Things are unraveling in the concluding book of The Book of Dust, the second of Philip Pullman's masterful trilogies set in a universe that manifests, in this volume especially, as a intense and tilted version of our own. Institutions are crumbling, or reassembling themselves along new and disquieting lines. An hidden force "is ruining the air and the seasons"; simultaneously, "money's going bad, and no one knows why". Control is flowing away from states, and accumulating in the offices of religious leaders, the vaults of conglomerates, the control of mobs. "An element is at work, very quietly, imperceptibly", says businessman a merchant figure, keeping a observant eye on the ancient paths from his place in an city cafe. "Things we thought were firm and solid are weakening and giving way."
The Central Mystery and The Protagonist's Path
Just what that element might be, and ways to oppose it, is the inquiry that propels the concluding book, which resumes where the previous book left off. This is, reportedly, Pullman's last foray into the intricately constructed, endlessly enchanting world he first introduced 30 years ago, with the publication of the first trilogy. It's a realm whose geography corresponds to that of the real world, but whose chronicles veers and changes with ours; where the individuals look and reason and behave like us, but are joined by daemons, essences in creature form; where the air are teeming with witches and mythical beasts, but below, transports are caught and drinks is drunk, and older professors carry luxury shopping bags. Lyra, whom we first introduced to as a young girl in the first trilogy, and then revisited as a toddler in La Belle Sauvage, the origin story with which Pullman began this trilogy, is now a mature individual: still distinctly the sharp and persistent main character of the previous installments, but more mature, melancholic, warier, less sure. This circumscription is intensified by her division from her daemon, Pan – but it was also, paradoxically, the trigger which caused him to abandon her in the first place.
Merging Narratives
Pan's decision to leave in quest of that innocent part of the heroine which she appears to have shed (an quality which he symbolizes as her "creativity"), and her mission to reunite with him, were the catalysts of its predecessor, which saw the protagonist undertake a picaresque voyage 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 religious council – the church's governing authority, and the author's deliciously chilling representation of austere, administrative wickedness – is under new leadership, and showing its strength. Marcel Delamare – the heroine's uncle, who holds responsible her for his sister's death – has worked himself into the role of leader of the Magisterium's High Council, and is set on using his recently acquired influence to broaden the religion's rule. Malcolm Polstead, who carried infant the heroine to safety along a flooded Thames as an young boy in La Belle Sauvage, is now an academic with a secondary role in espionage: he is sent to Geneva to discover more about Delamare's plans. And behind all of this is the mystery surrounding the rare and precious essential oil which seems mysteriously to be the cause of a social and financial disturbance emanating out from Central Asia. The oil is seen by various factions as a marketable product, by others as a empirical or spiritual miracle, and by yet others – the zealous "mountain dwellers" – as a origin of malevolence; an insult that must be eradicated. The dilemma of its origins, what it stands for, and whether it should be destroyed or safeguarded is coming rapidly to the fore.
Like His Dark Materials, Lyra's actions, and her fate, are revealed to be inseparably linked with the destiny of the universe
In the previous volume, these plots ran mostly in parallel. In The Rose Field, they merge. Like His Dark Materials, Lyra's movements and her fate are revealed to be inextricably entwined with the fate of the universe. Her individual quest to rejoin with her companion and regain her imagination becomes the central struggle in a larger battle with an oppressive government which, as such authorities always have, is seeking to suppress freedom of thought, originality and art: all the internal, rebellious ways in which people can be liberated.
Atmospheric Fissures and Philosophical Struggles
The book opens with the finding of a set of curious fissures in the structure of the world's air: gateways that look to lead to alternate realities. An example of a portal manifests to be the point of the fiercely disputed rose oil. The church, with Delamare at its leadership, labels these openings as a challenge to the institution's beliefs and endeavors to eradicate them. As Lyra begins to turn away from inflexible reason and return to intuition, however, her certainty that these locations must be defended – that their significance and what they offer is in some way crucial – grows. "Cosmic particles, or the substance, or the imagination, or the botanical realm, or whatever we call it," she says, "we need it." The setting for a Blakean tussle between naivety and knowledge is prepared.
Plot Rhythm and Character Development
At 640 pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
