Things are unraveling in the last installment of Pullman's latest trilogy, the next of the author's magisterial trilogies set in a world that appears, in this volume especially, as a intense and slanted version of our own. Institutions are crumbling, or restructuring themselves along new and disturbing lines. An unseen force "is wrecking the air and the seasons"; at the same time, "wealth is decaying, and no one knows why". Authority is draining from states, and pooling in the chambers of theocrats, the coffers of business empires, the control of crowds. "An element is at work, silently, very subtly", says businessman Mustafa Bey, keeping a observant eye on the ancient paths from his seat in an Aleppo cafe. "Things we thought were stable and durable are faltering and failing."
The Central Mystery and Lyra's Journey
Just what that element might be, and methods to fight it, is the inquiry that drives The Rose Field, which picks up where its predecessor ended. This is, by all accounts, the author's final foray into the intricately constructed, deeply captivating realm he first revealed 30 years ago, with the publication of His Dark Materials. It's a world whose landscape corresponds to that of our world, but whose chronicles veers and changes with ours; where the humans appear and reason and behave like us, but are joined by daemons, essences in animal form; where the air are filled with enchantresses and mythical beasts, but underneath, vehicles are ridden and tea is drunk, and mature academics carry fancy shopping bags. Our heroine, whom we first encountered as a young girl in the original trilogy, and then revisited as a infant in the prequel, the prequel with which Pullman began the series, is now a adult: still distinctly the prickly and tenacious main character of the prior volumes, but aged, more sorrowful, more cautious, less sure. This restraint is amplified by her division from her daemon, Pan – but it was also, unexpectedly, the cause which led him to leave her in the first place.
Interwoven Plots
Pan's decision to leave in quest of that innocent part of Lyra which she seems to have lost (an quality which he epitomises as her "imagination"), and her mission to rejoin with him, were the driving forces of its predecessor, which followed Lyra undertake a picaresque voyage across the continent and into the Caucasus, facing with wonder and risk on the way. But from the outset, profound shifts were in motion, and malevolent elements at work. The Magisterium – the church's controlling power, and the author's deliciously chilling representation of austere, bureaucratic wickedness – is under recent guidance, and showing its strength. The antagonist – Lyra's relative, who faults her for his family member's death – has worked himself into the position of head of the authority's High Council, and is set on using his fresh power to expand the religion's rule. A key character, who saved young the heroine to safety along a swollen river as an 11-year-old in the prequel, is now an Oxford don with a sideline in spycraft: he is assigned to Geneva to learn more about the antagonist's intentions. And beneath all of this is the enigma surrounding the scarce and valuable botanical extract which manifests somehow to be the source of a social and economic crisis rippling out from the region. The oil is viewed by some as a tradeable good, by others as a empirical or mystical phenomenon, and by yet others – the extremist "mountain dwellers" – as a wellspring of evil; an insult that must be destroyed. The dilemma of where it comes from, what it stands for, and if it should be removed or preserved is becoming urgent.
Like His Dark Materials, the heroine's deeds, and her destiny, are revealed to be deeply entwined with the future of the realm
In The Secret Commonwealth, these plots ran mostly in parallel. In this final book, they merge. Like the first trilogy, Lyra's choices and her fate are shown to be inseparably woven with the destiny of the universe. Her private quest to reunite with her companion and recover her vision becomes the key struggle in a larger war with an authoritarian government which, as these systems always have, is attempting to quell autonomy of thought, creativity and expression: all the inner, resistant ways in which individuals can be liberated.
Atmospheric Fissures and Philosophical Struggles
The novel begins with the unveiling of a series of strange cracks in the fabric of the world's atmosphere: portals that appear to lead to different dimensions. An example of a window appears to be the source of the highly contested rose oil. The Magisterium, with Delamare at its head, classifies these windows as a challenge to the institution's doctrine and endeavors to eliminate them. As our protagonist begins to turn away from strict rationalism and revert to instinct, however, her belief that these sites must be defended – that their significance and what they provide is somehow crucial – increases. "The substance, or rose oil, or the creativity, or the field of roses, or no matter what we label it," she says, "we require it." The stage for a philosophical struggle between naivety and experience is set.
Plot Rhythm and Character Development
At 640 pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
