Tings are unraveling in the final volume of The Book of Dust, the second of the author's masterful trilogies set in a universe that seems, here more than ever, as a intense and slanted version of our own. Establishments are weakening, or reassembling themselves along new and disturbing lines. An invisible force "is ruining the air and the seasons"; at the same time, "wealth is decaying, and no one knows why". Control is draining from states, and pooling in the halls of religious leaders, the treasuries of conglomerates, the control of crowds. "Something is at work, stealthily, very subtly", says merchant a trader character, keeping a vigilant eye on the Silk Roads from his seat in an Aleppo cafe. "Aspects we thought were secure and solid are deteriorating and collapsing."
The Central Mystery and Her Quest
Precisely what that something might be, and ways to oppose it, is the question that animates The Rose Field, which continues where the previous book concluded. This is, reportedly, Pullman's final foray into the elaborately built, infinitely beguiling world he first unveiled in the distant past, with the release of His Dark Materials. It's a domain whose terrain maps on to that of this world, but whose history veers and changes with ours; where the people look and reason and behave like us, but are accompanied by external spirits, essences in animal form; where the air are teeming with enchantresses and mythical beasts, but beneath those skies, transports are caught and drinks is sipped, and mature scholars carry fancy shopping bags. Lyra, whom we first introduced to as a young girl in the original trilogy, and then saw again as a infant in La Belle Sauvage, the introductory book with which the author began this trilogy, is now a adult: still clearly the sharp and determined main character of the prior volumes, but more mature, more sorrowful, warier, less sure. This restraint is heightened by her split from her animal guide, Pantalaimon – but it was also, ironically, the catalyst which made him desert her in the first place.
Converging Storylines
Pan's decision to depart in pursuit of that childlike part of the heroine which she may have forgotten (an quality which he symbolizes as her "creativity"), and her quest to rejoin with him, were the driving forces of its predecessor, which saw the protagonist undertake a picaresque trek across Europe and into the Caucasus, encountering with wonder and danger on the way. But from the start, profound shifts were in play, and malevolent elements at work. The Magisterium – the religious controlling power, and the author's brilliantly sinister incarnation of strict, bureaucratic wickedness – is under fresh command, and flexing its muscles. Lyra's uncle – the heroine's family member, who faults her for his family member's death – has worked himself into the position of head of the authority's High Council, and is determined on using his fresh power to broaden the institution's dominium. A key character, who carried young the heroine to refuge along a swollen Thames as an 11-year-old in La Belle Sauvage, is now an academic with a secondary role in intelligence work: he is dispatched to Geneva to discover more about his aims. And behind all of this is the puzzle surrounding the rare and valuable rose oil which seems somehow to be the source of a societal and financial crisis spreading out from that area. The oil is regarded by various factions as a tradeable good, by others as a research-based or mystical wonder, and by yet others – the extremist "highland figures" – as a wellspring of evil; an challenge that must be obliterated. The question of its source, what it stands for, and whether it should be removed or preserved is escalating in importance.
Like His Dark Materials, our protagonist's actions, and her destiny, are shown to be deeply linked with the fate of the universe
In its predecessor, these narratives ran broadly in parallel. In this final book, they merge. As in the first trilogy, Lyra's choices and her fate are shown to be deeply woven with the destiny of the world. Her private quest to reconnect with her companion and recover her imagination becomes the key conflict in a wider war with an oppressive government which, as these systems often attempt, is striving to stifle independence of thought, innovation and art: all the inner, rebellious ways in which humans can be independent.
Cosmic Openings and Philosophical Struggles
The story opens with the unveiling of a set of unusual cracks in the makeup of the Earth's air: windows that appear to lead to different dimensions. One such window seems to be the point of the much debated mystical extract. The church, with Delamare at its head, labels these portals as a problem to the church's beliefs and sets out to eliminate them. As Lyra begins to shift from rigid rationalism and return to instinct, however, her conviction that these places must be preserved – that what they stand for and what they provide is somehow vital – strengthens. "The substance, or rose oil, or the vision, or the botanical realm, or whatever we label it," she says, "it is necessary." The stage for a philosophical struggle between naivety and knowledge is prepared.
Narrative Pacing and Protagonist Growth
At over six hundred pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
