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Golden Compass

The story follows Lyra Belacqua, an 11-year-old girl who uncovers a plot to assassinate her uncle, Lord Asriel, and becomes embroiled in a larger conflict involving the mysterious Gobblers who are kidnapping children. After escaping from the clutches of the Gobblers, Lyra teams up with the Gyptians and a sapient bear named Iorek Byrnison to rescue her friend Roger and confront the sinister organization. The narrative culminates in a dramatic confrontation where Lyra learns the true purpose of her journey and the implications of Dust, leading her to follow Lord Asriel into a parallel world.

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39 views2 pages

Golden Compass

The story follows Lyra Belacqua, an 11-year-old girl who uncovers a plot to assassinate her uncle, Lord Asriel, and becomes embroiled in a larger conflict involving the mysterious Gobblers who are kidnapping children. After escaping from the clutches of the Gobblers, Lyra teams up with the Gyptians and a sapient bear named Iorek Byrnison to rescue her friend Roger and confront the sinister organization. The narrative culminates in a dramatic confrontation where Lyra learns the true purpose of her journey and the implications of Dust, leading her to follow Lord Asriel into a parallel world.

Uploaded by

lilymae.mote
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Download as TXT, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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The story starts when Lyra Belacqua� a supposedly orphaned 11 year old girl

residing at Jordan College, Oxford�secretly enters and hides in the forbidden


'Retiring Room' in the college, despite resistance from her d�mon, Pantalaimon � an
animal-formed, shape-shifting manifestation of her soul. Hidden behind an armchair,
Lyra and "Pan" see the Master of the college putting poison into wine intended for
the visiting Lord Asriel, Lyra's uncle, in an attempt to assassinate him. Lord
Asriel later enters after the Master of the college has left and Lyra, having by
now hidden in a wardrobe, bursts out and immediately warns him that the wine is
poisoned. Rather than punishing her for being where she should not, he allows her
to stay hidden if she will spy on the other attendees at his upcoming meeting. When
the meeting commences, Lord Asriel shows the resident scholars and the master
pictures of the Aurora Borealis (the 'Northern Lights' of the title) and the
mysterious elementary particles called Dust. Shortly after, Lord Asriel travels to
the Arctic North, and Lyra continues her studies at the college.

After the meeting, the master and the librarian discuss Lord Asriel's journey to
the north and allude to another invisible and untouchable world.

When �the Gobblers,� who have become a recent urban legend, kidnap her friend
Roger, a kitchen boy from the college, Lyra vows to rescue him. But instead an
important visitor, a woman named Mrs. Marisa Coulter (who has already been revealed
to the reader to be leading the Gobblers), offers to take Lyra away from Jordan
College to become her apprentice. Lyra assents, but before she leaves, the Master
of the college entrusts to her (with the condition that she keep it absolutely
secret) a priceless object previously given to the College by Lord Asriel: an
alethiometer. Resembling a golden, many-handed pocket-watch, it can answer any
question asked by a skilled user. Although presently unable to read or understand
its complex symbols, Lyra takes it with her to Mrs. Coulter's flat. Soon after,
Lyra becomes suspicious of Mrs. Coulter's motives when her d�mon searches Lyra's
room for the alethiometer.

At a cocktail party hosted by Mrs. Coulter, Lyra discovers by eavesdropping that


Mrs. Coulter heads an organization known as the "General Oblation Board" and that
this board is in fact, the "Gobblers" who have been kidnapping children. Horrified,
Lyra flees Mrs. Coulter's flat during the party.

While escaping from the "Gobblers," Lyra is rescued by the Gyptians (nomadic,
canal-boat-dwelling people) who afterwards reveal that Lord Asriel and Mrs. Coulter
are Lyra's father and mother. She also learns that many children like Roger have
been disappearing from among the Gyptians, and that the Gyptians are planning an
expedition to the north to rescue them. During her time with the Gyptians, Lyra
intuitively begins to learn how to operate the alethiometer.

On a stop in Trollesund, Lyra meets a sapient armoured bear called Iorek Byrnison.
Iorek is an exiled bear prince who is paid for his work in spirits, a considerably
dishonorable job for a panserbj�rne. However, the villagers had taken his armour,
which is comparable to a d�mon for him, binding him to his work. Lyra uses her
alethiometer to aid Iorek in reclaiming his armour, thereby enlisting his aid.

After departure from Trollesund, the Gyptians and Lyra continue north to the
destination of Bolvangar, where they believe the Gobblers are keeping the children.
On the way, Lyra stops at a village in response to her alethiometer readings,
looking for a child. She finds a boy, Tony Makarios, who had been separated from
his d�mon, Ratter. Lyra then realizes that "intercision" carried out by the
Gobblers is actually a process that severs the tie that binds children to their
d�mons, effectively removing their soul. Tony dies within the day, and the group
continues on after burning the body.

Soon after, Lyra is captured by a party of hunters who take her to an


experimentation facility in Bolvangar, where she discovers that the children are
being subjected to experimental intercision. Inside, she locates Roger and devises
an escape plan. She is caught spying on Ms. Coulter and a group of workers at the
facility, and narrowly escapes suffering the intercision process herself; she is
rescued, unfortunately, by Mrs. Coulter, who tries to take the alethiometer. Lyra
escapes the clutches of Ms. Coulter once again. Lyra leads the other children from
the facility and is rescued by Lee Scoresby in his hydrogen balloon. Iorek Byrnison
and a clan of witches friendly with the Gyptians also aid in rescuing the children
by fighting the guards of Bolvangar.

Having found Roger, Lyra now is determined to deliver the alethiometer to Lord
Asriel, believing that he needs it for his purposes. He is imprisoned at Svalbard,
the armoured bears' fortress, because the church opposes his experiments on Dust.
As they travel to Svalbard, bat-like cliff ghasts attack the balloon; Lyra is
thrown out but lands safely, only to be captured by the armoured bears. She tricks
the usurping bear-king, Iofur Raknison, into fighting Iorek Byrnison, who regains
his throne. Thereafter, she travels to Lord Asriel�s cabin, accompanied by Iorek
and Roger.

Despite being imprisoned, Lord Asriel has become so influential that he has
accumulated the necessary equipment to continue his experiments on Dust. After
explaining to Lyra the nature of Dust, an emanation from another world, and the
existence of parallel universes, he departs, taking Roger and much scientific
equipment. Lyra pursues them, having discovered that she has indeed brought her
father what he wanted, though not in the way she thought. It was not the
alethiometer he needed, but Roger: the severing of the child-d�mon tie releases an
enormous amount of energy, which Lord Asriel needs to complete his task. Roger dies
when Lord Asriel separates him from his d�mon, and with the enormous energy
released -- combined with his specialized equipment -- Lord Asriel is able to tear
a hole through the sky into a parallel world. Lord Asriel offers to bring Ms.
Coulter, who had come by means of her zeppelin, with him, but she declines. Lord
Asriel walks through into the new world alone. On Pantalaimon's advice, Lyra
follows. This concludes the first novel, with the trilogy continuing in the next
book, The Subtle Knife.

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