Tings are collapsing in the last installment of The Book of Dust, the next of Philip Pullman's magisterial trilogies set in a universe that manifests, here more than ever, as a energized and tilted version of our own. Institutions are crumbling, or reorganizing themselves along unfamiliar and troubling lines. An invisible force "is wrecking the air and the seasons"; concurrently, "wealth is decaying, and no one knows why". Authority is flowing away from states, and pooling in the chambers of religious leaders, the vaults of business empires, the grasp of mobs. "Something is at work, stealthily, gradually", says businessman a merchant figure, keeping a watchful eye on the Silk Roads from his place in an Aleppo cafe. "Aspects we thought were firm and durable are weakening and collapsing."
The Central Mystery and The Protagonist's Path
Precisely what that element might be, and how to counteract it, is the mystery that propels this final volume, which resumes where the previous book left off. This is, by all accounts, the author's concluding venture into the carefully crafted, endlessly enchanting universe he first introduced three decades past, with the publication of the first trilogy. It's a realm whose landscape corresponds to that of this world, but whose chronicles veers and changes with ours; where the people look and think and behave like us, but are accompanied by animal souls, beings in animal form; where the air are filled with enchantresses and legendary creatures, but underneath, transports are caught and tea is sipped, and older professors carry Harrods shopping bags. Lyra, whom we first introduced to as a child in the first trilogy, and then revisited as a infant in the prequel, the introductory book with which the author began this trilogy, is now a young woman: still recognisably the spiky and determined main character of the earlier books, but more mature, sadder, more cautious, less certain. This restraint is amplified by her separation from her animal guide, Pan – but it was also, ironically, the trigger which led him to leave her in the first place.
Merging Narratives
The daemon's resolve to depart in pursuit of that innocent part of the heroine which she appears to have shed (an quality which he symbolizes as her "vision"), and her journey to rejoin with him, were the catalysts of its predecessor, which chronicled the protagonist undertake a adventurous voyage across Europe and into the mountain region, encountering with marvel and peril on the way. But from the start, underlying forces were in motion, and darker forces at work. The church authority – the church's ruling body, and Pullman's deliciously chilling incarnation of austere, administrative wickedness – is under fresh command, and flexing its muscles. Lyra's uncle – Lyra's family member, who faults her for his family member's death – has manoeuvred himself into the office of president of the church's ruling assembly, and is intent on using his recently acquired influence to extend the church's rule. A key character, who saved infant the heroine to safety along a swollen river as an child in the prequel, is now an academic with a additional duty in espionage: he is sent to a key location to discover more about the antagonist's aims. And beneath all of this is the enigma surrounding the scarce and precious botanical extract which manifests mysteriously to be the origin of a societal and economic crisis rippling out from that area. The oil is seen by various factions as a marketable product, by others as a empirical or spiritual wonder, and by others still – the fanatical "mountain dwellers" – as a wellspring of malevolence; an affront that must be eradicated. The question of its origins, its significance, and whether it should be destroyed or protected is becoming urgent.
Like the first series, the heroine's actions, and her fate, are revealed to be inextricably linked with the destiny of the world
In its predecessor, these plots ran mostly in tandem. In The Rose Field, they converge. Similar to His Dark Materials, her movements and her path are shown to be inseparably woven with the future of the world. Her personal mission to reunite with her companion and regain her imagination becomes the primary conflict in a broader war with an controlling regime which, as such authorities typically do, is striving to quell independence of thought, innovation and culture: all the personal, resistant ways in which individuals can be free.
Cosmic Openings and Ideological Conflicts
The story starts with the unveiling of a series of strange fissures in the makeup of the planet's atmosphere: portals that seem to open into alternate realities. One such portal appears to be the point of the fiercely disputed rose oil. The authority, with its leader at its leadership, classifies these windows as a challenge to the religion's doctrine and endeavors to eliminate them. As our protagonist begins to turn away from strict rationalism and revert to intuition, nevertheless, her belief that these locations must be defended – that their significance and what they provide is mysteriously essential – strengthens. "The substance, or rose oil, or the creativity, or the Rose Field, or whatever we label it," she says, "we require it." The setting for a philosophical tussle between purity and experience is established.
Plot Rhythm and Protagonist Growth
At a substantial length, The Rose Field|this volume|the
