Things are falling apart in the concluding book of The Dust Trilogy, the next of Philip Pullman's masterful trilogies set in a universe that seems, in this volume especially, as a intense and slanted version of our own. Institutions are crumbling, or reassembling themselves along new and troubling lines. An invisible force "is wrecking the air and the seasons"; concurrently, "currency is failing, and no one knows why". Power is flowing away from authorities, and pooling in the offices of religious leaders, the coffers of corporations, the grasp of crowds. "Something is at work, very quietly, imperceptibly", says businessman Mustafa Bey, keeping a vigilant eye on the ancient paths from his seat in an Aleppo cafe. "Things we thought were stable and durable are deteriorating and failing."
The Central Mystery and The Protagonist's Path
Exactly what that element might be, and how to counteract it, is the mystery that animates this final volume, which continues where The Secret Commonwealth concluded. This is, according to many, Pullman's final excursion into the elaborately built, deeply captivating world he first unveiled 30 years ago, with the launch of the first trilogy. It's a domain whose geography corresponds to that of this world, but whose past tacks and jibes with ours; where the people appear and reason and behave like us, but are accompanied by animal souls, beings in beast form; where the skies are populated with witches and mythical beasts, but beneath those skies, buses are taken and tea is consumed, and mature professors carry Harrods shopping bags. Lyra, whom we first met as a 12-year-old in the first trilogy, and then revisited as a toddler in the first volume, the origin story with which the author began The Book of Dust, is now a young woman: still distinctly the prickly and determined protagonist of the earlier books, but older, more sorrowful, warier, less sure. This circumscription is heightened by her separation from her soul companion, Pan – but it was also, unexpectedly, the cause which caused him to abandon her in the first place.
Converging Storylines
His choice to depart in search of that youthful part of her which she seems to have lost (an quality which he symbolizes as her "vision"), and her journey to reconnect with him, were the incitements of The Secret Commonwealth, which followed Lyra undertake a adventurous trek across the continent and into the Caucasus, facing with marvel and danger on the way. But from the beginning, deeper currents were in motion, and darker forces at work. The church authority – the faith's governing authority, and Pullman's masterfully eerie incarnation of austere, bureaucratic wickedness – is under fresh command, and flexing its muscles. Marcel Delamare – our protagonist's uncle, who faults her for his sister's death – has manoeuvred himself into the office of leader of the church's ruling assembly, and is set on using his recently acquired influence to extend the institution's dominium. Another protagonist, who saved young the heroine to refuge along a overflowing river as an child in the prequel, is now an university scholar with a additional duty in intelligence work: he is assigned to the city to learn more about his aims. And underlying all of this is the enigma surrounding the scarce and costly rose oil which appears in some way to be the origin of a societal and financial upheaval rippling out from the region. The extract is regarded by various factions as a tradeable good, by different parties as a research-based or esoteric wonder, and by further factions – the extremist "mountain dwellers" – as a origin of malevolence; an affront that must be eradicated. The dilemma of its origins, its meaning, and whether it should be destroyed or safeguarded is becoming urgent.
As in His Dark Materials, our protagonist's deeds, and her future, are demonstrated to be inextricably entwined with the destiny of the universe
In its predecessor, these storylines ran broadly in side by side. In The Rose Field, they converge. As in the first trilogy, the protagonist's actions and her path are unveiled to be deeply entwined with the fate of the universe. Her personal journey to rejoin with her soul and rediscover her vision becomes the primary battleground in a larger battle with an controlling government which, as such authorities often attempt, is striving to suppress freedom of thinking, creativity and expression: all the inner, resistant ways in which individuals can be independent.
Cosmic Openings and Moral Battles
The book begins with the finding of a collection of unusual fissures in the makeup of the world's atmosphere: windows that appear to give on to alternate realities. A particular portal appears to be the origin of the fiercely disputed rose oil. The Magisterium, with Delamare at its leadership, designates these portals as a challenge to the church's beliefs and sets out to destroy them. As Lyra begins to move from strict reason and back to instinct, nevertheless, her belief that these places must be protected – that their significance and their value is in some way vital – strengthens. "Cosmic particles, or the substance, or the creativity, or the Rose Field, or whatever we name it," she says, "it is necessary." The scene for a poetic struggle between purity and knowledge is established.
Plot Rhythm and Character Development
At over six hundred pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
