Tings are collapsing in the last installment of Pullman's latest trilogy, the second of the author's masterful trilogies set in a realm that appears, now more than ever, as a energized and skewed version of our own. Organizations are failing, or reorganizing themselves along unfamiliar and troubling lines. An invisible force "is wrecking the air and the seasons"; simultaneously, "wealth is decaying, and no one knows why". Power is draining from states, and pooling in the chambers of theocrats, the treasuries of business empires, the control of crowds. "An element is at work, silently, imperceptibly", says businessman a trader character, keeping a vigilant eye on the ancient paths from his place in an city cafe. "Aspects we thought were stable and strong are deteriorating and giving way."
Key Puzzle and Lyra's Journey
Precisely what that force might be, and how to counteract it, is the question that animates the concluding book, which picks up where The Secret Commonwealth ended. This is, by all accounts, the author's final excursion into the elaborately built, infinitely beguiling realm he first unveiled 30 years ago, with the launch of His Dark Materials. It's a realm whose geography maps on to 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 joined by daemons, beings in animal form; where the air are teeming with witches and gryphons, but beneath those skies, buses are caught and tea is sipped, and middle-aged academics carry luxury shopping bags. Lyra, whom we first encountered as a child in the His Dark Materials trilogy, and then met once more as a infant in La Belle Sauvage, the introductory book with which Pullman began the series, is now a mature individual: still recognisably the prickly and persistent protagonist of the earlier books, but aged, melancholic, warier, more doubtful. This circumscription is heightened by her split from her soul companion, Pantalaimon – but it was also, unexpectedly, the cause which led him to leave her in the first place.
Converging Storylines
The daemon's resolve to depart in search of that innocent part of her which she appears to have shed (an trait which he represents as her "vision"), and her journey to rejoin with him, were the incitements of the prior book, which saw the protagonist undertake a adventurous journey across the continent and into the Caucasus, meeting with marvel and peril on the way. But from the beginning, deeper currents were in action, and sinister powers at work. The religious council – the religious governing authority, and Pullman's deliciously chilling incarnation of rigid, administrative evil – is under fresh command, and flexing its muscles. Lyra's uncle – Lyra's relative, who blames her for his sibling's death – has manoeuvred himself into the position of president of the church's governing body, and is determined on using his fresh authority to expand the institution's control. A key character, who saved baby the heroine to refuge along a swollen Thames as an young boy in the prequel, is now an academic with a sideline in spycraft: he is sent to the city to learn more about his aims. And beneath all of this is the puzzle surrounding the rare and costly essential oil which appears somehow to be the cause of a societal and financial disturbance emanating out from Central Asia. The oil is regarded by some as a commercial good, by different parties as a scientific or mystical phenomenon, and by others still – the fanatical "men from the mountains" – as a wellspring of malevolence; an affront that must be eradicated. The dilemma of where it comes from, what it stands for, and whether it should be destroyed or protected is coming rapidly to the fore.
Like the original trilogy, Lyra's decisions, and her future, are shown to be deeply entwined with the future of the universe
In its predecessor, these storylines ran largely in tandem. In the conclusion, they come together. Similar to His Dark Materials, Lyra's choices and her path are shown to be inextricably woven with the future of the universe. Her private mission to reunite with her daemon and regain her imagination becomes the key battleground in a broader battle with an oppressive system which, as such authorities typically do, is seeking to stifle freedom of thinking, innovation and culture: all the personal, resistant ways in which people can be free.
Dimensional Rifts and Philosophical Struggles
The book begins with the discovery of a set of unusual openings in the fabric of the planet's air: portals that seem to open into other worlds. One such opening manifests to be the point of the fiercely disputed rose oil. The church, with Delamare at its leadership, labels these openings as a problem to the church's doctrine and endeavors to eradicate them. As our protagonist begins to turn away from rigid logic and return to intuition, however, her certainty that these sites must be protected – that their meaning and what they offer is mysteriously essential – strengthens. "Dust, or rose oil, or the creativity, or the botanical realm, or no matter what we label it," she says, "we require it." The stage for a philosophical conflict between naivety and maturity is established.
Story Tempo and Protagonist Growth
At over six hundred pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
