I have not read Phillip Pullman’s trilogy ‘His Dark Materials’ but we have been watching the BBC series of His Dark Materials. Animal lovers will be entranced by the variety of pets that follow the characters around – but wait! These are not pets, they are daemons! Every human in Pullman’s world is born with a dæmon – a physical manifestation of that person’s inner self that takes the form of an animal.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p07s8824
Once we have grasped this important fact questions come to mind.
What would my daemon be?
How do people avoid tripping over their daemons?
What would a rugby match be like if the players all came on with their daemons? When characters argue or fight in the story, so do the daemons. Commentators would be very busy in sport if there was a parallel scrum of assorted animals or an eagle daemon grabbed the tennis ball and prevented the opponent’s winning point. As for the Tour de France, can you imagine the chaos as they speed down those winding roads with rabbits, rats and cheetahs getting tangled in the spokes?
Would we take politicians even less seriously if their daemons were monkeys telling them what to say?
Children’s daemons take different forms until they ‘settle’ during adolescence. Lyra the heroine’s daemon seems to be swift and agile, usually a white ferret and small enough to cuddle in bed like a teddy. One chap has a cougar/leopard, another an eagled perched on his shoulder, but most of the adults have small animals. A horse would be handy for transport, but nobody has a giraffe, elephant or rhino – that would be a challenge.
Phillip Pullman did not invent the name; the Ancient Greek daemon referred to a lesser deity or guiding spirit. Nor is he the only one to reinvent the word; a daemon is a computer programme that runs as a background process, rather than being under the direct control of an interactive user. Have you got daemons lurking in your computer?
I may already have a daemon, our resident robin does follow me round when I’m gardening, like a bluebird in a Disney cartoon.
What would you choose as your daemon?
Times and Tides of a Beachwriter 
The books are wonderful. I would highly recommend them.
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Thanks, my daughter loved them, I must get around to them.
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I will have to look up the books…haven’t heard of them, and they sound interesting.
And I would choose a cat, they suit my personality.😊
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I imagine cats would be a popular choice.
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I loved the books, which I read with my son. I’ve not watched the series yet, but have been recording the episodes to watch later. I have a feeling we don’t get to choose our daemon.
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It will be interesting to see how you find the series after the books.
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Reading a review one day it seems the series follows the book quite faithfully until about the third or fourth episoode when it introduces something different.
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I’m not familiar with the books or series—sounds delightful.
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Yes Pete, everyone who has read the books, young or old, seems to love them, but I remember when they first came out Phillip Pullman was criticized by the church ( as was JK Rowling with Harry Potter ) because of his atheist views.
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I would like my daemon to be a bird but I expect it would be a tortoise.
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That made me laugh Julie, I’m going to look out when I’m watching tonight to see if anyone has got a tortoise as a daemon!
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I think I would want my daemon to be a dog, perhaps a Golden Retriever, a St. Bernard, or a Newfoundland. Just a calm, happy go lucky dog, that is simply content hanging with its family…
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That sounds like a reassuring choice Jim.
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Great question. We’ve been enjoying the programme and my son is a Pullman fan. We’ve actually discussed the same point – I am envious of the idea of a constant companion like this. Anyway, I got stuck as a dolphin wouldn’t live out of water. My daughter, a tiger – what’s the psychology there!?
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A tiger – hmm I wonder how many families are discussing their daemons?
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How intriguing! I believe history has shown that animals and their spirits interact with humans on a variety of levels. Not sure what my spirit demon might be, but for now I have two little brown shadows that occupy the bodies of dogs who follow me around and go almost everywhere we go. While paddling, I’ve seen dolphins swim by, so perhaps an aquatic mammal would be mine!
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Daemons for land and sea, perfect.
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There’s quite a few robins of late who’ve formed attachments to humans whose blogs I regularly read … I suspect they’re up to something …. not necessarily nefarious, but probably trouble of some sort. 🙂
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Yes, who knows what robins are thinking; just pretending they are on the lookout for tasty grubs when we’re digging in the garden!
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I like the idea of a bird (a small hawk? a blue jay? a cardinal) or a turtle as mentioned in another comment. But the first animal that came into my mind was hedgehog… Thank you for steering me towards new reading material!
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Thanks Will, you might be rather a prickly characer with a hedgehog daemon.
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This is right up my alley in terms of things I enjoy reading and I am glad you brought them to my attention. As for my daemon, I might choose a praying mantis because of its symbology, and because an orange one came to visit on my front porch and it stayed for three days before taking its leave. I like creatures that are symbolic of transformation, for I think it is an important aspect of life for all of us. Thank you for this great share.
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Thanks Anne, that sounds an excellent choice for your daemon. Good wishes for the new year.
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