🔗 Share this article

Tings are falling apart in the final volume of The Book of Dust, the next of the author's magisterial trilogies set in a world that appears, here more than ever, as a charged and skewed version of our own. Establishments are failing, or restructuring themselves along unfamiliar and disquieting lines. An invisible force "is wrecking the air and the seasons"; simultaneously, "wealth is decaying, and no one knows why". Control is shifting from authorities, and accumulating in the chambers of theocrats, the coffers of conglomerates, the hands of crowds. "An element is at work, very quietly, imperceptibly", says businessman a trader character, keeping a vigilant eye on the ancient paths from his place in an city cafe. "Elements we thought were secure and strong are faltering and collapsing."

Core Enigma and Lyra's Journey

Precisely what that force might be, and methods to fight it, is the mystery that propels this final volume, which continues where its predecessor ended. This is, reportedly, Pullman's final excursion into the carefully crafted, infinitely beguiling world he first revealed three decades past, with the publication of the first trilogy. It's a world whose landscape maps on to that of our world, but whose history diverges and shifts with ours; where the people appear and think and act like us, but are joined by external spirits, beings in beast form; where the air are filled with witches and mythical beasts, but underneath, vehicles are ridden and beverages is sipped, and older professors carry fancy shopping bags. Our heroine, whom we first encountered as a 12-year-old in the original trilogy, and then met once more as a infant in the prequel, the prequel with which the author began this trilogy, is now a mature individual: still clearly the prickly and persistent heroine of the prior volumes, but more mature, more sorrowful, more cautious, less certain. This restraint is heightened by her separation from her daemon, Pantalaimon – but it was also, paradoxically, the trigger which caused him to abandon her in the first place.

Interwoven Plots

Pan's decision to go off in quest of that innocent part of her which she may have forgotten (an quality which he represents as her "vision"), and her mission to reconnect with him, were the catalysts of The Secret Commonwealth, which chronicled the protagonist undertake a wandering trek across the continent and into the mountain region, facing with marvel and danger on the way. But from the beginning, deeper currents were in motion, and darker forces at work. The Magisterium – the religious ruling body, and Pullman's masterfully eerie incarnation of rigid, bureaucratic evil – is under recent guidance, and showing its strength. Lyra's uncle – our protagonist's relative, who faults her for his sibling's death – has positioned himself into the role of leader of the authority's High Council, and is set on using his newfound influence to expand the church's control. Another protagonist, who rescued infant the heroine to safety along a swollen river as an young boy in the first book, is now an university scholar with a sideline in spycraft: he is dispatched to a key location to find out more about the antagonist's aims. And underlying all of this is the enigma surrounding the uncommon and precious botanical extract which manifests somehow to be the source of a social and economic disturbance emanating out from the region. The oil is regarded by various factions as a commercial product, by alternate groups as a scientific or esoteric miracle, and by yet others – the zealous "mountain dwellers" – as a origin of evil; an challenge that must be eradicated. The dilemma of its source, its meaning, and if it should be eliminated or safeguarded is becoming urgent.

Like the first series, the heroine's deeds, and her fate, are revealed to be inextricably entwined with the fate of the world

In The Secret Commonwealth, these narratives ran mostly in tandem. In The Rose Field, they come together. Similar to the original series, Lyra's actions and her fate are unveiled to be inseparably linked with the destiny of the universe. Her individual mission to reunite with her companion and recover her creativity becomes the central battleground in a wider battle with an oppressive regime which, as such regimes often attempt, is striving to suppress freedom of thought, innovation and expression: all the internal, defiant ways in which people can be liberated.

Atmospheric Fissures and Moral Battles

The novel opens with the finding of a collection of curious openings in the makeup of the Earth's atmosphere: gateways that look to lead to other worlds. An example of a opening seems to be the origin of the much debated rose oil. The authority, with the antagonist at its helm, labels these portals as a threat to the religion's doctrine and sets out to destroy them. As Lyra begins to move from rigid reason and back to instinct, nevertheless, her certainty that these places must be preserved – that what they stand for and what they offer is in some way essential – strengthens. "Cosmic particles, or rose oil, or the creativity, or the Rose Field, or no matter what we call it," she says, "it is necessary." The setting for a poetic conflict between naivety and knowledge is set.

Story Tempo and Protagonist Growth

At 640 pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the