Things are collapsing in the last installment of Pullman's latest trilogy, the second of the author's grand trilogies set in a universe that seems, here more than ever, as a charged and tilted version of our own. Institutions are weakening, or reorganizing themselves along new and troubling lines. An invisible force "is destroying the air and the seasons"; at the same time, "wealth is decaying, and no one knows why". Power is shifting from authorities, and pooling in the chambers of religious leaders, the treasuries of business empires, the hands of mobs. "Something is at work, very quietly, gradually", says merchant a trader character, keeping a observant eye on the ancient paths from his post in an Aleppo cafe. "Aspects we thought were secure and strong are deteriorating and collapsing."
Key Puzzle and Her Quest
Just what that element might be, and ways to oppose it, is the question that drives the concluding book, which picks up where The Secret Commonwealth ended. This is, by all accounts, the author's concluding excursion into the carefully crafted, endlessly enchanting world he first unveiled three decades past, with the launch of Northern Lights. It's a world whose terrain maps on to that of this world, but whose history tacks and jibes with ours; where the individuals look and think and act like us, but are joined by external spirits, essences in beast form; where the heavens are populated with witches and mythical beasts, but underneath, vehicles are ridden and drinks is drunk, and middle-aged scholars carry luxury shopping bags. The protagonist, whom we first introduced to as a 12-year-old in the His Dark Materials trilogy, and then met once more as a baby in the prequel, the introductory book with which Pullman began the series, is now a young woman: still recognisably the sharp and determined heroine of the previous installments, but older, melancholic, more cautious, less sure. This restraint is amplified by her division from her animal guide, her daemon – but it was also, unexpectedly, the trigger which caused him to abandon her in the first place.
Merging Narratives
His choice to leave in search of that youthful part of the heroine which she seems to have lost (an trait which he represents as her "vision"), and her mission to reunite with him, were the catalysts of its predecessor, which chronicled the protagonist undertake a picaresque journey across Europe and into the mountain region, encountering with wonder and peril on the way. But from the beginning, deeper currents were in action, and sinister powers at work. The church authority – the religious governing authority, and Pullman's deliciously chilling incarnation of strict, administrative malice – is under recent guidance, and showing its strength. Lyra's uncle – the heroine's uncle, who faults her for his sibling's death – has positioned himself into the office of president of the church's ruling assembly, and is determined on using his fresh power to broaden the religion's rule. Malcolm Polstead, who saved young the heroine to safety along a flooded Thames as an child in the prequel, is now an Oxford don with a secondary role in intelligence work: he is dispatched to Geneva to discover more about his plans. And behind all of this is the enigma surrounding the uncommon and costly rose oil which seems in some way to be the cause of a social and financial upheaval emanating out from the region. The oil is regarded by certain groups as a tradeable product, by others as a scientific or esoteric phenomenon, and by others still – the zealous "men from the mountains" – as a source of evil; an affront that must be obliterated. The dilemma of its source, its meaning, and whether it should be removed or safeguarded is coming rapidly to the fore.
Like the original trilogy, the heroine's decisions, and her future, are revealed to be inseparably connected with the fate of the realm
In its predecessor, these plots ran broadly in side by side. In the conclusion, they come together. As in His Dark Materials, Lyra's movements and her path are unveiled to be deeply woven with the fate of the universe. Her personal quest to rejoin with her soul and regain her vision becomes the central battleground in a wider conflict with an authoritarian system which, as such regimes often attempt, is seeking to stifle independence of thought, creativity and culture: all the internal, rebellious ways in which people can be free.
Atmospheric Fissures and Philosophical Struggles
The book starts with the discovery of a collection of strange openings in the structure of the Earth's atmosphere: gateways that appear to lead to other worlds. One such opening seems to be the point of the highly contested mystical extract. The authority, with the antagonist at its leadership, designates these portals as a challenge to the religion's beliefs and aims to eliminate them. As our protagonist begins to move from strict rationalism and back to instinct, nevertheless, her certainty that these places must be protected – that their meaning and their value is somehow vital – grows. "The substance, or rose oil, or the imagination, or the field of roses, or no matter what we label it," she says, "we require it." The stage for a Blakean struggle between innocence and knowledge is prepared.
Plot Rhythm and Protagonist Growth
At a substantial length, The Rose Field|this volume|the
