Tings are unraveling in the concluding book of Pullman's latest trilogy, the second of Philip Pullman's grand trilogies set in a realm that appears, in this volume especially, as a charged and slanted version of our own. Institutions are weakening, or reorganizing themselves along unfamiliar and troubling lines. An unseen force "is wrecking the air and the seasons"; concurrently, "currency is failing, and no one knows why". Authority is draining from authorities, and gathering in the halls of theocrats, the coffers of corporations, the grasp of rioters. "Some force is at work, stealthily, very subtly", says businessman a merchant figure, keeping a watchful eye on the ancient paths from his seat in an Aleppo cafe. "Elements we thought were secure and solid are deteriorating and giving way."
The Central Mystery and Lyra's Journey
Just what that element might be, and how to counteract it, is the question that animates the concluding book, which continues where The Secret Commonwealth ended. This is, according to many, Pullman's concluding foray into the carefully crafted, infinitely beguiling realm he first revealed in the distant past, with the publication of the first trilogy. It's a realm whose terrain aligns with that of this world, but whose history tacks and jibes with ours; where the people look and think and act like us, but are accompanied by animal souls, souls in creature form; where the heavens are teeming with sorceresses and mythical beasts, but underneath, transports are caught and drinks is consumed, and older professors carry luxury shopping bags. Lyra, whom we first introduced to as a 12-year-old in the first trilogy, and then met once more as a toddler in the prequel, the introductory book with which the author began The Book of Dust, is now a young woman: still clearly the prickly and tenacious protagonist of the prior volumes, but aged, melancholic, warier, less certain. This restraint is heightened by her split from her soul companion, her daemon – but it was also, paradoxically, the catalyst which led him to leave her in the first place.
Merging Narratives
His choice to leave in pursuit of that childlike part of the heroine which she appears to have shed (an trait which he epitomises as her "creativity"), and her quest to rejoin with him, were the catalysts of The Secret Commonwealth, which saw the protagonist undertake a wandering voyage across the continent and into the Caucasus, facing with wonder and danger on the way. But from the outset, deeper currents were in motion, and sinister powers at work. The Magisterium – the faith's controlling power, and Pullman's deliciously chilling representation of austere, procedural malice – is under new leadership, and showing its strength. Lyra's uncle – Lyra's relative, who holds responsible her for his family member's death – has manoeuvred himself into the role of head of the authority's High Council, and is intent on using his fresh power to expand the institution's dominium. Malcolm Polstead, who saved young the heroine to refuge along a overflowing Thames as an child in the first book, is now an academic with a additional duty in spycraft: he is assigned to the city to discover more about Delamare's intentions. And behind all of this is the mystery surrounding the uncommon and valuable essential oil which manifests mysteriously to be the cause of a social and economic disturbance emanating out from that area. The extract is seen by some as a marketable good, by different parties as a research-based or mystical phenomenon, and by yet others – the fanatical "highland figures" – as a wellspring of malevolence; an insult that must be eradicated. The issue of its source, its meaning, and if it should be destroyed or preserved is escalating in importance.
As in His Dark Materials, the heroine's deeds, and her fate, are shown to be inextricably entwined with the future of the realm
In the previous volume, these narratives ran mostly in parallel. In The Rose Field, they converge. Like the first trilogy, her movements and her path are revealed to be deeply linked with the destiny of the universe. Her personal quest to rejoin with her soul and recover her creativity becomes the central struggle in a broader battle with an authoritarian system which, as such authorities typically do, is attempting to suppress autonomy of thinking, creativity and expression: all the inner, defiant ways in which humans can be independent.
Atmospheric Fissures and Ideological Conflicts
The novel opens with the finding of a collection of unusual fissures in the fabric of the Earth's sky: portals that appear to lead to different dimensions. An example of a window manifests to be the origin of the highly contested mystical extract. The Magisterium, with the antagonist at its leadership, classifies these portals as a challenge to the institution's doctrine and endeavors to eliminate them. As our protagonist begins to shift from inflexible rationalism and return to instinct, yet, her conviction that these locations must be defended – that their meaning and what they provide is somehow vital – strengthens. "The substance, or the substance, or the vision, or the field of roses, or no matter what we name it," she says, "we require it." The setting for a philosophical struggle between innocence and experience is set.
Narrative Pacing and Personal Evolution
At 640 pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
