Tings are unraveling in the last installment of Pullman's latest trilogy, the second of Philip Pullman's masterful trilogies set in a universe that seems, now more than ever, as a intense and slanted version of our own. Institutions are weakening, or reassembling themselves along new and disquieting lines. An hidden force "is ruining the air and the seasons"; simultaneously, "currency is failing, and no one knows why". Control is draining from states, and gathering in the halls of theocrats, the coffers of conglomerates, the grasp of rioters. "An element is at work, stealthily, imperceptibly", says businessman Mustafa Bey, keeping a observant eye on the trade routes from his post in an Aleppo cafe. "Elements we thought were secure and strong are weakening and giving way."
The Central Mystery and Lyra's Journey
Just what that something might be, and ways to oppose it, is the question that propels this final volume, which picks up where The Secret Commonwealth ended. This is, according to many, the author's final excursion into the carefully crafted, deeply captivating universe he first introduced 30 years ago, with the release of His Dark Materials. It's a world whose geography maps on to that of our world, but whose history veers and changes with ours; where the individuals look and think and behave like us, but are joined by external spirits, beings in animal form; where the skies are teeming with sorceresses and gryphons, but underneath, vehicles are caught and beverages is consumed, and older academics carry fancy shopping bags. The protagonist, whom we first encountered as a 12-year-old in the original trilogy, and then revisited as a baby in La Belle Sauvage, the introductory book with which the author began the series, is now a young woman: still distinctly the sharp and determined heroine of the previous installments, but aged, more sorrowful, more careful, less certain. This limitation is intensified by her split from her soul companion, her daemon – but it was also, paradoxically, the catalyst which caused him to abandon her in the first place.
Interwoven Plots
Pan's decision to go off in pursuit of that childlike part of Lyra which she may have forgotten (an trait which he represents as her "imagination"), and her quest to rejoin with him, were the driving forces of its predecessor, which followed Lyra undertake a adventurous trek across Europe and into the mountain region, facing with wonder and danger on the way. But from the start, profound shifts were in action, and malevolent elements at work. The religious council – the faith's controlling power, and the author's deliciously chilling incarnation of austere, procedural wickedness – is under recent guidance, and asserting its power. Lyra's uncle – the heroine's family member, who faults her for his sister's death – has manoeuvred himself into the office of head of the authority's governing body, and is determined on using his recently acquired authority to expand the church's control. Another protagonist, who saved baby the heroine to safety along a swollen Thames as an 11-year-old in La Belle Sauvage, is now an university scholar with a secondary role in espionage: he is assigned to the city to learn more about the antagonist's aims. And behind all of this is the mystery surrounding the scarce and costly botanical extract which seems somehow to be the cause of a societal and financial upheaval emanating out from that area. The oil is seen by some as a marketable product, by alternate groups as a empirical or mystical miracle, and by others still – the fanatical "highland figures" – as a origin of malevolence; an challenge that must be eradicated. The dilemma of its origins, its meaning, and if it should be removed or preserved is escalating in importance.
Similar to His Dark Materials, Lyra's decisions, and her fate, are shown to be inseparably connected with the future of the universe
In The Secret Commonwealth, these narratives ran mostly in tandem. In The Rose Field, they come together. Like His Dark Materials, Lyra's actions and her path are shown to be inextricably woven with the destiny of the universe. Her private mission to reunite with her daemon and rediscover her vision becomes the key struggle in a broader conflict with an authoritarian regime which, as such authorities often attempt, is seeking to suppress freedom of thought, originality and culture: all the personal, resistant ways in which humans can be independent.
Atmospheric Fissures and Ideological Conflicts
The book opens with the discovery of a set of unusual cracks in the fabric of the planet's atmosphere: gateways that appear to lead to other worlds. A particular window appears to be the point of the highly contested botanical substance. The Magisterium, with the antagonist at its head, classifies these portals as a threat to the institution's doctrine and endeavors to eradicate them. As the heroine begins to turn away from inflexible logic and back to feeling, yet, her belief that these sites must be preserved – that what they stand for and what they offer is in some way vital – increases. "Dust, or the substance, or the creativity, or the Rose Field, or whatever we call it," she says, "we require it." The stage for a Blakean tussle between naivety and experience is set.
Story Tempo and Personal Evolution
At a substantial length, The Rose Field|this volume|the
