Philip Pullman's Dark Material

Author Philip Pullman's Web site is a must-read for fans of his work. It's one of the more comprehensive author Web site's I've been to, written in the first-person and including candid thoughts on all his books, including "Northern Lights," which we here in the U.S. know as "The Golden Compass."

The site also includes Pullman's thoughts on the adaptation of "The Golden Compass" for film:

"People who are interested will probably have seen the film by now. If they're very interested, they'll probably have read about how the film didn't do as well as the studio had hoped at the American box office. They might also have read that the film did very well in the rest of the world, but that despite that, the studio isn't likely to make the sequels."

Pullman even addresses -- however subtly -- those who would criticize his work as being anti-religious establishment:

"As a passionate believer in the democracy of reading, I don't think it's the task of the author of a book to tell the reader what it means. The meaning of a story emerges in the meeting between the words on the page and the thoughts in the reader's mind. So when people ask me what I meant by this story, or what was the message I was trying to convey in that one, I have to explain that I'm not going to explain. Anyway, I'm not in the message business; I'm in the 'Once upon a time' business."

Good stuff. See more here.