All Program Dates

• February 11, 2026 | 7:30pm - 9:00pm ET

• February 25, 2026 | 7:30pm - 9:00pm ET

• March 11, 2026 | 7:30pm - 9:00pm ET

• March 25, 2026 | 7:30pm - 9:00pm ET

• April 8, 2026 | 7:30pm - 9:00pm ET

Registration

• Tuition/Admission for this course $275. Members receive exclusive discounts on our programs and courses. Not a member? Learn more.

• Please check your spam folder for your email confirmation. If you have questions, please call (215) 732-1600 or email rsvp@rosenbach.org.

• This program is for those 18 and older.

• Registration opens for Delancey Society members on Friday, November 14, for Rosenbach members on Friday, November 21, and for the general public on Wednesday, November 26.

Description

A journey through parallel worlds. A quest for an elusive material known as “Dust.” A journey through the underworld. Two children trying to save a dying multiverse, up against the dark forces of an oppressive Magisterium. Angels, dæmons, warring witches, and polar bears. This is the adventure of Philip Pullman’s His Dark Materials trilogy—The Golden Compass (UK title: Northern Lights), The Subtle Knife, and The Amber Spyglass. These books are not only international bestsellers, they have been adapted for film, stage, graphic novels, and other media. First published in the 1990s, Pullman’s novels have often been marketed as children’s literature, but they have garnered critical acclaim and won prestigious awards in the category of adult fiction as well. In addition to offering a gripping story, the novels ask profound philosophical questions about the nature of the material world and our relationship to each other. They also offer a rich adaptation of aspects of John Milton’s Classical epic, the magisterial 17th-century poem, Paradise Lost. In this course, we will read these books in community, following their many paths and considering their literary inheritance. 

Instructor

Kristen Poole is the Ned B. Allen Professor of English at the University of Delaware, where she teaches on Shakespeare, Milton, and Biblical and Classical literature. She holds a PhD from Harvard and a Master of Sacred Theology from United Lutheran Seminary in Philadelphia. She has published extensively on English Renaissance literature. Her most recent book is Philip Pullman and the Historical Imagination: Seventeenth-Century Literature, Science, and Religion in His Dark Materials and The Book of Dust (Oxford University Press, 2025).