Things are falling apart in the final volume of Pullman's latest trilogy, the next of Philip Pullman's magisterial trilogies set in a world that appears, in this volume especially, as a intense and tilted version of our own. Organizations are failing, or restructuring themselves along novel and disturbing lines. An invisible force "is wrecking the air and the seasons"; simultaneously, "money's going bad, and no one knows why". Control is flowing away from governments, and pooling in the offices of religious leaders, the coffers of business empires, the control of crowds. "An element is at work, silently, gradually", says businessman a trader character, keeping a vigilant eye on the Silk Roads from his post in an city cafe. "Things we thought were firm and durable are weakening and collapsing."
Core Enigma and The Protagonist's Path
Exactly what that something might be, and methods to fight it, is the question that drives the concluding book, which picks up where its predecessor concluded. This is, reportedly, Pullman's concluding excursion into the carefully crafted, endlessly enchanting realm he first revealed three decades past, with the release of His Dark Materials. It's a realm whose geography maps on to that of this world, but whose chronicles diverges and shifts with ours; where the humans appear and think and behave like us, but are accompanied by animal souls, essences in animal form; where the air are populated with witches and legendary creatures, but underneath, vehicles are caught and beverages is consumed, and middle-aged academics carry luxury shopping bags. The protagonist, whom we first met as a 12-year-old in the original trilogy, and then met once more as a toddler in La Belle Sauvage, the introductory book with which the author began the series, is now a adult: still clearly the sharp and tenacious protagonist of the previous installments, but more mature, sadder, warier, more doubtful. This restraint is amplified by her split from her daemon, her daemon – but it was also, ironically, the catalyst which made him desert her in the first place.
Interwoven Plots
Pan's decision to depart in pursuit of that innocent part of the heroine which she may have forgotten (an trait which he epitomises as her "imagination"), and her quest to reunite with him, were the catalysts of its predecessor, which chronicled Lyra undertake a wandering journey across the continent and into the Caucasus, facing with amazement and risk on the way. But from the outset, underlying forces were in action, and malevolent elements at work. The church authority – the religious governing authority, and the author's brilliantly sinister representation of rigid, bureaucratic malice – is under recent guidance, and showing its strength. Lyra's uncle – Lyra's uncle, who blames her for his family member's death – has manoeuvred himself into the office of leader of the authority's ruling assembly, and is intent on using his newfound influence to extend the institution's rule. Another protagonist, who carried infant Lyra to refuge along a swollen Thames as an young boy in the first book, is now an academic with a additional duty in espionage: he is assigned to the city to find out more about the antagonist's aims. And underlying all of this is the enigma surrounding the uncommon and precious essential oil which appears mysteriously to be the source of a societal and economic disturbance emanating out from Central Asia. The substance is regarded by certain groups as a commercial good, by others as a empirical or mystical miracle, and by further factions – the extremist "highland figures" – as a wellspring of malevolence; an challenge that must be destroyed. The question of where it comes from, what it stands for, and whether it should be eliminated or safeguarded is escalating in importance.
Similar to the first series, our protagonist's decisions, and her future, are shown to be inseparably linked with the future of the realm
In the previous volume, these plots ran broadly in tandem. In The Rose Field, they come together. Similar to His Dark Materials, the protagonist's movements and her destiny are shown to be inextricably woven with the destiny of the universe. Her private quest to reconnect with her daemon and regain her creativity becomes the primary struggle in a wider conflict with an authoritarian regime which, as such regimes typically do, is attempting to stifle freedom of thought, creativity and art: all the inner, rebellious ways in which humans can be free.
Cosmic Openings and Philosophical Struggles
The novel opens with the discovery of a collection of curious fissures in the makeup of the Earth's air: gateways that look to give on to different dimensions. A particular portal appears to be the point of the much debated mystical extract. The Magisterium, with Delamare at its helm, classifies these openings as a threat to the institution's beliefs and endeavors to eliminate them. As our protagonist begins to shift from strict rationalism and revert to instinct, yet, her belief that these sites must be protected – that their meaning and what they provide is somehow essential – strengthens. "Cosmic particles, or the substance, or the vision, or the botanical realm, or no matter what we label it," she says, "it is necessary." The scene for a philosophical tussle between naivety and knowledge is set.
Narrative Pacing and Character Development
At over six hundred pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
