Tings are falling apart in the concluding book of Pullman's latest trilogy, the next of Philip Pullman's grand trilogies set in a realm that manifests, now more than ever, as a energized and skewed version of our own. Establishments are failing, or reassembling themselves along new and disturbing lines. An invisible force "is wrecking the air and the seasons"; at the same time, "wealth is decaying, and no one knows why". Power is draining from authorities, and accumulating in the offices of religious leaders, the treasuries of business empires, the grasp of rioters. "Something is at work, very quietly, imperceptibly", says businessman a trader character, keeping a observant eye on the trade routes from his post in an city cafe. "Aspects we thought were firm and strong are weakening and collapsing."
Core Enigma and Her Quest
Just what that element might be, and how to counteract it, is the inquiry that drives the concluding book, which continues where The Secret Commonwealth concluded. This is, by all accounts, the author's final venture into the elaborately built, deeply captivating universe he first introduced 30 years ago, with the launch of the first trilogy. It's a domain whose geography corresponds to that of the real world, but whose chronicles tacks and jibes with ours; where the humans look and reason and act like us, but are paired by daemons, souls in animal form; where the skies are populated with sorceresses and mythical beasts, but beneath those skies, transports are caught and tea is consumed, and mature academics carry luxury shopping bags. The protagonist, whom we first introduced to as a young girl in the first trilogy, and then met once more as a baby in the prequel, the origin story with which the author began The Book of Dust, is now a mature individual: still distinctly the sharp and persistent main character of the prior volumes, but more mature, more sorrowful, more cautious, more doubtful. This circumscription is amplified by her split from her soul companion, Pan – but it was also, ironically, the trigger which led him to leave her in the first place.
Converging Storylines
The daemon's resolve to leave in search of that childlike part of Lyra which she seems to have lost (an aspect which he epitomises as her "vision"), and her journey to rejoin with him, were the catalysts of the prior book, which chronicled Lyra undertake a wandering trek across the continent and into the Caucasus, meeting with marvel and danger on the way. But from the outset, underlying forces were in play, and darker forces at work. The religious council – the faith's controlling power, and Pullman's brilliantly sinister incarnation of rigid, procedural evil – is under new leadership, and showing its strength. Lyra's uncle – the heroine's uncle, who holds responsible her for his sibling's death – has manoeuvred himself into the role of leader of the church's ruling assembly, and is intent on using his newfound influence to extend the religion's dominium. A key character, who rescued baby Lyra to security along a flooded Thames as an child in the first book, is now an Oxford don with a additional duty in intelligence work: he is assigned to the city to find out more about his plans. And beneath all of this is the mystery surrounding the rare and costly essential oil which seems in some way to be the source of a societal and economic crisis rippling out from Central Asia. The extract is regarded by various factions as a commercial product, by alternate groups as a scientific or esoteric wonder, and by further factions – the zealous "men from the mountains" – as a source of evil; an insult that must be eradicated. The issue of its source, what it stands for, and if it should be destroyed or safeguarded is escalating in importance.
Like the original trilogy, our protagonist's deeds, and her future, are revealed to be deeply linked with the future of the realm
In The Secret Commonwealth, these narratives ran broadly in parallel. In the conclusion, they come together. Similar to the first trilogy, Lyra's choices and her path are revealed to be inseparably woven with the destiny of the world. Her individual journey to reconnect with her soul and regain her creativity becomes the central struggle in a larger conflict with an authoritarian system which, as these systems always have, is striving to stifle freedom of thought, innovation and expression: all the personal, rebellious ways in which people can be independent.
Atmospheric Fissures and Ideological Conflicts
The book begins with the discovery of a set of strange openings in the structure of the world's sky: portals that seem to open into different dimensions. A particular portal seems to be the origin of the much debated mystical extract. The church, with Delamare at its leadership, designates these portals as a challenge to the religion's orthodoxy and sets out to eradicate them. As our protagonist begins to move from strict rationalism and revert to intuition, however, her certainty that these places must be preserved – that their meaning and their value is in some way essential – increases. "Dust, or rose oil, or the creativity, or the field of roses, or whatever we label it," she says, "we require it." The stage for a philosophical struggle between purity and knowledge is established.
Story Tempo and Character Development
At 640 pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
