Things are unraveling in the final volume of Pullman's latest trilogy, the second of the author's magisterial trilogies set in a universe that manifests, here more than ever, as a charged and skewed version of our own. Institutions are failing, or reassembling themselves along new and disturbing lines. An unseen force "is destroying the air and the seasons"; concurrently, "money's going bad, and no one knows why". Power is draining from states, and gathering in the halls of theocrats, the coffers of conglomerates, the hands of mobs. "Some force is at work, very quietly, imperceptibly", says trader a merchant figure, keeping a observant eye on the ancient paths from his post in an Aleppo cafe. "Things we thought were secure and strong are faltering and collapsing."
The Central Mystery and Lyra's Journey
Exactly what that element might be, and how to counteract it, is the question that propels the concluding book, which resumes where its predecessor left off. This is, reportedly, the author's concluding venture into the elaborately built, endlessly enchanting universe he first revealed in the distant past, with the release of His Dark Materials. It's a world whose geography aligns with that of the real world, but whose past tacks and jibes with ours; where the humans look and reason and act like us, but are accompanied by daemons, essences in animal form; where the air are teeming with witches and mythical beasts, but below, transports are caught and beverages is drunk, and mature professors carry luxury shopping bags. The protagonist, whom we first encountered as a child in the His Dark Materials trilogy, and then revisited as a infant in La Belle Sauvage, the prequel with which Pullman began The Book of Dust, is now a adult: still recognisably the sharp and determined protagonist of the earlier books, but aged, more sorrowful, more cautious, less certain. This limitation is heightened by her division from her daemon, Pan – but it was also, ironically, the catalyst which caused him to abandon her in the first place.
Converging Storylines
The daemon's resolve to depart in pursuit of that innocent part of Lyra which she may have forgotten (an aspect which he epitomises as her "creativity"), and her journey to rejoin with him, were the incitements of its predecessor, which saw Lyra undertake a wandering voyage across the continent and into the Caucasus, facing with wonder and danger on the way. But from the outset, underlying forces were in motion, and sinister powers at work. The Magisterium – the church's governing authority, and the author's brilliantly sinister representation of strict, procedural malice – is under recent guidance, and flexing its muscles. Lyra's uncle – Lyra's relative, who holds responsible her for his sibling's death – has manoeuvred himself into the role of president of the Magisterium's High Council, and is set on using his newfound influence to broaden the religion's dominium. Malcolm Polstead, who saved baby Lyra to refuge along a flooded Thames as an 11-year-old in the prequel, is now an university scholar with a sideline in intelligence work: he is assigned to Geneva to learn more about the antagonist's plans. And behind all of this is the mystery surrounding the rare and costly essential oil which appears somehow to be the cause of a societal and economic upheaval emanating out from that area. The extract is viewed by various factions as a commercial commodity, by alternate groups as a empirical or esoteric wonder, and by further factions – the fanatical "mountain dwellers" – as a source of darkness; an insult that must be obliterated. The question of its origins, what it stands for, and whether it should be destroyed or preserved is escalating in importance.
Similar to His Dark Materials, the heroine's deeds, and her future, are demonstrated to be inextricably linked with the destiny of the realm
In its predecessor, these storylines ran mostly in tandem. In The Rose Field, they converge. Like the first trilogy, the protagonist's movements and her destiny are shown to be inextricably entwined with the future of the universe. Her individual mission to reconnect with her companion and rediscover her vision becomes the primary conflict in a wider war with an controlling regime which, as such authorities always have, is attempting to suppress freedom of thought, creativity and culture: all the personal, resistant ways in which individuals can be free.
Atmospheric Fissures and Philosophical Struggles
The novel starts with the finding of a set of unusual openings in the makeup of the world's sky: windows that seem to open into other worlds. An example of a portal appears to be the point of the fiercely disputed rose oil. The church, with Delamare at its helm, designates these portals as a challenge to the church's doctrine and endeavors to eliminate them. As Lyra begins to move from rigid logic and return to instinct, yet, her certainty that these locations must be protected – that what they stand for and what they offer is somehow essential – grows. "The substance, or rose oil, or the imagination, or the botanical realm, or whatever we label it," she says, "we require it." The scene for a poetic struggle between naivety and experience is prepared.
Narrative Pacing and Character Development
At over six hundred pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
