Tings are falling apart in the final volume of Pullman's latest trilogy, the second of Philip Pullman's magisterial trilogies set in a realm that appears, now more than ever, as a intense and slanted version of our own. Organizations are crumbling, or reorganizing themselves along new and disturbing lines. An invisible force "is ruining the air and the seasons"; simultaneously, "currency is failing, and no one knows why". Power is draining from states, and accumulating in the offices of religious leaders, the treasuries of corporations, the hands of crowds. "Some force is at work, silently, imperceptibly", says merchant Mustafa Bey, keeping a observant eye on the ancient paths from his place in an Aleppo cafe. "Elements we thought were stable and durable are deteriorating and collapsing."
Key Puzzle and The Protagonist's Path
Just what that force might be, and how to counteract it, is the question that drives this final volume, which picks up where the previous book concluded. This is, by all accounts, the author's final foray into the elaborately built, endlessly enchanting world he first introduced in the distant past, with the launch of His Dark Materials. It's a realm whose landscape corresponds to that of our world, but whose history veers and changes with ours; where the humans look and think and behave like us, but are paired by animal souls, essences in beast form; where the skies are populated with enchantresses and mythical beasts, but below, transports are taken and beverages is drunk, and older scholars carry fancy shopping bags. Lyra, whom we first introduced to as a 12-year-old in the His Dark Materials trilogy, and then saw again as a baby in the first volume, the prequel with which the author began this trilogy, is now a young woman: still recognisably the sharp and tenacious protagonist of the earlier books, but aged, more sorrowful, more cautious, less certain. This restraint is heightened by her separation from her soul companion, Pantalaimon – but it was also, unexpectedly, the cause which made him desert her in the first place.
Merging Narratives
His choice to depart in quest of that childlike part of her which she seems to have lost (an trait which he epitomises as her "creativity"), and her journey to rejoin with him, were the catalysts of the prior book, which saw the protagonist undertake a wandering trek across the continent and into the mountain region, encountering with wonder and peril on the way. But from the beginning, profound shifts were in play, and malevolent elements at work. The church authority – the church's governing authority, and Pullman's masterfully eerie embodiment of austere, administrative malice – is under new leadership, and showing its strength. The antagonist – the heroine's relative, who blames her for his family member's death – has positioned himself into the position of president of the authority's governing body, and is intent on using his fresh influence to extend the religion's rule. Another protagonist, who saved infant Lyra to refuge along a flooded Thames as an child in La Belle Sauvage, is now an academic with a sideline in intelligence work: he is assigned to the city to learn more about his aims. And behind all of this is the puzzle surrounding the uncommon and precious essential oil which manifests in some way to be the origin of a societal and economic crisis rippling out from the region. The extract is seen by some as a commercial commodity, by others as a research-based or spiritual phenomenon, and by yet others – the zealous "mountain dwellers" – as a wellspring of malevolence; an insult that must be obliterated. The dilemma of its origins, what it stands for, and if it should be eliminated or safeguarded is escalating in importance.
Like the original trilogy, Lyra's decisions, and her future, are demonstrated to be inseparably linked with the fate of the universe
In the previous volume, these plots ran broadly in side by side. In The Rose Field, they come together. Like the original series, Lyra's movements and her fate are unveiled to be inextricably woven with the fate of the realm. Her personal mission to reunite with her daemon and rediscover her vision becomes the primary struggle in a larger battle with an authoritarian system which, as such authorities always have, is attempting to stifle autonomy of thought, creativity and culture: all the inner, defiant ways in which humans can be liberated.
Cosmic Openings and Moral Battles
The story opens with the discovery of a set of curious cracks in the makeup of the planet's atmosphere: portals that appear to give on to alternate realities. A particular portal appears to be the point of the fiercely disputed mystical extract. The church, with Delamare at its helm, classifies these portals as a problem to the religion's beliefs and endeavors to destroy them. As our protagonist begins to turn away from strict reason and return to feeling, nevertheless, her conviction that these places must be protected – that their significance and what they offer is mysteriously crucial – grows. "Dust, or rose oil, or the vision, or the Rose Field, or whatever we label it," she says, "we require it." The scene for a philosophical conflict between purity and knowledge is set.
Narrative Pacing and Protagonist Growth
At 640 pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
