Things are falling apart in the last installment of The Book of Dust, the second of Philip Pullman's magisterial trilogies set in a realm that manifests, now more than ever, as a charged and tilted version of our own. Establishments are weakening, or restructuring themselves along novel and disturbing lines. An invisible force "is wrecking the air and the seasons"; at the same time, "currency is failing, and no one knows why". Power is shifting from authorities, and pooling in the halls of religious leaders, the treasuries of corporations, the hands of mobs. "Something is at work, stealthily, very subtly", says merchant a trader character, keeping a watchful eye on the ancient paths from his seat in an city cafe. "Things we thought were firm and strong are faltering and collapsing."
Core Enigma and The Protagonist's Path
Just what that force might be, and methods to fight it, is the question that animates The Rose Field, which resumes where the previous book ended. This is, according to many, the author's last venture into the elaborately built, infinitely beguiling world he first introduced three decades past, with the launch of the first trilogy. It's a realm whose geography maps on to that of our world, but whose chronicles diverges and shifts with ours; where the humans appear and reason and act like us, but are accompanied by daemons, essences in creature form; where the air are populated with enchantresses and mythical beasts, but beneath those skies, vehicles are ridden and beverages is drunk, and mature professors carry luxury shopping bags. Our heroine, whom we first introduced to as a 12-year-old in the original trilogy, and then saw again as a toddler in the prequel, the introductory book with which the author began this trilogy, is now a mature individual: still clearly the sharp and determined main character of the prior volumes, but more mature, more sorrowful, more cautious, less certain. This circumscription is heightened by her separation from her soul companion, Pan – but it was also, paradoxically, the trigger which led him to leave her in the first place.
Converging Storylines
The daemon's resolve to leave in quest of that innocent part of her which she seems to have lost (an trait which he symbolizes as her "vision"), and her quest to reunite with him, were the incitements of its predecessor, which saw the protagonist undertake a wandering journey across the continent and into the mountain region, facing with amazement and risk on the way. But from the beginning, profound shifts were in motion, and darker forces at work. The church authority – the religious controlling power, and Pullman's deliciously chilling embodiment of strict, administrative evil – is under fresh command, and showing its strength. The antagonist – Lyra's uncle, who blames her for his sibling's death – has worked himself into the office of head of the Magisterium's governing body, and is determined on using his newfound power to broaden the church's rule. Another protagonist, who carried infant the heroine to refuge along a overflowing river as an 11-year-old in La Belle Sauvage, is now an university scholar with a additional duty in intelligence work: he is assigned to a key location to learn more about his intentions. And underlying all of this is the enigma surrounding the scarce and precious essential oil which appears mysteriously to be the origin of a social and economic crisis emanating out from Central Asia. The extract is regarded by certain groups as a commercial commodity, by different parties as a research-based or esoteric wonder, and by others still – the zealous "highland figures" – as a source of darkness; an affront that must be eradicated. The dilemma of where it comes from, its significance, and whether it should be eliminated or preserved is becoming urgent.
As in His Dark Materials, Lyra's deeds, and her fate, are shown to be inextricably linked with the future of the realm
In its predecessor, these plots ran largely in parallel. In the conclusion, they converge. Similar to the first trilogy, her actions and her fate are revealed to be deeply entwined with the fate of the world. Her individual quest to reunite with her companion and rediscover her creativity becomes the central conflict in a wider battle with an controlling government which, as such regimes always have, is striving to suppress autonomy of thinking, innovation and expression: all the personal, resistant ways in which people can be free.
Dimensional Rifts and Moral Battles
The story begins with the finding of a set of curious openings in the makeup of the Earth's sky: portals that look to lead to different dimensions. A particular portal manifests to be the point of the highly contested botanical substance. The Magisterium, with Delamare at its helm, classifies these windows as a challenge to the religion's beliefs and sets out to eliminate them. As our protagonist begins to turn away from rigid rationalism and return to intuition, yet, her certainty that these sites must be preserved – that what they stand for and what they provide is somehow crucial – grows. "Cosmic particles, or rose oil, or the creativity, or the field of roses, or no matter what we name it," she says, "it is necessary." The stage for a Blakean tussle between purity and maturity is prepared.
Story Tempo and Character Development
At 640 pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
