Tings are falling apart in the concluding book of Pullman's latest trilogy, the next of the author's magisterial trilogies set in a realm that appears, here more than ever, as a energized and slanted version of our own. Institutions are weakening, or reorganizing themselves along novel and disquieting lines. An unseen force "is destroying the air and the seasons"; concurrently, "currency is failing, and no one knows why". Power is draining from governments, and pooling in the chambers of religious leaders, the vaults of business empires, the grasp of rioters. "Something is at work, very quietly, imperceptibly", says trader Mustafa Bey, keeping a vigilant eye on the ancient paths from his post in an city cafe. "Things we thought were secure and durable are weakening and giving way."
The Central Mystery and The Protagonist's Path
Exactly what that something might be, and ways to oppose it, is the mystery that animates The Rose Field, which picks up where its predecessor ended. This is, reportedly, the author's final venture into the elaborately built, endlessly enchanting world he first unveiled three decades past, with the launch of the first trilogy. It's a domain whose geography corresponds to that of the real world, but whose past tacks and jibes with ours; where the people appear and reason and act like us, but are accompanied by animal souls, beings in beast form; where the air are teeming with witches and legendary creatures, but underneath, buses are taken and beverages is sipped, and older academics carry fancy shopping bags. The protagonist, whom we first met as a child in the original trilogy, and then revisited as a infant in La Belle Sauvage, the introductory book with which Pullman began the series, is now a mature individual: still recognisably the spiky and determined protagonist of the previous installments, but aged, more sorrowful, more careful, less certain. This circumscription is heightened by her division from her animal guide, Pantalaimon – but it was also, unexpectedly, the trigger which made him desert her in the first place.
Merging Narratives
His choice to depart in quest of that youthful part of her which she seems to have lost (an trait which he epitomises as her "vision"), and her journey to rejoin with him, were the driving forces of the prior book, which saw Lyra undertake a adventurous voyage across Europe and into the mountain region, meeting with amazement and danger on the way. But from the beginning, deeper currents were in motion, and darker forces at work. The church authority – the religious governing authority, and the author's deliciously chilling incarnation of rigid, procedural malice – is under fresh command, and asserting its power. Lyra's uncle – the heroine's relative, who faults her for his sibling's death – has positioned himself into the position of leader of the authority's High Council, and is determined on using his fresh authority to extend the religion's dominium. Another protagonist, who rescued infant the heroine to refuge along a overflowing Thames as an 11-year-old in the first book, is now an university scholar with a secondary role in espionage: he is dispatched to the city to find out more about Delamare's aims. And underlying all of this is the enigma surrounding the uncommon and costly essential oil which appears mysteriously to be the source of a social and financial crisis spreading out from the region. The extract is regarded by certain groups as a commercial good, by others as a research-based or esoteric phenomenon, and by further factions – the fanatical "highland figures" – as a origin of darkness; an challenge that must be destroyed. The question of where it comes from, its significance, and whether it should be removed or safeguarded is becoming urgent.
Similar to His Dark Materials, our protagonist's actions, and her fate, are demonstrated to be inseparably entwined with the fate of the world
In its predecessor, these storylines ran largely in parallel. In The Rose Field, they merge. Like the first trilogy, Lyra's actions and her path are revealed to be inextricably linked with the fate of the realm. Her individual journey to rejoin with her daemon and regain her creativity becomes the central struggle in a larger war with an authoritarian government which, as these systems typically do, is striving to quell freedom of reason, innovation and culture: all the inner, rebellious ways in which humans can be liberated.
Atmospheric Fissures and Ideological Conflicts
The story starts with the finding of a series of curious fissures in the structure of the world's sky: portals that seem to lead to different dimensions. An example of a window seems to be the origin of the highly contested botanical substance. The church, with its leader at its helm, labels these openings as a threat to the church's orthodoxy and aims to destroy them. As Lyra begins to move from inflexible rationalism and revert to intuition, nevertheless, her certainty that these places must be defended – that what they stand for and their value is somehow essential – grows. "The substance, or rose oil, or the creativity, or the botanical realm, or no matter what we call it," she says, "we need it." The setting for a Blakean conflict between innocence and knowledge is established.
Plot Rhythm and Personal Evolution
At over six hundred pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
