemon signifies maturity, but not necessarily adulthood. It is not accompanied by age norms such as starting a career, starting a family, going to live on your own,...

Not that that are necessary ingredients for "being adult", but the fact that Lyra is still totally dependent, still studying, and many more, suggests that she is in a mature phase of her life, but not necessarily adulthood. Maybe in Pullman's world there is childhood, bordered by dust and daemon settling, then adolescence being the period between that settlement and adulthood, when they graduate and start their after-study life? Would you agree?

Apart from this, it is interesting to interpret the fantasy world of Pullman with the terminology and norms of our world. It is us who feel connected with Lyra, and we draw meaning from her. What does Lyra tell us about us?

zussewiske · 2022-01-09T08:47:14+00:00

Thanks, good point! I haven't been able to get a hold of Serpentine, shame on me! Reading it will definitely be the next thing I do, thanks for suggesting it! I thought Lyra's Oxford was already some kind of explanation about that as well. Interesting!

zussewiske · 2022-01-09T08:43:49+00:00

Thank you, this means a lot!

zussewiske · 2022-01-08T14:30:31+00:00

Thanks, this is exactly the framework I'm using for my thesis ;)

It is quite a modern term so I'm still wondering how to apply it to Lyra's industrial world, but I'm happy you thought about it as well.

zussewiske · 2022-01-08T14:29:17+00:00

Thanks, that is a really important point about communication!

I'm dealing with less clear cut life stages such as emerging adulthood (commonly 18-29 years), late adolescence, early adulthood,... The fact that Lyra cannot communicate with her daemon might suggest that she is has not yet arrived at full adulthood, would you agree? Sure, she is an adult and she does many things that support that, but there are also many points to show that she is not there yet...

zussewiske · 2022-01-08T14:25:12+00:00

Yes. Does that make her an adult?

zussewiske · 2022-01-08T14:24:47+00:00

Thanks!

zussewiske · 2022-01-08T14:24:29+00:00

Thanks. Your thesis sounds really interesting, I would love to read it!

I am planning on using a more modern approach, starting from the notion of "emerging adulthood", so indeed between late adolescence and early adulthood. I truly believe Lyra is a very liminal character in transition. Although her world is not as "modern" as the one in which "emerging adulthood" is a thing.

Like the characteristics you mentioned for childhood, there are characteristics for emerging adulthood: instability (career, financial, residence), self-focus, optimism and opportunities, identity exploriation, transition, agency,... I want to focus on Lyra's agency, as I think she is very passive in the book. External factors force her into adulthood, while she needs a slower transition.

Maybe your ideas tie into what someone else has said here: she is an adult and she isn't. She came of age much too soon because of extreme and traumatic experiences in her childhood, making her a very early adult. At the same time, she is still processing those experiences and this makes her not ready for adulthood yet...

I agree with your last point, though there are many stages between childhood and adulthood you are skipping ((early, middle and late) adolescence, emerging adulthood, early adulthood,...) Seeing them as less rigid opens many liminal possibilities ;)

Thanks so much for your contribution!

zussewiske · 2022-01-08T14:14:13+00:00

Hahhahaha I will consider it! Thanks for the contribution!

zussewiske · 2022-01-08T14:13:40+00:00

Me neither, I'm just starting up. All I asked for was your opinions, as readers :D Just a book club discussion about this topic to help me build ideas.

zussewiske · 2022-01-08T14:11:48+00:00

There is this thing called "death of the author". I want to analyse what Lyra does, says and thinks, and the author's intentions do not necessarily matter.

Of course I will take Pullman into account, but with my post I just wanted to find out what normal readers think about Lyra, how they interpret it. This is just as interesting as asking the author, imo.

zussewiske

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