Things are falling apart in the last installment of The Book of Dust, the second of Philip Pullman's masterful trilogies set in a realm that manifests, in this volume especially, as a intense and slanted version of our own. Organizations are crumbling, or restructuring themselves along unfamiliar and disquieting lines. An invisible force "is wrecking the air and the seasons"; at the same time, "wealth is decaying, and no one knows why". Control is draining from states, and accumulating in the chambers of theocrats, the vaults of corporations, the grasp of crowds. "Some force is at work, stealthily, very subtly", says businessman Mustafa Bey, keeping a vigilant eye on the trade routes from his post in an Aleppo cafe. "Things we thought were stable and solid are faltering and failing."
The Central Mystery and Lyra's Journey
Just what that something might be, and ways to oppose it, is the mystery that propels this final volume, which resumes where the previous book ended. This is, reportedly, Pullman's last venture into the carefully crafted, endlessly enchanting realm he first revealed three decades past, with the release of His Dark Materials. It's a realm whose geography maps on to that of our world, but whose history tacks and jibes with ours; where the humans appear and think and behave like us, but are paired by daemons, souls in animal form; where the heavens are filled with sorceresses and gryphons, but beneath those skies, buses are ridden and beverages is consumed, and middle-aged scholars carry fancy shopping bags. The protagonist, whom we first introduced to as a young girl in the His Dark Materials trilogy, and then met once more as a infant in La Belle Sauvage, the origin story with which the author began this trilogy, is now a adult: still recognisably the spiky and determined protagonist of the earlier books, but aged, sadder, more cautious, more doubtful. This limitation is amplified by her division from her daemon, Pantalaimon – but it was also, ironically, the catalyst which led him to leave her in the first place.
Merging Narratives
Pan's decision to leave in quest of that childlike part of Lyra which she appears to have shed (an trait which he represents as her "creativity"), and her quest to rejoin with him, were the incitements of its predecessor, which saw Lyra undertake a picaresque journey across Europe and into the Caucasus, encountering with wonder and risk on the way. But from the start, deeper currents were in play, and darker forces at work. The Magisterium – the religious governing authority, and the author's masterfully eerie representation of rigid, bureaucratic wickedness – is under fresh command, and flexing its muscles. Marcel Delamare – Lyra's relative, who blames her for his sister's death – has manoeuvred himself into the position of leader of the Magisterium's ruling assembly, and is intent on using his fresh authority to expand the religion's control. Another protagonist, who saved infant Lyra to security along a overflowing river as an 11-year-old in La Belle Sauvage, is now an academic with a sideline in espionage: he is dispatched to a key location to discover more about Delamare's intentions. And behind all of this is the mystery surrounding the uncommon and valuable botanical extract which manifests mysteriously to be the cause of a societal and economic upheaval rippling out from Central Asia. The substance is regarded by some as a commercial product, by others as a research-based or mystical phenomenon, and by others still – the fanatical "highland figures" – as a origin of evil; an challenge that must be obliterated. The question of where it comes from, what it stands for, and whether it should be destroyed or preserved is escalating in importance.
Similar to the original trilogy, the heroine's deeds, and her destiny, are shown to be deeply linked with the future of the universe
In its predecessor, these narratives ran mostly in side by side. In The Rose Field, they come together. Similar to the first trilogy, the protagonist's movements and her fate are revealed to be inextricably entwined with the future of the universe. Her private mission to reconnect with her daemon and recover her imagination becomes the primary struggle in a wider conflict with an oppressive government which, as such authorities typically do, is striving to suppress freedom of thought, creativity and art: all the inner, defiant ways in which individuals can be free.
Cosmic Openings and Ideological Conflicts
The novel begins with the finding of a set of unusual fissures in the structure of the Earth's air: portals that appear to lead to alternate realities. A particular window appears to be the source of the fiercely disputed botanical substance. The Magisterium, with its leader at its leadership, designates these openings as a threat to the church's doctrine and sets out to eradicate them. As the heroine begins to turn away from strict logic and revert to feeling, nevertheless, her belief that these locations must be protected – that their significance and what they provide is in some way crucial – grows. "The substance, or rose oil, or the creativity, or the field of roses, or whatever we call it," she says, "we require it." The setting for a Blakean conflict between naivety and experience is established.
Plot Rhythm and Personal Evolution
At over six hundred pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
