The Golden Compass and Philosophy God Bites the Dust

With these words, the spell is cast. Upon reading them, millions of people have been pulled irresistibly into the adventure-filled cosmic vision of Pullman's His Dark Materials, a vision in which the angelic being who claims to be God is a fraud and a tyrant, life and love are made out of Dust, a whole world is dominated by a malignant church bent on separating children from their animal natures, and the best hope for the future lies with a grimy young girl who revels in trickery and deceit.

Richard Greene is Associate Professor of Philosophy at Weber State University. He co-edited Quentin Tarantino and Philosophy (2007) and Zombies, Vampires, and Philosophy (2010). Rachel Robison is completing her Ph.D. at UMass, Amherst. She contributed chapters to Quentin Tarantino and Philosophy (2007) and The Legend of Zelda and Philosophy (2008). Both co-editors have sometimes not seen eye to eye with the Authority.