Tings are falling apart in the final volume of Pullman's latest trilogy, the second of the author's grand trilogies set in a world that manifests, here more than ever, as a energized and slanted version of our own. Institutions are failing, or reorganizing themselves along unfamiliar and disquieting lines. An unseen force "is wrecking the air and the seasons"; at the same time, "money's going bad, and no one knows why". Authority is flowing away from states, and accumulating in the halls of religious leaders, the treasuries of business empires, the grasp of mobs. "An element is at work, very quietly, gradually", says trader Mustafa Bey, keeping a watchful eye on the Silk Roads from his seat in an city cafe. "Aspects we thought were secure and durable are faltering and collapsing."
Core Enigma and Her Quest
Precisely what that element might be, and how to counteract it, is the question that propels this final volume, which resumes where the previous book left off. This is, by all accounts, the author's last foray into the carefully crafted, endlessly enchanting world he first unveiled in the distant past, with the release of Northern Lights. It's a world whose terrain aligns with that of this world, but whose history diverges and shifts with ours; where the individuals look and think and behave like us, but are paired by animal souls, souls in beast form; where the air are filled with sorceresses and mythical beasts, but below, buses are taken and tea is consumed, and mature academics carry luxury shopping bags. Lyra, whom we first introduced to as a 12-year-old in the His Dark Materials trilogy, and then saw again as a baby in La Belle Sauvage, the origin story with which the author began The Book of Dust, is now a young woman: still distinctly the prickly and persistent main character of the prior volumes, but aged, melancholic, warier, less sure. This circumscription is amplified by her split from her soul companion, Pantalaimon – but it was also, paradoxically, the cause which led him to leave her in the first place.
Converging Storylines
Pan's decision to go off in quest of that youthful part of Lyra which she seems to have lost (an trait which he symbolizes as her "vision"), and her journey to reconnect with him, were the driving forces of The Secret Commonwealth, which followed the protagonist undertake a picaresque voyage across Europe and into the mountain region, facing with amazement and peril on the way. But from the start, underlying forces were in motion, and darker forces at work. The church authority – the religious governing authority, and the author's masterfully eerie representation of rigid, procedural malice – is under recent guidance, and flexing its muscles. Marcel Delamare – our protagonist's uncle, who faults her for his sister's death – has positioned himself into the office of head of the church's High Council, and is determined on using his fresh power to extend the church's rule. Malcolm Polstead, who rescued baby Lyra to refuge along a swollen Thames as an child in the first book, is now an academic with a sideline in espionage: he is sent to a key location to learn more about Delamare's plans. And underlying all of this is the enigma surrounding the scarce and valuable essential oil which appears mysteriously to be the origin of a societal and financial disturbance emanating out from that area. The substance is viewed by various factions as a marketable product, by different parties as a research-based or mystical phenomenon, and by further factions – the zealous "highland figures" – as a wellspring of malevolence; an affront that must be destroyed. The dilemma of its origins, its significance, and whether it should be destroyed or preserved is becoming urgent.
Like His Dark Materials, the heroine's deeds, and her future, are demonstrated to be deeply entwined with the future of the universe
In its predecessor, these narratives ran broadly in side by side. In The Rose Field, they come together. As in the first trilogy, Lyra's movements and her path are unveiled to be inextricably linked with the fate of the world. Her private quest to reunite with her daemon and regain her vision becomes the key struggle in a broader conflict with an oppressive government which, as these systems typically do, is striving to quell independence of thought, innovation and culture: all the inner, resistant ways in which people can be free.
Atmospheric Fissures and Philosophical Struggles
The story begins with the unveiling of a set of unusual openings in the makeup of the Earth's air: gateways that look to give on to different dimensions. An example of a window appears to be the origin of the much debated botanical substance. The Magisterium, with Delamare at its helm, classifies these windows as a threat to the religion's doctrine and endeavors to eliminate them. As the heroine begins to turn away from strict rationalism and return to instinct, however, her belief that these sites must be defended – that their meaning and their value is mysteriously vital – strengthens. "Dust, or rose oil, or the vision, or the Rose Field, or no matter what we label it," she says, "we require it." The scene for a Blakean tussle between naivety and maturity is prepared.
Plot Rhythm and Protagonist Growth
At 640 pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
