La Belle Sauvage question

(A Character Study)

SPOILER - I don´t think there a big or many spoilers. Mostly because I don´t finished La belle sauvage yet. This text is also a bit abstract about intelligence in general:) But I love Malcolm and I wanted to write about a charatcer trait which attracted my attention). So:

I actually really like Malcoms “kind of knowledge.”

Tough he´s just eleven, you know, he´s sometimes a bit like a Lyra… while staying in his father´ s inn he´s just listening to all the interesting stuff, scientists and explorer´s are discussing about. astronomy things, physics, a strange kind of elementary particle called “dust”…
Just scraps of specific knowledge and even if he don´t understand them completely, he just remembers. Like saving them somewhere in his head. “For later use”.

It´s the same thing with this Doctor - Hanna? - he´s allowed to come to her, not just for spying, but also for lending some books from her. Malcom usally picks something fun like a thriller and then something scientific or philosopical. “A short story about history” (or sth like that?). It remembers me on Stephen Hawking somehow:D
He´s just really interested in a lot of things. Okay, I think he already knew, but he never had a kind of “source” - but he learns some things you better understand if you just read about it.

Where he´s more different from Lyra is his practical knowledge. Malcolm is a clever boy but without a kind of higher education. (Remember: Lyra grew up on a college) He´s on elementary school, but most of his free time he works on different places. With his parents on the inn (where he learns about cooking and the “chemistry behind cooking”:D) with the nuns of the Priory of St. Rosamund and their caretaker (so fixing stuff and thinks like that…)
He has a lot of different tasks and loves to improve his qualities or to look how things work off-stage. He also doesn´t think some work or task is more simple than the other. He doesn´t judge non-educational work places. But that´s a diffferent topic:D
More interesting: He thinks about how HE could improve the work of Sister Fernella or the care taker. How their job could be less stressful and try to activeley change a progress or to invent something new.

He´s not really influenced by higher powers or power games, not the chosen-one like Lyra. But when politics effects the life of everyone, the church for example, Malcolm is also able to think about these kind of effects.
He questions clericals concepts, not in a big-bang-theory kind of way (”is the really a god?” - altough sometimes he discusses these matters with the nuns of st. rosamund) but more like: “What would happen if I contribute? Or agree? Why should I?” Which is a very special thing for a eleven-year-old boy.

Also - you can´t talk about His Dark Materials without daemons. So here we go. Malcom doesn´t really argue with his daemon Asta. Not the way Lyra does. He calls her his “intuition”. I interpreted it like Asta his more his heart, while Pan is more Lyra´s head.
Together Malcom and Asta are unbeatable in watching and recognizing things. He really IS curious, but also more careful and reasonable. He knows when he needs to be quiet.

I think Malcom is a very special character. Not a Mary-Stu-Hero. Not a Genius. More a collector of many- and many, many brainy- things and way to clever for his age (but not so clever that it would seem unrealistic). He just love to learn. And it´s not difficult or stressful, just a kind of side-effect.
La belle sauvage just shows: There are a lot of different types of wisdom, knowledge & intelligence. You don´t have to be the child of academic or something. You don´t have to become a doctor or scientist to use your head. Real knowledge comes from within:)

Again: I´m not finished the book yet, but I´m really interested about his way and his development:) His Dark MaterialsHis Dark MaterialsLa Belle Sauvage