Tings are unraveling in the final volume of The Book of Dust, the second of Philip Pullman's masterful trilogies set in a world that appears, now more than ever, as a charged and tilted version of our own. Institutions are weakening, or reorganizing themselves along new and troubling lines. An unseen force "is wrecking the air and the seasons"; at the same time, "money's going bad, and no one knows why". Authority is flowing away from governments, and gathering in the offices of theocrats, the vaults of corporations, the control of mobs. "An element is at work, silently, imperceptibly", says trader a trader character, keeping a observant eye on the ancient paths from his seat in an city cafe. "Elements we thought were firm and durable are faltering and collapsing."
The Central Mystery and Lyra's Journey
Just what that force might be, and ways to oppose it, is the question that drives this final volume, which picks up where The Secret Commonwealth concluded. This is, by all accounts, Pullman's final foray into the intricately constructed, infinitely beguiling world he first unveiled three decades past, with the launch of His Dark Materials. It's a domain whose landscape corresponds to that of this world, but whose past tacks and jibes with ours; where the individuals appear and think and behave like us, but are paired by external spirits, essences in creature form; where the air are populated with enchantresses and mythical beasts, but below, transports are caught and beverages is consumed, and mature academics carry Harrods shopping bags. Our heroine, whom we first introduced to as a 12-year-old in the first trilogy, and then saw again as a toddler in the first volume, the origin story with which the author began this trilogy, is now a adult: still clearly the spiky and tenacious heroine of the earlier books, but more mature, melancholic, more careful, less certain. This limitation is heightened by her division from her daemon, Pantalaimon – but it was also, paradoxically, the trigger which made him desert her in the first place.
Interwoven Plots
His choice to go off in pursuit of that childlike part of Lyra which she seems to have lost (an quality which he symbolizes as her "imagination"), and her mission to rejoin with him, were the catalysts of the prior book, which chronicled Lyra undertake a adventurous journey across the continent and into the Caucasus, meeting with marvel and risk on the way. But from the start, deeper currents were in action, and malevolent elements at work. The Magisterium – the faith's controlling power, and the author's brilliantly sinister representation of rigid, procedural malice – is under recent guidance, and asserting its power. The antagonist – our protagonist's relative, who holds responsible her for his family member's death – has positioned himself into the role of president of the church's ruling assembly, and is intent on using his newfound power to broaden the institution's rule. A key character, who saved infant Lyra to safety along a flooded Thames as an young boy in the first book, is now an academic with a secondary role in spycraft: he is assigned to Geneva to find out more about Delamare's aims. And beneath all of this is the mystery surrounding the rare and costly rose oil which appears somehow to be the cause of a societal and economic upheaval spreading out from Central Asia. The extract is regarded by various factions as a marketable commodity, by different parties as a scientific or spiritual phenomenon, and by others still – the zealous "men from the mountains" – as a wellspring of malevolence; an challenge that must be eradicated. The dilemma of its source, its significance, and if it should be removed or safeguarded is coming rapidly to the fore.
Similar to the first series, the heroine's deeds, and her fate, are shown to be inextricably entwined with the destiny of the realm
In the previous volume, these storylines ran mostly in tandem. In The Rose Field, they merge. Like the original series, her actions and her fate are unveiled to be inextricably linked with the destiny of the universe. Her personal quest to reunite with her soul and rediscover her imagination becomes the key conflict in a broader war with an controlling system which, as these systems typically do, is striving to quell independence of reason, creativity and expression: all the personal, defiant ways in which people can be free.
Cosmic Openings and Philosophical Struggles
The book begins with the unveiling of a series of curious openings in the fabric of the world's atmosphere: gateways that appear to open into other worlds. An example of a opening appears to be the point of the much debated mystical extract. The Magisterium, with the antagonist at its leadership, classifies these portals as a challenge to the religion's orthodoxy and sets out to eradicate them. As our protagonist begins to turn away from inflexible rationalism and return to instinct, nevertheless, her belief that these locations must be defended – that what they stand for and their value is mysteriously vital – increases. "The substance, or rose oil, or the creativity, or the Rose Field, or no matter what we name it," she says, "we need it." The setting for a poetic conflict between innocence and experience is established.
Plot Rhythm and Protagonist Growth
At 640 pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
