Tings are collapsing in the concluding book of The Dust Trilogy, the second of Philip Pullman's magisterial trilogies set in a world that manifests, in this volume especially, as a charged and skewed version of our own. Establishments are weakening, or reorganizing themselves along unfamiliar and disquieting lines. An invisible force "is destroying the air and the seasons"; at the same time, "money's going bad, and no one knows why". Power is draining from states, and gathering in the offices of theocrats, the treasuries of business empires, the grasp of rioters. "Some force is at work, very quietly, very subtly", says trader Mustafa Bey, keeping a observant eye on the Silk Roads from his post in an city cafe. "Things we thought were firm and strong are faltering and giving way."
Key Puzzle and The Protagonist's Path
Precisely what that force might be, and methods to fight it, is the inquiry that animates The Rose Field, which resumes where its predecessor ended. This is, according to many, Pullman's concluding venture into the elaborately built, deeply captivating realm he first unveiled in the distant past, with the release of Northern Lights. It's a world whose terrain maps on to that of the real world, but whose history veers and changes with ours; where the people look and think and behave like us, but are joined by animal souls, essences in animal form; where the air are teeming with enchantresses and gryphons, but underneath, transports are caught and drinks is drunk, and older academics carry fancy shopping bags. Our heroine, whom we first met as a child in the first trilogy, and then met once more as a toddler in La Belle Sauvage, the prequel with which Pullman began the series, is now a young woman: still recognisably the prickly and determined heroine of the prior volumes, but older, sadder, more cautious, more doubtful. This limitation is intensified by her split from her daemon, Pantalaimon – but it was also, paradoxically, the trigger which made him desert her in the first place.
Merging Narratives
Pan's decision to leave in quest of that innocent part of Lyra which she may have forgotten (an trait which he epitomises as her "imagination"), and her quest to reconnect with him, were the driving forces of The Secret Commonwealth, which chronicled Lyra undertake a picaresque journey across Europe and into the mountain region, facing with amazement and danger on the way. But from the start, underlying forces were in motion, and malevolent elements at work. The church authority – the faith's controlling power, and the author's masterfully eerie embodiment of rigid, administrative evil – is under fresh command, and showing its strength. Lyra's uncle – the heroine's relative, who faults her for his sibling's death – has positioned himself into the office of head of the church's ruling assembly, and is intent on using his recently acquired authority to extend the religion's control. A key character, who carried baby the heroine to security along a swollen river as an young boy in the first book, is now an Oxford don with a sideline in espionage: he is dispatched to Geneva to learn more about the antagonist's plans. And behind all of this is the puzzle surrounding the scarce and valuable botanical extract which appears in some way to be the origin of a societal and financial crisis rippling out from the region. The extract is regarded by various factions as a commercial commodity, by others as a research-based or mystical miracle, and by others still – the fanatical "mountain dwellers" – as a source of evil; an challenge that must be obliterated. The question of its source, its significance, and if it should be destroyed or preserved is becoming urgent.
As in the original trilogy, the heroine's deeds, and her fate, are demonstrated to be deeply linked with the fate of the world
In its predecessor, these storylines ran broadly in tandem. In this final book, they come together. As in His Dark Materials, the protagonist's actions and her fate are shown to be deeply woven with the future of the realm. Her private quest to rejoin with her daemon and recover her vision becomes the central conflict in a wider battle with an controlling government which, as such authorities typically do, is attempting to stifle independence of reason, creativity and culture: all the internal, rebellious ways in which humans can be independent.
Cosmic Openings and Philosophical Struggles
The novel begins with the finding of a series of curious openings in the makeup of the planet's air: gateways that appear to lead to other worlds. An example of a portal seems to be the source of the much debated botanical substance. The Magisterium, with Delamare at its leadership, designates these openings as a threat to the institution's orthodoxy and aims to destroy them. As our protagonist begins to shift from strict logic and back to feeling, however, her belief that these locations must be preserved – that their meaning and what they provide is mysteriously vital – increases. "The substance, or the extract, or the creativity, or the botanical realm, or no matter what we name it," she says, "it is necessary." The stage for a Blakean conflict between purity and experience is established.
Story Tempo and Character Development
At 640 pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
