Tings are collapsing in the last installment of The Dust Trilogy, the second of Philip Pullman's grand trilogies set in a realm that seems, in this volume especially, as a energized and skewed version of our own. Organizations are weakening, or reorganizing themselves along new and disturbing lines. An invisible force "is ruining the air and the seasons"; simultaneously, "money's going bad, and no one knows why". Power is flowing away from governments, and pooling in the offices of theocrats, the vaults of conglomerates, the grasp of rioters. "Some force is at work, silently, imperceptibly", says businessman a trader character, keeping a observant eye on the trade routes from his post in an Aleppo cafe. "Elements we thought were firm and strong are deteriorating and giving way."
Key Puzzle and Lyra's Journey
Just what that force might be, and how to counteract it, is the question that animates The Rose Field, which continues where its predecessor concluded. This is, by all accounts, Pullman's last venture into the intricately constructed, endlessly enchanting world he first revealed in the distant past, with the publication of the first trilogy. It's a realm whose geography maps on to that of the real world, but whose history diverges and shifts with ours; where the humans appear and think and behave like us, but are accompanied by external spirits, beings in creature form; where the air are filled with enchantresses and gryphons, but beneath those skies, transports are caught and tea is consumed, and older academics carry Harrods shopping bags. The protagonist, whom we first met as a 12-year-old in the original trilogy, and then saw again as a baby in the first volume, the origin story with which the author began the series, is now a young woman: still recognisably the sharp and determined main character of the previous installments, but older, melancholic, more cautious, more doubtful. This limitation is amplified by her division from her daemon, Pan – but it was also, paradoxically, the cause which led him to leave her in the first place.
Interwoven Plots
Pan's decision to leave in pursuit of that childlike part of Lyra which she appears to have shed (an quality which he epitomises as her "vision"), and her quest to reconnect with him, were the catalysts of The Secret Commonwealth, which followed Lyra undertake a picaresque trek across the continent and into the Caucasus, encountering with amazement and danger on the way. But from the outset, underlying forces were in motion, and sinister powers at work. The religious council – the religious governing authority, and the author's brilliantly sinister embodiment of strict, bureaucratic malice – is under fresh command, and asserting its power. Marcel Delamare – the heroine's family member, who holds responsible her for his sister's death – has worked himself into the office of president of the authority's governing body, and is intent on using his fresh power to extend the religion's dominium. Another protagonist, who saved infant the heroine to security along a flooded Thames as an young boy in La Belle Sauvage, is now an Oxford don with a secondary role in espionage: he is dispatched to a key location to discover more about Delamare's plans. And underlying all of this is the mystery surrounding the scarce and valuable essential oil which seems in some way to be the source of a social and financial upheaval emanating out from the region. The extract is regarded by various factions as a marketable product, by different parties as a scientific or esoteric wonder, and by others still – the fanatical "mountain dwellers" – as a wellspring of darkness; an insult that must be destroyed. The issue of where it comes from, its significance, and whether it should be eliminated or safeguarded is coming rapidly to the fore.
As in the original trilogy, the heroine's deeds, and her fate, are revealed to be inseparably linked with the destiny of the world
In its predecessor, these plots ran broadly in side by side. In this final book, they merge. Like the first trilogy, her movements and her destiny are shown to be inextricably entwined with the fate of the universe. Her private quest to reconnect with her daemon and regain her vision becomes the key conflict in a wider conflict with an oppressive government which, as these systems often attempt, is seeking to suppress independence of thought, creativity and expression: all the internal, resistant ways in which individuals can be independent.
Atmospheric Fissures and Philosophical Struggles
The story begins with the unveiling of a set of strange fissures in the fabric of the world's sky: gateways that seem to give on to alternate realities. One such portal appears to be the source of the much debated rose oil. The church, with the antagonist at its helm, designates these portals as a threat to the religion's orthodoxy and endeavors to eradicate them. As the heroine begins to shift from rigid rationalism and revert to instinct, nevertheless, her belief that these locations must be defended – that their meaning and what they offer is mysteriously essential – strengthens. "The substance, or rose oil, or the creativity, or the botanical realm, or whatever we label it," she says, "we need it." The stage for a poetic tussle between purity and maturity is prepared.
Story Tempo and Protagonist Growth
At a substantial length, The Rose Field|this volume|the
