Things are unraveling in the last installment of The Dust Trilogy, the second of Philip Pullman's masterful trilogies set in a world that appears, here more than ever, as a charged and skewed version of our own. Institutions are weakening, or restructuring themselves along new and disturbing lines. An hidden force "is destroying the air and the seasons"; simultaneously, "money's going bad, and no one knows why". Control is flowing away from governments, and gathering in the offices of religious leaders, the coffers of business empires, the control of mobs. "An element is at work, stealthily, very subtly", says businessman a merchant figure, keeping a watchful eye on the trade routes from his seat in an city cafe. "Things we thought were stable and solid are weakening and collapsing."
The Central Mystery and The Protagonist's Path
Precisely what that force might be, and how to counteract it, is the question that drives The Rose Field, which picks up where its predecessor ended. This is, according to many, Pullman's last foray into the intricately constructed, endlessly enchanting realm he first unveiled 30 years ago, with the release of Northern Lights. It's a world whose landscape aligns with that of the real world, but whose history tacks and jibes with ours; where the humans appear and think and act like us, but are accompanied by animal souls, essences in creature form; where the heavens are teeming with witches and gryphons, but underneath, vehicles are taken and drinks is sipped, and older professors carry fancy shopping bags. Our heroine, whom we first met as a child in the original trilogy, and then met once more as a infant in the first volume, the origin story with which the author began the series, is now a young woman: still distinctly the sharp and persistent main character of the prior volumes, but more mature, more sorrowful, warier, less certain. This circumscription is amplified by her separation from her daemon, Pan – but it was also, paradoxically, the catalyst which caused him to abandon her in the first place.
Merging Narratives
Pan's decision to depart in search of that childlike part of her which she appears to have shed (an aspect which he represents as her "creativity"), and her mission to reunite with him, were the incitements of its predecessor, which chronicled Lyra undertake a adventurous journey across the continent and into the mountain region, facing with wonder and peril on the way. But from the outset, profound shifts were in play, and sinister powers at work. The Magisterium – the religious governing authority, and the author's brilliantly sinister embodiment of rigid, administrative wickedness – is under fresh command, and flexing its muscles. Lyra's uncle – Lyra's family member, who blames her for his sister's death – has worked himself into the position of president of the authority's High Council, and is determined on using his newfound influence to broaden the religion's dominium. A key character, who carried infant Lyra to security along a overflowing river as an child in the prequel, is now an university scholar with a secondary role in intelligence work: he is sent to the city to find out more about the antagonist's aims. And beneath all of this is the puzzle surrounding the scarce and precious rose oil which seems mysteriously to be the cause of a social and financial disturbance spreading out from that area. The substance is viewed by certain groups as a tradeable commodity, by alternate groups as a empirical or spiritual phenomenon, and by yet others – the fanatical "highland figures" – as a source of darkness; an insult that must be eradicated. The question of its source, its significance, and if it should be eliminated or safeguarded is coming rapidly to the fore.
Like His Dark Materials, Lyra's deeds, and her future, are demonstrated to be inseparably connected with the fate of the world
In its predecessor, these plots ran mostly in tandem. In this final book, they merge. Similar to His Dark Materials, her choices and her path are shown to be deeply entwined with the fate of the world. Her personal mission to reunite with her companion and regain her imagination becomes the central conflict in a larger conflict with an oppressive government which, as these systems often attempt, is attempting to quell independence of thinking, creativity and art: all the inner, resistant ways in which humans can be free.
Atmospheric Fissures and Moral Battles
The book starts with the discovery of a set of unusual fissures in the makeup of the Earth's air: portals that appear to give on to other worlds. One such opening manifests to be the source of the highly contested botanical substance. The church, with its leader at its helm, labels these windows as a threat to the church's orthodoxy and endeavors to eradicate them. As Lyra begins to turn away from strict rationalism and back to intuition, however, her belief that these locations must be defended – that their significance and what they offer is in some way crucial – grows. "Cosmic particles, or the substance, or the imagination, or the field of roses, or whatever we name it," she says, "we require it." The stage for a poetic struggle between innocence and experience is established.
Story Tempo and Character Development
At a substantial length, The Rose Field|this volume|the
