Pet Ownership in Lyra’s World
Pets seem to be very uncommon in Lyra’s world and most animals kept by people seem to be working ones(sled dogs in particular being mentioned multiple times in TGC/NL), but I occasionally see people misunderstand it as them not keeping pets at all. This seems to come a lot from the assumption that dæmons fulfill a similar companionship role as pets do, which I think is very far from the truth. Dæmons are like an organ, they’re a part of someone and not a separate entity from them. If you liken your mind to your brain, your dæmon would probably best fit your heart while your soul is your whole body.
Of course dæmons are still companions and more often than not serve as helpful guides as well, but it’s not the same as having another person or animal as a companion. I’ve made dæmons a core part of my own spiritual practice and while my dæmon is very helpful to me she often can’t do much more than I could myself if I were still “alone”. Always knowing your dæmon wouldn’t erase the want or need for the companionship of an animal. Someone who only has their dæmon to interact with would still go mad eventually, though it may take longer than for someone who doesn’t know their dæmon at all. Your dæmon can’t replace the social interaction you’d get from a separate individual.
This assumption also ignores the fact many people who have pets don’t just have one. I personally grew up having several pets with the most at once being seven. And that’s not even including the many bugs I collected as a kid that I couldn’t even begin to count. Many people who do only have one pet would at least briefly consider getting another if possible, especially if having only one isn’t fully by choice. Even if the idea that dæmons fulfilled the same wants and needs that pets were true, that alone wouldn’t explain the observable rarity of them in Lyra’s world. I’m sure that if I lived in her world and Fallon was known to me from the start, I’d still end up having one or multiple animals for the sole or at least primary purpose of companionship.
Instead, I believe the rarity of pets is mostly cultural/societal and not directly related to dæmons, at least not as a primary reason. In our world, companionship animals weren’t commonplace for the majority of history. While working animals were common all throughout history and many people had bonds with their working animals, few animals were kept purely for companionship. Instead, pets were kept primarily by the aristocracy and were often seen as status symbols. Pet ownership among the middle and lower classes in the U.S. and Europe didn’t become popular until after World War II, with it still being mostly kept to the upper class in the early 1900s. Pet ownership was a growing trend but not nearly as common as in the modern day and cats were only just beginning to be seen as acceptable household pets.
While Lyra’s world is not remotely analogous to ours, it can be roughly compared to our pre-WWII society. My own estimate would be around 1900-1950, though the main HDM trilogy seems to be take place in the late 1990s and TBOD in the mid 2000s. The calendar dates themselves aren’t as relevant as the societal similarities and any connections we can make based on our own history. Just as most animals kept(with the exception of the upper class) in our pre-WWII societies were working animals and people weren’t as interested in keeping companion pets, that holds true in Lyra’s world. It also just isn’t very practical for most people to keep animals that don’t provide any type of service or resource(as it was for people in our world during a similar time period), so even beyond a lack of interest it’s understandable that most wouldn’t. Dæmons also can provide some services that otherwise would be fulfilled by a household animal, such as alerting their people to unusual sounds or mitigating some disabilities(something I’ll likely write about soon).
Could dæmons play a role in people not keeping pets as frequently as we do? Perhaps. But I think whatever role they do play is quite small and it’s not as big of a factor as it may appear at first glance. In a world exactly like ours where the only difference was the presence of corporeal and naturally externalized dæmons, the rate of pet ownership would likely be the same. It may even be more common as many things would need to be constructed with dæmons in mind, and therefore actual animals as a byproduct. For example, regularly traveling with a dog would be much simpler on transportation that naturally expects and anticipates a dog shaped space will be taken up where people sit. What would be very different though is the specific roles animals would play in society, like I mentioned earlier. Many household pets in our world still provide some sort of service even if not necessarily working animals trained to do so, and for many people there wouldn’t be a big need for that if their dæmon fulfilled that role instead.
