Things are unraveling in the last installment of The Dust Trilogy, the second of Philip Pullman's grand trilogies set in a world that manifests, in this volume especially, as a energized and tilted version of our own. Establishments are weakening, or restructuring themselves along novel and disturbing lines. An invisible force "is destroying the air and the seasons"; at the same time, "wealth is decaying, and no one knows why". Control is draining from states, and gathering in the offices of theocrats, the vaults of conglomerates, the hands of mobs. "Something is at work, silently, gradually", says merchant Mustafa Bey, keeping a observant eye on the ancient paths from his post in an city cafe. "Elements we thought were firm and strong are faltering and giving way."
Core Enigma and Her Quest
Precisely what that element might be, and ways to oppose it, is the inquiry that drives the concluding book, which resumes where The Secret Commonwealth concluded. This is, reportedly, the author's last foray into the elaborately built, endlessly enchanting realm he first unveiled three decades past, with the release of His Dark Materials. It's a realm whose terrain maps on to that of the real world, but whose history tacks and jibes with ours; where the individuals appear and reason and behave like us, but are paired by animal souls, souls in beast form; where the heavens are populated with witches and gryphons, but below, vehicles are taken and drinks is consumed, and mature academics carry luxury shopping bags. Lyra, whom we first met as a child in the His Dark Materials trilogy, and then revisited as a baby in the prequel, the introductory book with which Pullman began the series, is now a adult: still clearly the sharp and determined heroine of the earlier books, but more mature, more sorrowful, more cautious, less sure. This limitation is heightened by her split from her daemon, Pan – but it was also, paradoxically, the catalyst which caused him to abandon her in the first place.
Interwoven Plots
The daemon's resolve to go off in quest of that childlike part of Lyra which she appears to have shed (an aspect which he represents as her "imagination"), and her journey to reconnect with him, were the catalysts of its predecessor, which saw Lyra undertake a picaresque journey across the continent and into the mountain region, facing with marvel and danger on the way. But from the start, profound shifts were in play, and darker forces at work. The religious council – the church's ruling body, and the author's brilliantly sinister representation of strict, bureaucratic wickedness – is under new leadership, and showing its strength. Lyra's uncle – Lyra's family member, who blames her for his sister's death – has worked himself into the role of president of the Magisterium's governing body, and is set on using his newfound authority to broaden the religion's dominium. Another protagonist, who rescued infant the heroine to safety along a flooded Thames as an 11-year-old in the first book, is now an university scholar with a sideline in espionage: he is sent to a key location to discover more about Delamare's aims. And behind all of this is the puzzle surrounding the uncommon and precious rose oil which seems mysteriously to be the origin of a social and financial upheaval spreading out from Central Asia. The extract is viewed by some as a tradeable product, by different parties as a empirical or esoteric phenomenon, and by others still – the zealous "men from the mountains" – as a source of darkness; an affront that must be destroyed. The issue of its source, what it stands for, and if it should be destroyed or protected is becoming urgent.
Similar to the first series, the heroine's actions, and her future, are shown to be deeply linked with the destiny of the realm
In its predecessor, these narratives ran mostly in side by side. In The Rose Field, they merge. As in the first trilogy, the protagonist's movements and her destiny are shown to be deeply entwined with the fate of the universe. Her individual quest to reunite with her companion and recover her creativity becomes the central struggle in a wider war with an authoritarian regime which, as such authorities always have, is attempting to suppress autonomy of thought, originality and expression: all the internal, defiant ways in which individuals can be independent.
Dimensional Rifts and Moral Battles
The story begins with the unveiling of a series of strange cracks in the makeup of the Earth's air: windows that look to open into alternate realities. One such portal appears to be the point of the fiercely disputed botanical substance. The church, with its leader at its helm, labels these windows as a problem to the church's doctrine and sets out to eradicate them. As our protagonist begins to move from rigid rationalism and revert to feeling, nevertheless, her belief that these places must be preserved – that their significance and their value is somehow crucial – increases. "The substance, or the substance, or the creativity, or the field of roses, or no matter what we name it," she says, "it is necessary." The stage for a poetic conflict between innocence and knowledge is prepared.
Narrative Pacing and Protagonist Growth
At a substantial length, The Rose Field|this volume|the
