Well, apparently.. As the US edition came out after the UK edition, and after all 3 books had been written, they wanted the first book to match the naming convention of the other two - ie, named after an item that features heavily in the book. But, alethiometer is too long (and probably wierd), so as the alethiometer is compass like, they named it the Golden Compass.. but I didn't know whether they'd changed everything to compass within the book!! I'm very pleased to know they haven't!
As an aside, the programme for the "His Dark Materials" plays in London has this fantastic pull out guide to the alethiometer.. and some fantastic stuff written by Pullman!

Fimbrethil, how *was* the His Dark Materials play in London? I was considering going to see it but I haven't had the chance to go to London since a year and a half ago (I picked up the UK version of Lost In A Good Book then, it's signed! :P). I was wondering if people liked it.

Hi.. sorry - haven't checked into this forum for a little while.

the plays were awesome. really really fantastic. I was dubious before hand, especially as Will and Lyra were played by adults, but I found it superb, and everyone else I know who went found it superb. It was worth it just for the programme!!!

There were alot of changes from the book.. no Mary Malone for a start, but it was all very cleverly done so you didn't miss her at all (Think the Muleffa would have been just too hard to do on stage). And the casting was perfect - Timothy Dalton as Lord Asriel was perfect, Patricia Hodge and Mrs Coulter was perfect, and Niamh Cusack made a (wait for it..) Perfect Serafine Pekkala!

I also couldn't see how they were going to work the deamons.. and the first 5 minutes of the play I still thought that. But suddenly I believed in them!

I cried just as much at the end as I did when the first I read the books!!

Oh, and the stage has to be seen to be believed. My husband has worked in theatre and even he was blown away by the staging. a 3 story corkscrew kind of affair, so there were about 6 different stages in total.. hard to explain, but very very clever! (It's in the Olivier Theatre, so if you've been there before you'll have an idea of what I mean by the cork screw stage!)

Its on again (At the National Theatre) starting this November, so if you have a chance to see it, DO!

And get a t-shirt.. They have the wood cuts that Pullman did on them.. and are very good sizes (they go up to a size 20 for females which I was very impressed with)

I'm currently yearning after the 80 CD set of Pullman reading the entire trilogy!

AWESOME. Fimbrethil, thanks for the details! I've been thinking about going back to London, and that's one of my main motives :)

Well, I have the British version ( or thought I had) but it has elevator and flashlight in it !

There is absolutely no need to change the wording. If the characters are British and it is set in Britain, then there would not alter their speech to include American words !

The stolen 'u' s being consigned to a specific geographic area was a cool joke !

Tone <><

I think that the UK editions are best as they have nicer covers and 'colour' is spelt correctly : ) .

I prefer my TEA cover to all of the others. I don't know what edition etc, but it's the best in my opinion. and other than that the UK covers are better.



=)

Yes.... Uh, no.... Actually......I don't know.... Um, hang on.... What was the question again?