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Sally Lockhart Essay

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Introduction There is a variety of ways that Philip Pullman has presented Sally Lockhart. Firstly, Sally is portrayed as brave because she is really independent: her father is dead, tough/a strong women as she could stand up for herself and was able to look after herself – especially since she was only 16 years old and the book was based in the Victorian Era therefore, there was a bit of sexism, saying that only male’s could do certain things. Pullman also shows the reader that Sally is very mature and intelligent. Throughout the opening chapters, Pullman introduces us to a nightmare that Sally has about her father and the description makes her seem so intriguing because she was a person who didn’t need company and would still be happy however …show more content…

This is because everyone treasures the ruby and wants to have it so badly – able to sacrifice for it - and when Sally is in possession of the ruby; she does not value it as the others do. This is implied in the quote ‘in the centre of the crumpled whiteness was a dome of blood. It was hard and cold.’ The dome of blood resembles the danger of the ruby; Sally does not have the need to feel that this is something, which she must treasure like the others who have been intoxicated by it. Instead, it is just shown by the adjectives used: ‘hard,’ and ‘cold.’ The repetition of ‘and,’ puts emphasis on each description of the ruby, showing how empty of emotion it is to Sally. Mrs Holland was so obstinate that she wanted the ruby; she ends up dying after telling Sally all the information she wanted to know. She wanted to know how her father died and why, and this is when she finds out that her real father was Major Marchbanks. Mrs Holland died because she jumped into the river with the ruby that Sally threw it into. The ruby mesmerized Major Marchbanks and he wanted to trade the ruby for Sally when she was a little baby. Captain Lockhart thought that Major Marchbanks was a coward and so he decided to be the father of Sally, as she would have died. In chapter 19, she finds herself shooting the man that killed her father – Hendrik Van Eeden or Ah Ling. You can see that she bottles

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