Tings are collapsing in the concluding book of The Dust Trilogy, the next of the author's masterful trilogies set in a world that manifests, in this volume especially, as a intense and skewed version of our own. Institutions are weakening, or restructuring themselves along unfamiliar and disturbing lines. An unseen force "is destroying the air and the seasons"; concurrently, "currency is failing, and no one knows why". Control is shifting from authorities, and accumulating in the halls of theocrats, the treasuries of business empires, the grasp of crowds. "An element is at work, silently, imperceptibly", says merchant Mustafa Bey, keeping a watchful eye on the Silk Roads from his seat in an Aleppo cafe. "Aspects we thought were secure and strong are weakening and collapsing."
Core Enigma and Her Quest
Just what that element might be, and methods to fight it, is the inquiry that animates this final volume, which resumes where The Secret Commonwealth concluded. This is, reportedly, Pullman's final excursion into the elaborately built, infinitely beguiling realm he first unveiled 30 years ago, with the release of His Dark Materials. It's a realm whose geography corresponds to that of our world, but whose past veers and changes with ours; where the individuals look and think and behave like us, but are paired by animal souls, souls in creature form; where the heavens are populated with sorceresses and mythical beasts, but underneath, vehicles are ridden and drinks is sipped, and older professors carry luxury shopping bags. Lyra, whom we first introduced to as a young girl in the original trilogy, and then met once more as a infant in the prequel, the introductory book with which Pullman began this trilogy, is now a adult: still distinctly the sharp and tenacious main character of the prior volumes, but older, sadder, more careful, less sure. This restraint is intensified by her split from her daemon, her daemon – but it was also, paradoxically, the catalyst which made him desert her in the first place.
Merging Narratives
Pan's decision to leave in search of that youthful part of Lyra which she seems to have lost (an aspect which he represents as her "vision"), and her quest to rejoin with him, were the incitements of the prior book, which followed Lyra undertake a wandering voyage across Europe and into the Caucasus, meeting with wonder and risk on the way. But from the beginning, underlying forces were in action, and sinister powers at work. The Magisterium – the church's ruling body, and Pullman's brilliantly sinister representation of rigid, procedural wickedness – is under recent guidance, and asserting its power. The antagonist – our protagonist's relative, who blames her for his sibling's death – has positioned himself into the position of head of the authority's High Council, and is set on using his newfound power to extend the institution's dominium. A key character, who saved baby Lyra to security along a swollen river as an child in La Belle Sauvage, is now an university scholar with a secondary role in espionage: he is assigned to the city to find out more about his aims. And underlying all of this is the mystery surrounding the rare and costly rose oil which manifests in some way to be the cause of a societal and economic upheaval rippling out from that area. The oil is seen by certain groups as a tradeable product, by different parties as a empirical or mystical miracle, and by others still – the zealous "men from the mountains" – as a source of evil; an insult that must be destroyed. The issue of its source, its significance, and whether it should be eliminated or protected is becoming urgent.
As in the original trilogy, Lyra's deeds, and her destiny, are revealed to be deeply connected with the fate of the universe
In the previous volume, these plots ran mostly in parallel. In The Rose Field, they come together. Similar to His Dark Materials, her choices and her path are unveiled to be inseparably entwined with the future of the universe. Her private journey to reconnect with her soul and regain her creativity becomes the primary struggle in a larger battle with an oppressive government which, as these systems always have, is seeking to quell autonomy of reason, creativity and art: all the inner, defiant ways in which people can be liberated.
Cosmic Openings and Philosophical Struggles
The novel starts with the finding of a set of curious openings in the structure of the planet's atmosphere: portals that look to give on to other worlds. One such window manifests to be the source of the much debated mystical extract. The Magisterium, with Delamare at its head, classifies these openings as a challenge to the church's doctrine and endeavors to eliminate them. As Lyra begins to turn away from strict rationalism and back to feeling, nevertheless, her belief that these sites must be preserved – that what they stand for and what they provide is mysteriously vital – increases. "Cosmic particles, or the substance, or the vision, or the field of roses, or no matter what we label it," she says, "we require it." The stage for a Blakean tussle between innocence and knowledge is established.
Narrative Pacing and Personal Evolution
At over six hundred pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
