Tings are unraveling in the final volume of Pullman's latest trilogy, the second of Philip Pullman's magisterial trilogies set in a realm that seems, now more than ever, as a intense and slanted version of our own. Organizations are weakening, or reassembling themselves along new and disturbing lines. An invisible force "is destroying the air and the seasons"; at the same time, "currency is failing, and no one knows why". Authority is flowing away from governments, and pooling in the halls of theocrats, the vaults of business empires, the control of mobs. "An element is at work, very quietly, imperceptibly", says merchant Mustafa Bey, keeping a watchful eye on the trade routes from his seat in an Aleppo cafe. "Elements we thought were secure and solid are deteriorating and failing."
Core Enigma and Her Quest
Precisely what that element might be, and how to counteract it, is the inquiry that drives the concluding book, which resumes where its predecessor concluded. This is, by all accounts, Pullman's last excursion into the elaborately built, infinitely beguiling realm he first introduced three decades past, with the publication of the first trilogy. It's a domain whose geography maps on to that of our world, but whose chronicles tacks and jibes with ours; where the people look and think and act like us, but are paired by daemons, beings in creature form; where the air are populated with enchantresses and legendary creatures, but below, transports are caught and beverages is sipped, and mature academics carry Harrods shopping bags. Our heroine, whom we first encountered as a child in the His Dark Materials trilogy, and then saw again as a toddler in the prequel, the origin story with which Pullman began The Book of Dust, is now a mature individual: still clearly the prickly and determined main character of the earlier books, but older, sadder, more cautious, more doubtful. This limitation is intensified by her split from her soul companion, Pan – but it was also, unexpectedly, the catalyst which made him desert her in the first place.
Interwoven Plots
His choice to leave in search of that childlike part of the heroine which she may have forgotten (an aspect which he epitomises as her "creativity"), and her quest to reunite with him, were the driving forces of The Secret Commonwealth, which followed Lyra undertake a adventurous journey across the continent and into the Caucasus, encountering with wonder and danger on the way. But from the outset, profound shifts were in play, and darker forces at work. The religious council – the faith's controlling power, and Pullman's brilliantly sinister representation of rigid, administrative malice – is under recent guidance, and asserting its power. The antagonist – the heroine's relative, who holds responsible her for his sister's death – has manoeuvred himself into the position of head of the church's governing body, and is intent on using his fresh influence to expand the church's control. Another protagonist, who carried baby the heroine to security along a overflowing river as an young boy in the prequel, is now an academic with a additional duty in espionage: he is dispatched to the city to learn more about Delamare's plans. And behind all of this is the mystery surrounding the uncommon and costly rose oil which manifests in some way to be the origin of a social and financial disturbance emanating out from the region. The oil is regarded by certain groups as a tradeable good, by others as a scientific or spiritual miracle, and by others still – the zealous "men from the mountains" – as a origin of malevolence; an affront that must be eradicated. The question of its origins, its significance, and if it should be removed or preserved is escalating in importance.
Like the original trilogy, Lyra's decisions, and her future, are revealed to be inseparably entwined with the fate of the world
In The Secret Commonwealth, these plots ran largely in tandem. In The Rose Field, they converge. As in the first trilogy, Lyra's choices and her fate are revealed to be inseparably woven with the fate of the world. Her private journey to reconnect with her soul and regain her creativity becomes the central battleground in a broader conflict with an authoritarian system which, as these systems typically do, is striving to stifle independence of thought, creativity and expression: all the internal, defiant ways in which people can be independent.
Atmospheric Fissures and Ideological Conflicts
The story opens with the discovery of a set of curious openings in the makeup of the planet's atmosphere: portals that look to give on to alternate realities. One such window seems to be the point of the highly contested rose oil. The Magisterium, with Delamare at its head, designates these windows as a threat to the institution's orthodoxy and aims to eliminate them. As our protagonist begins to shift from strict rationalism and return to feeling, yet, her belief that these places must be protected – that their meaning and what they offer is somehow vital – increases. "Cosmic particles, or rose oil, or the vision, or the botanical realm, or whatever we label it," she says, "we require it." The setting for a poetic struggle between purity and experience is established.
Plot Rhythm and Personal Evolution
At 640 pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
