Serafina Pekkala

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Serafina Pekkala is a witch queen in the His Dark Materials series by Philip Pullman. She rules over certain clans in the district of Lake Enara, which is an alternate name Pullman created for Lake Inari in northern Finland. Serafina appears throughout the fantasy trilogy and is closely associated with the journey of Lyra Belacqua and her companions. Serafina Pekkala's dæmon is Kaisa, a large grey goose who is capable of being separated from Pekkala by long distances, as is normal with the dæmons of witches. She assists Lyra in her journey to find out about Dust.

She once was in love with, and had a child with the Gyptian Farder Coram who saved her life as she was attacked by a large red bird, possibly another witch's dæmon as Farder Coram said. For witches to fall in love with men appears not uncommon. There are men within the witch society who serve the witches, or who can be taken for lovers or husbands. Witches are said to be capable of appreciating men for their beauty, intelligence and bravery, but due to the witches long life-span, the men appear to grow old and die almost at once. This is said to cause the witches great emotional pain. When witches give birth, if the child is female it is a witch, human if it is a male.

According to Serafina, witches live for many hundreds of years. Serafina claims to be three hundred or more, and states that her clans oldest witch mother is nearly a thousand. Witches own nothing, and so have no means of exchange save mutual aid. They have no notions of honor, so insults mean nothing to them. Temperature extremes appear not to harm witches and although they feel the cold, wrapping up against it would prevent them from experiencing other things that the humans of the text may not feel, such as "the bright tingle of the stars, or the music of the Aurora". Witches fly on branches of Cloud-Pine, and equate flying to living, as Serafina states "A witch would no sooner give up flying than give up breathing. To fly is to be perfectly ourselves." Witches see themselves as subject to fate, yet they feel they must act as if they are not, or "die of despair". They believe that when they die Yambe-Akka, the goddess of the dead, comes kindly to collect them.

Her name apparently originated from Pullman's browsing of a Finnish telephone directory.

In the forthcoming movie adaptation of Northern Lights, the first book in the trilogy, entitled The Golden Compass (which was the American title of the book), the part is to be played by Eva Green.

Part of Philip Pullman’s His Dark Materials series
Books
Northern Lights/The Golden Compass - The Subtle Knife - The Amber Spyglass Lyra's Oxford - The Book of Dust
Films
His Dark Materials: The Golden Compass
Games
The Golden Compass
Characters
Lyra Belacqua and Pantalaimon - Will Parry - Lord Asriel - Marisa Coulter - Iorek Byrnison - John Faa - Farder Coram - Serafina Pekkala - Lee Scoresby - Iofur Raknison - The Authority - Balthamos - Baruch - Mary Malone - Xaphania - Roger Parslow - Metatron
Other
Alethiometer - Dust - Æsahættr - Locations - Dæmons - Panserbjørne This box: view • talk • edit