Tings are falling apart in the concluding book of Pullman's latest trilogy, the second of Philip Pullman's masterful trilogies set in a realm that manifests, here more than ever, as a charged and tilted version of our own. Institutions are crumbling, or reorganizing themselves along novel and disturbing lines. An hidden force "is ruining the air and the seasons"; at the same time, "wealth is decaying, and no one knows why". Authority is flowing away from governments, and gathering in the offices of theocrats, the vaults of business empires, the control of rioters. "An element is at work, silently, imperceptibly", says merchant Mustafa Bey, keeping a observant eye on the ancient paths from his seat in an city cafe. "Things we thought were secure and solid are faltering and collapsing."
Core Enigma and The Protagonist's Path
Precisely what that element might be, and ways to oppose it, is the question that animates the concluding book, which resumes where its predecessor ended. This is, by all accounts, the author's concluding excursion into the elaborately built, endlessly enchanting realm he first unveiled three decades past, with the launch of His Dark Materials. It's a domain whose landscape corresponds to that of this world, but whose past diverges and shifts with ours; where the individuals appear and reason and behave like us, but are paired by daemons, souls in beast form; where the air are teeming with enchantresses and gryphons, but beneath those skies, vehicles are caught and tea is drunk, and older scholars carry Harrods shopping bags. The protagonist, whom we first introduced to as a young girl in the first trilogy, and then met once more as a baby in La Belle Sauvage, the origin story with which the author began this trilogy, is now a young woman: still recognisably the sharp and tenacious main character of the previous installments, but older, sadder, more cautious, more doubtful. This circumscription is amplified by her division from her animal guide, Pantalaimon – but it was also, ironically, the trigger which caused him to abandon her in the first place.
Converging Storylines
The daemon's resolve to go off in quest of that youthful part of Lyra which she appears to have shed (an aspect which he symbolizes as her "vision"), and her quest to reunite with him, were the incitements of its predecessor, which followed the protagonist undertake a picaresque journey across Europe and into the mountain region, meeting with wonder and risk on the way. But from the beginning, deeper currents were in motion, and malevolent elements at work. The church authority – the church's governing authority, and Pullman's brilliantly sinister incarnation of austere, administrative evil – is under new leadership, and showing its strength. Lyra's uncle – our protagonist's relative, who blames her for his sibling's death – has worked himself into the position of president of the church's ruling assembly, and is determined on using his fresh influence to broaden the religion's rule. Another protagonist, who saved baby Lyra to safety along a overflowing Thames as an 11-year-old in the first book, is now an university scholar with a additional duty in spycraft: he is sent to the city to learn more about Delamare's intentions. And underlying all of this is the puzzle surrounding the scarce and valuable botanical extract which manifests somehow to be the origin of a societal and financial upheaval emanating out from the region. The extract is seen by certain groups as a tradeable commodity, by alternate groups as a scientific or spiritual wonder, and by yet others – the zealous "highland figures" – as a origin of malevolence; an challenge that must be eradicated. The issue of its origins, its meaning, and if it should be destroyed or safeguarded is escalating in importance.
As in His Dark Materials, our protagonist's deeds, and her fate, are demonstrated to be inextricably connected with the fate of the world
In its predecessor, these narratives ran largely in side by side. In The Rose Field, they come together. Similar to the original series, her movements and her path are revealed to be inextricably entwined with the destiny of the world. Her personal mission to reunite with her companion and recover her creativity becomes the central struggle in a wider battle with an controlling government which, as such authorities always have, is seeking to stifle autonomy of thought, creativity and art: all the internal, resistant ways in which people can be free.
Atmospheric Fissures and Moral Battles
The book starts with the discovery of a series of unusual fissures in the makeup of the planet's atmosphere: gateways that appear to give on to different dimensions. A particular window seems to be the origin of the much debated botanical substance. The Magisterium, with its leader at its helm, labels these windows as a challenge to the church's orthodoxy and endeavors to eliminate them. As our protagonist begins to shift from inflexible logic and revert to instinct, however, her belief that these sites must be preserved – that their meaning and what they offer is somehow essential – strengthens. "The substance, or the substance, or the creativity, or the Rose Field, or whatever we name it," she says, "we require it." The scene for a Blakean tussle between innocence and maturity is established.
Plot Rhythm and Protagonist Growth
At 640 pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
