I just finished the children’s series by Phillip Pullman, “The Golden Compass.” There are a lot of subtle and not so subtle remarks on Christianity in his books, but what I feel he hits dead on is the relationship between adulthood and childhood. Pullman acknowledges that such a great leap is made from innocence to adulthood, that it changes your very nature. Throughout the book the heroine’s soul is the form of an animal. In her world everyone’s soul is the form of some animal. And those children who have not yet hit puberty have daemons (souls) that are constantly shifting shapes. The shape that they settle on after puberty is the telling trait of who they are in their heart of hearts. Are they crafty like a snake? Do they like to obey like a dog? Are they set on conquering the world like a lion or large cat? These hearts desires are all wrapped up in the idea of having a daemon.
According to Pullman’s stories a child is best friends with their daemon until they become of age. Then, after the knowledge of sex, of sin, and the knowing of the world around them settles into their minds, they suddenly have the free will to argue and be disconcerted with their daemons, their souls.
Pullman’s tale is so convincing because I too have felt that war within me. I can make a constant stream of differences between my younger self and the me that is here and now. Not only do I argue with my heart now, there are a million different truths. When I was a child things were so black and white. Now there are multiple shades of gray. Where does the Bible fit into any of it?
Pullman also shows the example of having amazing gifts as children and growing up and almost having to rediscover what was intuitively yours. I know that half of us have had a childhood skill like drawing, dancing, racing, swimming, joke telling… the list goes on and on. But in our adulthood we have simply forgotten that we were masters at some craft. Some have gone on to cut out that part of their hearts completely. Those who were great at jokes never sought it out in their grownup selves and became people who helped the
economy but never helped themselves and never helped people the way they were intended. Is this right? What is the exchange we make when our rose colored glasses finally fall from your innocent eyes and the world is no longer spring but auburn and dying in crisp autumn colors? Is winter all we have to look forward to? And then what?
C.S. Lewis and J.K. Rowling make similar diagnostics between the state of children and that magical time right before puberty. In Rowling’s tales magical children aren’t allowed to attend school until they are of age 11. And before that they each show remarkable spurts of magic that they cannot control. Their magic is powerful, but it isn’t until that special age that they are sent off to tame and learn it. C.S. Lewis uses the transition between Narnia and the real world as a sort of something like Rowling uses magic and Pullman uses daemons. The older children cannot make it back into Narnia. Narnia is a place for the young at heart and the innocent minded. What is this infatuation with the young that we all seem to understand but are not quite be able to put into words? And why is it that what comes after childhood is so hard to grasp at? Why, in other words, does it suddenly become so hard?
