Tings are falling apart in the final volume of The Book of Dust, the second of Philip Pullman's magisterial trilogies set in a world that seems, in this volume especially, as a energized and skewed version of our own. Institutions are weakening, or reassembling themselves along novel and troubling lines. An hidden force "is wrecking the air and the seasons"; concurrently, "money's going bad, and no one knows why". Control is flowing away from states, and pooling in the offices of theocrats, the vaults of conglomerates, the control of mobs. "Something is at work, stealthily, gradually", says merchant a merchant figure, keeping a watchful eye on the ancient paths from his place in an city cafe. "Aspects we thought were secure and solid are faltering and giving way."
Key Puzzle and Her Quest
Just what that something might be, and how to counteract it, is the mystery that animates this final volume, which resumes where The Secret Commonwealth ended. This is, according to many, the author's concluding venture into the elaborately built, deeply captivating realm he first revealed in the distant past, with the publication of His Dark Materials. It's a realm whose landscape aligns with that of our world, but whose history diverges and shifts with ours; where the individuals appear and think and behave like us, but are joined by daemons, beings in animal form; where the skies are populated with witches and gryphons, but underneath, transports are caught and beverages is drunk, and older scholars carry fancy shopping bags. Our heroine, whom we first encountered as a young girl in the first trilogy, and then met once more as a baby in the first volume, the origin story with which the author began this trilogy, is now a mature individual: still recognisably the sharp and persistent protagonist of the earlier books, but more mature, more sorrowful, more careful, less sure. This restraint is intensified by her split from her daemon, her daemon – but it was also, ironically, the trigger which caused him to abandon her in the first place.
Merging Narratives
The daemon's resolve to depart in pursuit of that youthful part of Lyra which she appears to have shed (an aspect which he represents as her "creativity"), and her journey to rejoin with him, were the incitements of the prior book, which saw Lyra undertake a picaresque journey across the continent and into the mountain region, encountering with marvel and peril on the way. But from the outset, deeper currents were in play, and sinister powers at work. The Magisterium – the faith's ruling body, and Pullman's deliciously chilling incarnation of austere, administrative evil – is under fresh command, and asserting its power. Lyra's uncle – our protagonist's relative, who blames her for his family member's death – has positioned himself into the role of head of the church's governing body, and is set on using his recently acquired authority to broaden the church's control. A key character, who rescued young the heroine to safety along a swollen Thames as an young boy in the prequel, is now an Oxford don with a additional duty in spycraft: he is sent to Geneva to discover more about the antagonist's plans. And beneath all of this is the puzzle surrounding the uncommon and precious botanical extract which manifests in some way to be the origin of a societal and financial crisis spreading out from that area. The oil is regarded by some as a commercial good, by others as a scientific or mystical wonder, and by further factions – the extremist "men from the mountains" – as a wellspring of darkness; an insult that must be eradicated. The question of its origins, its meaning, and whether it should be eliminated or preserved is escalating in importance.
Similar to the first series, Lyra's deeds, and her destiny, are revealed to be deeply entwined with the future of the world
In the previous volume, these narratives ran largely in side by side. In The Rose Field, they converge. Similar to the original series, Lyra's choices and her destiny are unveiled to be deeply linked with the future of the universe. Her personal mission to rejoin with her companion and regain her vision becomes the primary conflict in a larger battle with an controlling system which, as such regimes always have, is attempting to suppress freedom of thought, innovation and art: all the inner, rebellious ways in which humans can be free.
Dimensional Rifts and Moral Battles
The story begins with the unveiling of a collection of curious cracks in the structure of the planet's atmosphere: portals that seem to lead to alternate realities. An example of a portal seems to be the origin of the much debated rose oil. The church, with the antagonist at its leadership, designates these openings as a threat to the church's orthodoxy and aims to destroy them. As Lyra begins to turn away from inflexible logic and back to intuition, yet, her belief that these locations must be protected – that their significance and their value is in some way crucial – strengthens. "The substance, or the substance, or the creativity, or the field of roses, or no matter what we label it," she says, "we require it." The scene for a Blakean conflict between purity and knowledge is established.
Plot Rhythm and Personal Evolution
At 640 pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
