The Book of Dust: La Belle Sauvage

Alice Parslow is around 16 years old and washes dishes for Malcolm’s parents in the Trout. At the start of the novel, she is Malcolm’s “only annoyance,” teasing him relentlessly about having a girlfriend. Alice is skinny with “lank dark hair” and “lines of self-discontent […] already gathering on her forehead” (2). She is often “scowling and sneering,” especially at Malcolm. She mentions that her dæmon, Ben, doesn’t “fool around,” playfully changing shapes the way Asta and other children’s dæmons do, suggesting Alice’s more serious, unhappy demeanor. However, as the novel progresses, it becomes clear that Alice’s contemptuous attitude is a tool to mask her insecurities and hide a more sensitive interior. 

Despite Alice’s greater maturity, she is innocent enough to be seduced by Bonneville, who takes advantage of her insecurity about her looks and her wish for love and validation. He buys her fish and chips, kisses her, and tells her she is beautiful, offering her the male attention she has never had. However, in the end, she cannot overlook Bonneville’s “horrible” dæmon and knows that his affection isn’t genuine. This experience deeply affects Alice as her first exposure to intimacy turns out to be “just scorn and hate” (381), which reinforces her self-doubt. Later, the fairy woman also tries to prey on Alice’s insecurities, telling the girl, “I could make your face so lovely that every man would be your slave” (375). This temptation again causes Alice to hesitate while “a succession of emotions pass over” her face (375), but she rejects the woman’s offer, hiding once again behind her “usual half-sneering contempt” (375).

When the flood comes, Alice is working in the priory’s kitchen, allowing her to escape with Malcolm and baby Lyra. From the start of their journey, Malcolm is surprised by Alice. She complains little about the first uncomfortable night in the canoe and generally supports Malcolm and trusts him. She becomes gentler and kinder, calling Malcolm “Mal” and tenderly seeing to his injuries. She confides in him about Bonneville, opening up about her insecurities in a way she hasn’t before. At the end of the novel, she stands up to Lord Asriel, lecturing him on everything “Mal” has done to keep her and the baby safe. Like Malcolm, Alice matures considerably over the course of the novel, but she does so by learning to relax her rigid self-control to become more trusting and vulnerable.

Gerard Bonneville is the antagonist of La Belle Sauvage. Before being imprisoned, he was a “brilliant” scientist studying the mysterious Rusakov field. He wrote a paper claiming that Dust is the elementary particle that explains consciousness, arguing that “matter itself is conscious” (284) and, therefore, invoking the wrath of the Church. He went to prison for an unspecified “sexual crime” somehow involving Mrs. Coulter. Upon his release, he was dismissed from his position at the university and cut off from the tools and facilities he needed to do his work. When he learned that the Magisterium was searching for Lyra, he set off to find the child, thinking he could bargain with the Church and trade Lyra for a new laboratory and research equipment. 

Although the man seems kind and friendly to children, adults instinctively avoid him and warn Malcolm against speaking to him. Bonneville’s evil nature is revealed through his “horrible” dæmon, a hyena who loses a leg in a fight with Coram van Texel and later loses a second leg when Alice shoots the creature. The dæmon’s progressive disfigurement reflects Bonneville’s descent into madness and corruption. Malcolm even witnesses him beating his own dæmon, an unthinkable act that causes Sister Benedicta to suggest the man is “mentally ill” because Bonneville experiences all the same pain as his dæmon. Even though science and rational thought are generally pitted against the authoritarian Church, Bonneville’s identity as a leading scientist rejects binary notions of right and wrong, showing that religion is not inherently bad and science is not inherently good. Rather, the hunger for power and control is universally evil.

In order to capture Lyra, Bonneville manipulates and seduces Alice and, later, the young nun Sister Katarina. He relentlessly chases Alice and Malcolm, always one step behind them, and becomes extremely violent, assaulting Alice at the end of the novel. In their final exchange, Malcolm kills Bonneville, powered by his love of Lyra and desire to protect Alice.

Dr. Hannah Relf is part of a group of scholars studying the truth-telling alethiometer in Oxford. Her dæmon is a marmoset called Jesper. Hannah is considered “a woman of great gifts” (51) in her field and works on adding new “levels of meaning” to the hourglass symbol. In her unofficial work, she reads the alethiometer for the secret organization Oakley Street that works against the oppressive Magisterium. When the acorn containing her instructions fails to appear, she consults the alethiometer, and its answer leads her to the Trout, where she meets Malcolm. 

Hannah enlists Malcolm’s help as a spy, something she feels guilty about, given the boy’s youth and innocence. She also offers him books to borrow, giving him knowledge that is hard to come by because there are no public libraries in Oxford. As a scholar, Hannah helps initiate Malcolm into the world of adulthood. She symbolically ushers Malcolm out of childhood innocence by granting him access to knowledge and experience, both through his exposure to Oakley Street and, more literally, through the books she loans him. 

As the plot progresses, Hannah commits more fully to Oakley Street. When the organization acquires an alethiometer of its own, she abandons her research to read for Oakley Street full-time. When the flood starts, she immediately worries about Malcolm and sets out to check on him. She discovers the boy missing along with Lyra, Alice, and the canoe and knows that Malcolm will try to take Lyra to Jordan College or to London for safety. She is able to relay this information to Oakley Street to begin the search for the children.

In La Belle Sauvage, Lyra, who will become the beloved protagonist of Pullman’s His Dark Materials trilogy, is a six-month-old baby. She is the “love child” of Lord Asriel and Mrs. Coulter; however, Lord Asriel is considered an unfit guardian, and Mrs. Coulter has no interest in motherhood, so Lyra is delivered to the nuns of the Godstow Priory for safekeeping. 

As a baby, Lyra is already incredibly charismatic and quickly captures the affection of everyone she meets. Malcolm, in particular, is “enchanted” by her and her tiny dæmon, Pantalaimon. He is impressed with the child’s intelligence and loves playing with her when he visits the priory. When word spreads that the witches in the North have a prophecy about Lyra, both the Magisterium and Oakley Street begin searching for her. Little is known about the prophecy, just that “the child [is] destined to put an end to destiny,” and she must do so “without knowing that she’s doing it” (285). Although Lyra is just a baby, the plot revolves around her as opposing forces battle for custody of the child, and Malcolm and Alice work to keep her safe. Eventually, Lyra is delivered to Jordan College, where she is granted scholastic sanctuary and left in the care of the college’s Master.

Sister Fenella is a nun at the Godstow Priory, whom Malcolm is particularly close to. She is frail and elderly, and her dæmon is a squirrel. Malcolm loves the woman “with a deep and uncomplicated devotion” (15), and he often helps her in the priory’s kitchen. When baby Lyra arrives, Sister Fenella becomes her chief caretaker and the only nun the child is “perfectly happy with.”

Sister Fenella represents religion without the oppressive dogma of the Magisterium. She allows Malcolm to question and learn freely, and she never becomes angry or impatient with him. She tells him, for example, “days were much longer then” (4) when Malcolm asks how fossils fit into God’s creation of the world in six days. The day before the flood, Sister Fenella faints with the symptoms of phenomena, and it’s not clear if she survives the flood and damage to the priory.

Lord Asriel is Lyra’s father. He is a famous explorer whose dæmon is a regal snow leopard. Lyra was born when Asriel had an affair with Lyra’s mother, Mrs. Coulter. He later killed her husband when the man found out about their relationship and attacked Lord Asriel. Asriel loves his daughter, but he loses his fortune following the scandal of his affair and the murder of Mr. Coulter, so he cannot care for Lyra. Malcolm meets Lord Asriel briefly and helps him visit the priory to see Lyra in secret. When he sees the way he holds and speaks to his daughter, Malcolm knows Asriel cares for the child, even though he doesn’t trust him at first. When the flood strikes, Malcolm knows that Lyra will be safe if he can reunite her with her father.

Mrs. Coulter is Lyra’s mother. She is a beautiful woman with a “disconcerting” monkey dæmon with long golden fur. Initially, Mrs. Coulter wants nothing to do with her daughter, and Lyra is sent away. However, Mrs. Coulter is an agent of the Magisterium and the head of the League of St. Alexander. When she learns about the witches’ prophecy, she tries to find Lyra and take her back. Malcolm meets Mrs. Coulter briefly at Hannah Relf’s home, where the woman and her strange dæmon make him uncomfortable. Mrs. Coulter also has a connection to Gerard Bonneville, having testified against him in court before he went to prison.

Coram van Texel is a gyptian man with a dæmon in the form of a beautiful long-haired cat. As a gyptian, a nomadic people who live on boats, Coram connects many of the other characters. He first appears in Uppsala, gathering information on Lyra and the alethiometer. There, Coram is attacked by Gerard Bonneville, and he wounds the man’s dæmon so severely that she loses one of her legs. Later, Coram appears at the Trout, returning Malcolm’s canoe with the gyptian improvements. He also reports to Lord Nugent and other members of Oakley Street.