Tings are collapsing in the final volume of The Dust Trilogy, the second of Philip Pullman's grand trilogies set in a realm that seems, now more than ever, as a charged and skewed version of our own. Institutions are failing, or reassembling themselves along unfamiliar and disturbing lines. An unseen force "is ruining the air and the seasons"; at the same time, "currency is failing, and no one knows why". Power is flowing away from states, and gathering in the halls of religious leaders, the vaults of business empires, the hands of rioters. "Something is at work, very quietly, imperceptibly", says merchant a merchant figure, keeping a vigilant eye on the Silk Roads from his seat in an city cafe. "Elements we thought were secure and solid are deteriorating and giving way."
Core Enigma and Lyra's Journey
Precisely what that element might be, and ways to oppose it, is the mystery that drives The Rose Field, which picks up where the previous book concluded. This is, reportedly, the author's last excursion into the intricately constructed, endlessly enchanting world he first introduced in the distant past, with the launch of Northern Lights. It's a domain whose terrain corresponds to that of this world, but whose chronicles tacks and jibes with ours; where the humans look and think and act like us, but are accompanied by daemons, souls in beast form; where the skies are populated with witches and legendary creatures, but underneath, transports are taken and tea is consumed, and older professors carry fancy shopping bags. The protagonist, whom we first introduced to as a 12-year-old in the His Dark Materials trilogy, and then revisited as a baby in La Belle Sauvage, the introductory book with which the author began this trilogy, is now a mature individual: still clearly the spiky and persistent main character of the prior volumes, but aged, more sorrowful, more careful, less certain. This circumscription is amplified by her division from her soul companion, her daemon – but it was also, ironically, the trigger which led him to leave her in the first place.
Merging Narratives
Pan's decision to depart in quest of that youthful part of Lyra which she may have forgotten (an aspect which he symbolizes as her "creativity"), and her journey to reunite with him, were the incitements of its predecessor, which followed Lyra undertake a adventurous journey across Europe and into the Caucasus, meeting with wonder and peril on the way. But from the outset, deeper currents were in action, and darker forces at work. The church authority – the faith's governing authority, and Pullman's deliciously chilling representation of rigid, administrative wickedness – is under new leadership, and showing its strength. Marcel Delamare – the heroine's uncle, who blames her for his sibling's death – has manoeuvred himself into the position of president of the authority's High Council, and is determined on using his fresh power to broaden the religion's control. Another protagonist, who rescued infant the heroine to security along a swollen river as an young boy in La Belle Sauvage, is now an Oxford don with a secondary role in spycraft: he is assigned to Geneva to find out more about his plans. And underlying all of this is the enigma surrounding the uncommon and valuable essential oil which appears mysteriously to be the cause of a societal and economic crisis emanating out from Central Asia. The oil is regarded by certain groups as a commercial good, by different parties as a research-based or spiritual phenomenon, and by yet others – the zealous "men from the mountains" – as a source of evil; an insult that must be destroyed. The dilemma of its origins, what it stands for, and whether it should be destroyed or safeguarded is becoming urgent.
As in the original trilogy, Lyra's deeds, and her future, are revealed to be inextricably linked with the fate of the universe
In the previous volume, these storylines ran broadly in side by side. In The Rose Field, they come together. As in the original series, the protagonist's movements and her fate are shown to be inseparably woven with the future of the world. Her individual mission to reconnect with her daemon and rediscover her creativity becomes the key struggle in a wider battle with an authoritarian system which, as such authorities often attempt, is seeking to stifle independence of thought, originality and expression: all the inner, defiant ways in which humans can be liberated.
Atmospheric Fissures and Ideological Conflicts
The book starts with the unveiling of a set of unusual openings in the makeup of the world's sky: gateways that seem to open into alternate realities. One such window manifests to be the point of the highly contested rose oil. The authority, with its leader at its leadership, labels these openings as a problem to the institution's orthodoxy and aims to destroy them. As the heroine begins to move from strict reason and return to instinct, however, her belief that these places must be defended – that their meaning and what they offer is mysteriously crucial – grows. "Dust, or rose oil, or the creativity, or the botanical realm, or no matter what we label it," she says, "we need it." The setting for a philosophical tussle between innocence and knowledge is prepared.
Story Tempo and Character Development
At over six hundred pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
