Things are falling apart in the last installment of Pullman's latest trilogy, the second of the author's magisterial trilogies set in a world that manifests, now more than ever, as a energized and skewed version of our own. Organizations are weakening, or restructuring themselves along new and troubling lines. An unseen force "is wrecking the air and the seasons"; simultaneously, "wealth is decaying, and no one knows why". Power is draining from authorities, and accumulating in the halls of religious leaders, the vaults of conglomerates, the hands of mobs. "Some force is at work, silently, very subtly", says merchant a trader character, keeping a observant eye on the Silk Roads from his seat in an Aleppo cafe. "Things we thought were stable and solid are deteriorating and failing."
The Central Mystery and Lyra's Journey
Precisely what that force might be, and methods to fight it, is the inquiry that animates The Rose Field, which picks up where The Secret Commonwealth left off. This is, reportedly, Pullman's last excursion into the elaborately built, endlessly enchanting world he first revealed in the distant past, with the release of the first trilogy. It's a domain whose landscape corresponds to that of this world, but whose chronicles diverges and shifts with ours; where the individuals appear and think and act like us, but are paired by animal souls, essences in beast form; where the air are filled with enchantresses and gryphons, but below, transports are ridden and drinks is sipped, and mature academics carry luxury shopping bags. Lyra, whom we first introduced to as a 12-year-old in the His Dark Materials trilogy, and then saw again as a infant in the prequel, the origin story with which Pullman began The Book of Dust, is now a mature individual: still recognisably the prickly and determined main character of the prior volumes, but more mature, more sorrowful, warier, more doubtful. This circumscription is amplified by her separation from her animal guide, Pan – but it was also, unexpectedly, the catalyst which caused him to abandon her in the first place.
Merging Narratives
The daemon's resolve to go off in pursuit of that childlike part of the heroine which she appears to have shed (an aspect which he symbolizes as her "creativity"), and her mission to rejoin with him, were the driving forces of the prior book, which followed the protagonist undertake a picaresque trek across Europe and into the Caucasus, facing with marvel and danger on the way. But from the beginning, profound shifts were in play, and sinister powers at work. The Magisterium – the faith's controlling power, and Pullman's deliciously chilling embodiment of austere, administrative wickedness – is under recent guidance, and showing its strength. Lyra's uncle – Lyra's relative, who holds responsible her for his family member's death – has worked himself into the office of leader of the Magisterium's governing body, and is determined on using his recently acquired power to expand the church's dominium. Malcolm Polstead, who carried baby the heroine to security along a overflowing Thames as an child in La Belle Sauvage, is now an academic with a sideline in spycraft: he is dispatched to Geneva to discover more about his plans. And behind all of this is the puzzle surrounding the rare and costly essential oil which manifests in some way to be the source of a social and financial crisis rippling out from the region. The extract is viewed by certain groups as a marketable product, by others as a research-based or spiritual miracle, and by others still – the zealous "highland figures" – as a source of darkness; an challenge that must be obliterated. The dilemma of its source, what it stands for, and if it should be destroyed or protected is becoming urgent.
Like the first series, the heroine's actions, and her future, are shown to be inextricably entwined with the fate of the universe
In the previous volume, these narratives ran mostly in side by side. In the conclusion, they converge. Like the original series, the protagonist's choices and her destiny are unveiled to be inextricably entwined with the destiny of the world. Her personal mission to reunite with her companion and recover her vision becomes the central conflict in a wider conflict with an oppressive system which, as such regimes always have, is striving to stifle autonomy of thought, creativity and culture: all the personal, rebellious ways in which individuals can be independent.
Cosmic Openings and Moral Battles
The novel opens with the finding of a series of unusual openings in the structure of the planet's atmosphere: gateways that appear to give on to different dimensions. A particular opening manifests to be the point of the much debated mystical extract. The Magisterium, with its leader at its helm, classifies these windows as a challenge to the church's orthodoxy and aims to eradicate them. As our protagonist begins to turn away from strict reason and back to feeling, yet, her belief that these places must be protected – that their significance and what they offer is somehow crucial – increases. "The substance, or rose oil, or the creativity, or the field of roses, or whatever we label it," she says, "it is necessary." The setting for a philosophical conflict between innocence and experience is established.
Plot Rhythm and Personal Evolution
At 640 pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
