Things are falling apart in the final volume of The Dust Trilogy, the next of Philip Pullman's magisterial trilogies set in a world that manifests, now more than ever, as a intense and slanted version of our own. Establishments are failing, or restructuring themselves along novel and disquieting lines. An unseen force "is ruining the air and the seasons"; simultaneously, "wealth is decaying, and no one knows why". Power is draining from governments, and pooling in the offices of religious leaders, the coffers of conglomerates, the hands of mobs. "Something is at work, stealthily, very subtly", says businessman a merchant figure, keeping a vigilant eye on the Silk Roads from his seat in an Aleppo cafe. "Aspects we thought were secure and strong are weakening and failing."
Key Puzzle and Lyra's Journey
Just what that force might be, and ways to oppose it, is the inquiry that animates The Rose Field, which continues where its predecessor left off. This is, reportedly, the author's concluding venture into the intricately constructed, deeply captivating realm he first unveiled in the distant past, with the launch of the first trilogy. It's a realm whose geography maps on to that of the real world, but whose history diverges and shifts with ours; where the individuals look and think and act like us, but are joined by external spirits, souls in beast form; where the skies are teeming with witches and legendary creatures, but beneath those skies, buses are ridden and beverages is drunk, and middle-aged professors carry luxury shopping bags. The protagonist, whom we first met as a child in the first trilogy, and then saw again as a baby in La Belle Sauvage, the origin story with which Pullman began the series, is now a adult: still recognisably the prickly and tenacious main character of the prior volumes, but aged, more sorrowful, more cautious, less certain. This circumscription is intensified by her separation from her daemon, Pan – but it was also, ironically, the catalyst which made him desert her in the first place.
Converging Storylines
The daemon's resolve to depart in pursuit of that innocent part of Lyra which she appears to have shed (an trait which he represents as her "imagination"), and her mission to reunite with him, were the driving forces of its predecessor, which saw Lyra undertake a adventurous voyage 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 malevolent elements at work. The church authority – the church's controlling power, and the author's masterfully eerie incarnation of austere, bureaucratic malice – is under fresh command, and showing its strength. Marcel Delamare – Lyra's uncle, who faults her for his family member's death – has manoeuvred himself into the position of leader of the authority's governing body, and is determined on using his recently acquired influence to extend the religion's rule. Malcolm Polstead, who carried young Lyra to refuge along a swollen Thames as an child in the first book, is now an Oxford don with a additional duty in intelligence work: he is sent to the city to find out more about his aims. And behind all of this is the enigma surrounding the uncommon and costly rose oil which manifests in some way to be the source of a societal and economic crisis emanating out from that area. The extract is regarded by some as a commercial good, by others as a empirical or spiritual wonder, and by yet others – the extremist "highland figures" – as a wellspring of malevolence; an insult that must be eradicated. The dilemma of where it comes from, its meaning, and if it should be eliminated or preserved is escalating in importance.
Like the original trilogy, Lyra's actions, and her fate, are demonstrated to be deeply linked with the destiny of the universe
In The Secret Commonwealth, these narratives ran mostly in side by side. In The Rose Field, they converge. Like the first trilogy, the protagonist's movements and her path are revealed to be inextricably entwined with the future of the universe. Her private journey to reunite with her companion and rediscover her imagination becomes the key struggle in a larger war with an oppressive regime which, as such regimes often attempt, is seeking to quell autonomy of thinking, creativity and expression: all the inner, resistant ways in which people can be free.
Atmospheric Fissures and Philosophical Struggles
The novel begins with the unveiling of a collection of unusual cracks in the fabric of the Earth's sky: windows that seem to open into other worlds. One such window seems to be the origin of the much debated mystical extract. The Magisterium, with Delamare at its helm, classifies these windows as a challenge to the institution's beliefs and endeavors to eradicate them. As the heroine begins to move from strict logic and back to intuition, nevertheless, her belief that these sites must be protected – that what they stand for and their value is somehow crucial – grows. "Cosmic particles, or the substance, or the creativity, or the field of roses, or whatever we name it," she says, "it is necessary." The scene for a Blakean struggle between innocence and experience is established.
Story Tempo and Character Development
At 640 pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
