Tings are falling apart in the last installment of The Book of Dust, the second of Philip Pullman's magisterial trilogies set in a universe that appears, in this volume especially, as a energized and slanted version of our own. Establishments are crumbling, or reorganizing themselves along unfamiliar and troubling lines. An hidden force "is ruining the air and the seasons"; simultaneously, "wealth is decaying, and no one knows why". Power is draining from governments, and accumulating in the chambers of theocrats, the vaults of corporations, the hands of mobs. "Something is at work, silently, imperceptibly", says merchant Mustafa Bey, keeping a vigilant eye on the Silk Roads from his place in an Aleppo cafe. "Things we thought were stable and solid are deteriorating and collapsing."
The Central Mystery and Her Quest
Exactly what that something might be, and ways to oppose it, is the mystery that animates the concluding book, which continues where The Secret Commonwealth left off. This is, by all accounts, the author's final foray into the carefully crafted, infinitely beguiling universe he first introduced in the distant past, with the launch of Northern Lights. It's a realm whose landscape aligns with that of the real world, but whose chronicles diverges and shifts with ours; where the humans appear and reason and act like us, but are paired by daemons, essences in creature form; where the heavens are populated with sorceresses and mythical beasts, but underneath, transports are taken and beverages is consumed, and mature academics carry Harrods shopping bags. Our heroine, whom we first met as a 12-year-old in the first trilogy, and then saw again as a baby in the prequel, the origin story with which Pullman began the series, is now a young woman: still distinctly the prickly and persistent heroine of the previous installments, but older, melancholic, more cautious, less certain. This restraint is amplified by her division from her soul companion, Pan – but it was also, unexpectedly, the trigger which caused him to abandon her in the first place.
Interwoven Plots
Pan's decision to go off in search of that childlike part of the heroine which she appears to have shed (an trait which he represents as her "creativity"), and her mission to reconnect with him, were the catalysts of The Secret Commonwealth, which followed Lyra undertake a wandering voyage across the continent and into the mountain region, encountering with amazement and danger on the way. But from the beginning, profound shifts were in motion, and darker forces at work. The church authority – the religious ruling body, and Pullman's deliciously chilling incarnation of austere, procedural malice – is under fresh command, and showing its strength. Lyra's uncle – our protagonist's relative, who faults her for his sister's death – has worked himself into the office of leader of the church's High Council, and is set on using his fresh power to expand the institution's control. Another protagonist, who carried baby Lyra to security along a overflowing Thames as an young boy in the first book, is now an Oxford don with a secondary role in spycraft: he is sent to a key location to learn more about his plans. And beneath all of this is the mystery surrounding the scarce and precious botanical extract which seems somehow to be the source of a social and financial crisis spreading out from the region. The oil is viewed by some as a marketable product, by different parties as a empirical or mystical miracle, and by further factions – the fanatical "men from the mountains" – as a source of malevolence; an affront that must be obliterated. The question of its source, its meaning, and if it should be destroyed or protected is becoming urgent.
Similar to the first series, the heroine's deeds, and her future, are revealed to be deeply entwined with the future of the universe
In the previous volume, these plots ran broadly in tandem. In The Rose Field, they come together. Like the first trilogy, Lyra's choices and her fate are revealed to be inextricably entwined with the future of the realm. Her personal mission to reconnect with her soul and rediscover her imagination becomes the central battleground in a larger war with an oppressive regime which, as such regimes typically do, is attempting to stifle independence of thought, originality and expression: all the inner, rebellious ways in which individuals can be independent.
Atmospheric Fissures and Ideological Conflicts
The novel opens with the unveiling of a collection of curious cracks in the makeup of the world's atmosphere: gateways that appear to give on to other worlds. One such portal seems to be the point of the highly contested botanical substance. The authority, with its leader at its leadership, designates these windows as a challenge to the church's doctrine and aims to eradicate them. As our protagonist begins to turn away from strict rationalism and return to instinct, yet, her conviction that these places must be protected – that their significance and their value is somehow vital – strengthens. "Dust, or rose oil, or the creativity, or the botanical realm, or no matter what we name it," she says, "we need it." The stage for a philosophical struggle between innocence and knowledge is established.
Plot Rhythm and Protagonist Growth
At a substantial length, The Rose Field|this volume|the
