Tings are falling apart in the final volume of Pullman's latest trilogy, the second of Philip Pullman's magisterial trilogies set in a universe that appears, in this volume especially, as a charged and slanted version of our own. Establishments are crumbling, or restructuring themselves along new and disturbing lines. An hidden force "is ruining the air and the seasons"; at the same time, "money's going bad, and no one knows why". Control is flowing away from authorities, and pooling in the chambers of theocrats, the vaults of business empires, the hands of rioters. "Some force is at work, stealthily, imperceptibly", says merchant a merchant figure, keeping a vigilant eye on the Silk Roads from his seat in an Aleppo cafe. "Elements we thought were secure and strong are deteriorating and failing."
Core Enigma and Her Quest
Exactly what that element might be, and how to counteract it, is the mystery that drives this final volume, which continues where The Secret Commonwealth ended. This is, according to many, the author's last venture into the elaborately built, infinitely beguiling realm he first introduced three decades past, with the launch of the first trilogy. It's a domain whose landscape maps on to that of this world, but whose history veers and changes with ours; where the people look and think and act like us, but are paired by external spirits, beings in creature form; where the heavens are populated with enchantresses and legendary creatures, but underneath, transports are taken and tea is sipped, and middle-aged scholars carry luxury shopping bags. Lyra, whom we first met as a child in the first trilogy, and then revisited as a toddler in La Belle Sauvage, the origin story with which the author began the series, is now a mature individual: still clearly the prickly and persistent protagonist of the earlier books, but aged, sadder, more careful, more doubtful. This limitation is amplified 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
Pan's decision to leave in search of that childlike part of her which she seems to have lost (an quality which he symbolizes as her "creativity"), and her mission to reconnect with him, were the incitements of the prior book, which followed Lyra undertake a wandering voyage across Europe and into the mountain region, encountering with amazement and peril on the way. But from the outset, deeper currents were in motion, and malevolent elements at work. The Magisterium – the faith's controlling power, and the author's masterfully eerie representation of strict, administrative evil – is under new leadership, and flexing its muscles. Lyra's uncle – the heroine's uncle, who blames her for his sibling's death – has positioned himself into the role of leader of the authority's governing body, and is intent on using his newfound influence to extend the church's rule. Another protagonist, who carried baby the heroine to security along a swollen river as an young boy in La Belle Sauvage, is now an Oxford don with a sideline in intelligence work: he is sent to the city to discover more about his intentions. And behind all of this is the mystery surrounding the scarce and costly rose oil which seems mysteriously to be the source of a social and financial disturbance rippling out from the region. The extract is regarded by some as a tradeable product, by others as a empirical or spiritual wonder, and by yet others – the extremist "mountain dwellers" – as a origin of darkness; an affront that must be destroyed. The issue of where it comes from, what it stands for, and if it should be destroyed or preserved is becoming urgent.
As in the first series, Lyra's actions, and her destiny, are revealed to be inextricably linked with the destiny of the realm
In the previous volume, these narratives ran broadly in parallel. In this final book, they merge. Similar to the first trilogy, Lyra's actions and her destiny are shown to be inseparably woven with the fate of the realm. Her private quest to reunite with her companion and rediscover her vision becomes the central struggle in a broader conflict with an controlling system which, as such authorities typically do, is striving to stifle independence of thinking, creativity and culture: all the internal, resistant ways in which people can be free.
Dimensional Rifts and Ideological Conflicts
The story begins with the unveiling of a collection of strange cracks in the makeup of the planet's atmosphere: portals that seem to lead to other worlds. An example of a opening appears to be the point of the highly contested rose oil. The authority, with the antagonist at its helm, labels these portals as a challenge to the religion's doctrine and sets out to eliminate them. As our protagonist begins to move from rigid logic and back to instinct, nevertheless, her belief that these places must be defended – that their meaning and their value is mysteriously vital – strengthens. "Dust, or rose oil, or the imagination, or the botanical realm, or whatever we label it," she says, "we require it." The stage for a poetic conflict between purity and maturity is set.
Plot Rhythm and Character Development
At 640 pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
