Things are falling apart in the concluding book of The Dust Trilogy, the next of Philip Pullman's masterful trilogies set in a realm that appears, now more than ever, as a energized and skewed version of our own. Institutions are crumbling, or reorganizing themselves along new and disquieting lines. An invisible force "is destroying the air and the seasons"; concurrently, "money's going bad, and no one knows why". Power is shifting from authorities, and pooling in the chambers of religious leaders, the treasuries of corporations, the control of mobs. "An element is at work, very quietly, imperceptibly", says trader a merchant figure, keeping a vigilant eye on the ancient paths from his seat in an city cafe. "Aspects we thought were secure and strong are deteriorating and collapsing."
Key Puzzle and The Protagonist's Path
Exactly what that element might be, and ways to oppose it, is the inquiry that propels The Rose Field, which picks up where The Secret Commonwealth left off. This is, by all accounts, Pullman's concluding venture into the carefully crafted, deeply captivating realm he first introduced three decades past, with the launch of Northern Lights. It's a realm whose landscape maps on to that of this world, but whose history diverges and shifts with ours; where the individuals appear and reason and behave like us, but are paired by external spirits, souls in animal form; where the skies are teeming with sorceresses and legendary creatures, but below, transports are taken and beverages is drunk, and older scholars carry fancy shopping bags. The protagonist, whom we first introduced to as a child in the original trilogy, and then saw again as a toddler in the first volume, the prequel with which Pullman began The Book of Dust, is now a adult: still distinctly the prickly and tenacious heroine of the previous installments, but older, melancholic, more cautious, less sure. This limitation is amplified by her split from her soul companion, Pantalaimon – but it was also, unexpectedly, the cause which led him to leave her in the first place.
Converging Storylines
Pan's decision to depart in quest of that childlike part of Lyra which she appears to have shed (an aspect which he represents as her "creativity"), and her mission to rejoin with him, were the catalysts of the prior book, which saw Lyra undertake a adventurous voyage across Europe and into the Caucasus, facing with wonder and peril on the way. But from the start, profound shifts were in motion, and malevolent elements at work. The church authority – the church's governing authority, and Pullman's masterfully eerie embodiment of austere, bureaucratic malice – is under recent guidance, and flexing its muscles. Lyra's uncle – Lyra's relative, who faults her for his sibling's death – has positioned himself into the role of head of the authority's High Council, and is determined on using his recently acquired power to extend the religion's rule. Malcolm Polstead, who rescued baby Lyra to refuge along a swollen Thames as an young boy in the first book, is now an academic with a sideline in espionage: he is assigned to the city to discover more about Delamare's plans. And behind all of this is the enigma surrounding the scarce and costly botanical extract which seems in some way to be the source of a societal and economic disturbance emanating out from the region. The extract is viewed by certain groups as a tradeable commodity, by different parties as a empirical or spiritual miracle, and by others still – the extremist "men from the mountains" – as a source of malevolence; an challenge that must be obliterated. The dilemma of its origins, its meaning, and whether it should be eliminated or protected is becoming urgent.
Like the original trilogy, Lyra's deeds, and her fate, are shown to be inseparably linked with the fate of the realm
In The Secret Commonwealth, these narratives ran mostly in parallel. In this final book, they merge. As in the first trilogy, the protagonist's movements and her destiny are shown to be inextricably woven with the fate of the world. Her personal quest to reunite with her daemon and rediscover her vision becomes the key conflict in a wider battle with an controlling regime which, as such regimes typically do, is seeking to suppress independence of reason, innovation and expression: all the inner, defiant ways in which individuals can be free.
Atmospheric Fissures and Philosophical Struggles
The story begins with the finding of a series of unusual fissures in the structure of the planet's sky: windows that seem to lead to different dimensions. One such portal seems to be the point of the much debated rose oil. The authority, with the antagonist at its head, classifies these windows as a problem to the church's beliefs and sets out to eradicate them. As our protagonist begins to move from inflexible rationalism and return to intuition, yet, her certainty that these places must be preserved – that what they stand for and what they provide is in some way vital – increases. "The substance, or rose oil, or the vision, or the field of roses, or whatever we call it," she says, "we require it." The stage for a poetic tussle between naivety and maturity is established.
Plot Rhythm and Personal Evolution
At a substantial length, The Rose Field|this volume|the
