Things are collapsing in the final volume of Pullman's latest trilogy, the second of Philip Pullman's grand trilogies set in a realm that seems, here more than ever, as a intense and skewed version of our own. Institutions are crumbling, or reorganizing themselves along new and troubling lines. An hidden force "is ruining the air and the seasons"; concurrently, "money's going bad, and no one knows why". Authority is flowing away from states, and pooling in the halls of religious leaders, the vaults of conglomerates, the control of crowds. "Something is at work, very quietly, gradually", says businessman a trader character, keeping a vigilant eye on the ancient paths from his seat in an city cafe. "Aspects we thought were firm and durable are faltering and failing."
Core Enigma and Lyra's Journey
Exactly what that something might be, and how to counteract it, is the inquiry that drives this final volume, which continues where the previous book concluded. This is, according to many, the author's concluding foray into the carefully crafted, infinitely beguiling realm he first introduced three decades past, with the release of His Dark Materials. It's a domain whose landscape maps on to that of the real world, but whose history tacks and jibes with ours; where the individuals look and think and act like us, but are paired by animal souls, beings in creature form; where the skies are populated with enchantresses and legendary creatures, but beneath those skies, buses are taken and beverages is sipped, and mature professors carry luxury shopping bags. Lyra, whom we first met as a 12-year-old in the His Dark Materials trilogy, and then saw again as a infant in the first volume, the prequel with which Pullman began the series, is now a young woman: still distinctly the spiky and determined heroine of the previous installments, but more mature, more sorrowful, more careful, less certain. This circumscription is heightened by her split from her daemon, Pan – but it was also, paradoxically, the cause which made him desert her in the first place.
Interwoven Plots
Pan's decision to go off in search of that youthful part of her which she may have forgotten (an quality which he epitomises as her "vision"), and her mission to rejoin with him, were the catalysts of the prior book, which saw the protagonist undertake a wandering journey across Europe and into the Caucasus, facing with amazement and risk on the way. But from the start, deeper currents were in play, and darker forces at work. The church authority – the religious governing authority, and Pullman's masterfully eerie embodiment of rigid, procedural malice – is under recent guidance, and showing its strength. The antagonist – the heroine's uncle, who holds responsible her for his sibling's death – has manoeuvred himself into the role of head of the Magisterium's High Council, and is determined on using his newfound authority to broaden the church's dominium. Another protagonist, who saved baby the heroine to safety along a flooded Thames as an 11-year-old in the prequel, is now an Oxford don with a additional duty in intelligence work: he is sent to Geneva to learn more about his intentions. And underlying all of this is the enigma surrounding the uncommon and precious essential oil which appears mysteriously to be the cause of a societal and economic upheaval spreading out from the region. The extract is regarded by some as a tradeable commodity, by alternate groups as a research-based or spiritual wonder, and by others still – the zealous "highland figures" – as a source of darkness; an challenge that must be eradicated. The question of its origins, what it stands for, and if it should be eliminated or preserved is becoming urgent.
Like the first series, our protagonist's actions, and her fate, are shown to be inseparably connected with the destiny of the universe
In the previous volume, these narratives ran mostly in tandem. In the conclusion, they converge. As in His Dark Materials, Lyra's movements and her destiny are unveiled to be deeply woven with the destiny of the universe. Her personal quest to reunite with her daemon and recover her creativity becomes the primary struggle in a wider war with an controlling government which, as such regimes typically do, is striving to suppress independence of thinking, creativity and culture: all the internal, rebellious ways in which humans can be independent.
Dimensional Rifts and Ideological Conflicts
The novel begins with the unveiling of a collection of strange fissures in the fabric of the planet's sky: windows that look to open into alternate realities. A particular window appears to be the point of the much debated rose oil. The authority, with the antagonist at its helm, classifies these portals as a threat to the religion's orthodoxy and sets out to eliminate them. As our protagonist begins to shift from rigid rationalism and back to instinct, yet, her belief that these locations must be defended – that what they stand for and what they provide is in some way crucial – grows. "The substance, or rose oil, or the vision, or the field of roses, or no matter what we call it," she says, "we need it." The setting for a Blakean tussle between innocence and knowledge is prepared.
Plot Rhythm and Personal Evolution
At a substantial length, The Rose Field|this volume|the
