Tings are collapsing in the final volume of The Book of Dust, the second of Philip Pullman's grand trilogies set in a world that appears, now more than ever, as a intense and skewed version of our own. Institutions are failing, or reassembling themselves along unfamiliar and troubling lines. An unseen force "is destroying the air and the seasons"; simultaneously, "wealth is decaying, and no one knows why". Authority is shifting from governments, and pooling in the offices of religious leaders, the vaults of corporations, the hands of mobs. "Some force is at work, stealthily, gradually", says merchant Mustafa Bey, keeping a watchful eye on the trade routes from his place in an Aleppo cafe. "Things we thought were stable and durable are weakening and giving way."
The Central Mystery and Lyra's Journey
Just what that something might be, and how to counteract it, is the question that animates The Rose Field, which continues where its predecessor left off. This is, reportedly, the author's last foray into the carefully crafted, deeply captivating world he first revealed 30 years ago, with the release of His Dark Materials. It's a domain whose landscape maps on to that of this world, but whose history tacks and jibes with ours; where the individuals appear and reason and behave like us, but are joined by daemons, beings in beast form; where the air are populated with witches and mythical beasts, but underneath, transports are ridden and tea is consumed, and older academics carry Harrods shopping bags. The protagonist, whom we first introduced to as a 12-year-old in the original trilogy, and then revisited as a toddler in the prequel, the origin story with which Pullman began this trilogy, is now a mature individual: still distinctly the spiky and tenacious heroine of the earlier books, but aged, sadder, more careful, more doubtful. This restraint is amplified by her division from her daemon, Pantalaimon – but it was also, ironically, the cause which made him desert her in the first place.
Merging Narratives
The daemon's resolve to go off in pursuit of that youthful part of Lyra which she may have forgotten (an quality which he represents as her "vision"), and her journey to rejoin with him, were the incitements of The Secret Commonwealth, which followed Lyra undertake a adventurous journey across the continent and into the mountain region, meeting with wonder and risk on the way. But from the outset, profound shifts were in action, and darker forces at work. The church authority – the religious ruling body, and Pullman's deliciously chilling representation of rigid, procedural malice – is under new leadership, and flexing its muscles. Lyra's uncle – the heroine's family member, who blames her for his sister's death – has worked himself into the role of leader of the authority's governing body, and is intent on using his recently acquired authority to broaden the church's rule. Another protagonist, who carried baby the heroine to refuge along a swollen river as an 11-year-old in La Belle Sauvage, is now an Oxford don with a secondary role in espionage: he is dispatched to the city to discover more about Delamare's plans. And behind all of this is the puzzle surrounding the rare and valuable essential oil which manifests somehow to be the source of a social and financial upheaval spreading out from that area. The extract is regarded by various factions as a commercial commodity, by alternate groups as a research-based or spiritual wonder, and by others still – the extremist "highland figures" – as a source of malevolence; an insult that must be destroyed. The question of its source, what it stands for, and if it should be eliminated or safeguarded is becoming urgent.
Like the original trilogy, our protagonist's deeds, and her fate, are shown to be inextricably linked with the future of the world
In The Secret Commonwealth, these plots ran largely in parallel. In the conclusion, they merge. Like the first trilogy, her choices and her path are shown to be deeply entwined with the future of the universe. Her individual quest to reconnect with her daemon and recover her vision becomes the central struggle in a wider battle with an controlling government which, as such authorities always have, is seeking to suppress independence of thinking, creativity and culture: all the inner, rebellious ways in which people can be independent.
Cosmic Openings and Moral Battles
The story starts with the finding of a series of curious openings in the makeup of the world's atmosphere: gateways that appear to give on to different dimensions. One such window seems to be the source of the much debated rose oil. The Magisterium, with Delamare at its helm, classifies these windows as a challenge to the religion's orthodoxy and endeavors to destroy them. As our protagonist begins to shift from inflexible logic and back to instinct, yet, her certainty that these places must be protected – that their meaning and what they provide is in some way essential – strengthens. "The substance, or the extract, or the creativity, or the field of roses, or whatever we call it," she says, "we require it." The scene for a philosophical tussle between naivety and experience is established.
Plot Rhythm and Character Development
At over six hundred pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
