Tings are falling apart in the concluding book of Pullman's latest trilogy, the next of the author's grand trilogies set in a universe that seems, now more than ever, as a intense and tilted version of our own. Organizations are weakening, or reorganizing themselves along unfamiliar and disquieting lines. An unseen force "is ruining the air and the seasons"; at the same time, "currency is failing, and no one knows why". Control is draining from governments, and pooling in the chambers of theocrats, the coffers of business empires, the hands of rioters. "An element is at work, stealthily, very subtly", says businessman a trader character, keeping a watchful eye on the trade routes from his seat in an city cafe. "Things we thought were stable and durable are faltering and failing."
The Central Mystery and Lyra's Journey
Exactly what that something might be, and ways to oppose it, is the inquiry that drives The Rose Field, which resumes where the previous book ended. This is, by all accounts, Pullman's concluding excursion into the elaborately built, deeply captivating world he first revealed 30 years ago, with the publication of Northern Lights. It's a realm whose geography corresponds to that of this world, but whose history diverges and shifts with ours; where the humans appear and reason and behave like us, but are accompanied by animal souls, souls in beast form; where the heavens are populated with witches and mythical beasts, but below, vehicles are caught and drinks is sipped, and older professors carry fancy shopping bags. The protagonist, whom we first introduced to as a child in the original trilogy, and then saw again as a baby in the prequel, the prequel with which the author began this trilogy, is now a adult: still recognisably the sharp and tenacious heroine of the prior volumes, but more mature, melancholic, more cautious, less sure. This restraint is heightened by her division from her daemon, Pantalaimon – but it was also, unexpectedly, the catalyst which made him desert her in the first place.
Converging Storylines
Pan's decision to depart in search of that childlike part of the heroine which she seems to have lost (an quality which he represents as her "vision"), and her journey to reconnect with him, were the driving forces of its predecessor, which chronicled Lyra undertake a wandering journey across the continent and into the mountain region, facing with wonder and danger on the way. But from the beginning, underlying forces were in motion, and malevolent elements at work. The religious council – the faith's controlling power, and the author's deliciously chilling incarnation of rigid, administrative malice – is under recent guidance, and showing its strength. Lyra's uncle – the heroine's uncle, who faults her for his sister's death – has manoeuvred himself into the position of president of the authority's High Council, and is intent on using his fresh influence to broaden the religion's rule. Another protagonist, who rescued young the heroine to refuge along a flooded Thames as an young boy in the prequel, is now an academic with a secondary role in intelligence work: he is dispatched to the city to find out more about the antagonist's intentions. And behind all of this is the puzzle surrounding the uncommon and precious essential oil which manifests somehow to be the cause of a social and economic upheaval rippling out from that area. The extract is seen by various factions as a tradeable product, by alternate groups as a research-based or esoteric miracle, and by further factions – the fanatical "men from the mountains" – as a origin of malevolence; an challenge that must be eradicated. The dilemma of where it comes from, what it stands for, and if it should be removed or protected is escalating in importance.
Like His Dark Materials, Lyra's decisions, and her destiny, are demonstrated to be inextricably entwined with the destiny of the world
In its predecessor, these plots ran broadly in side by side. In The Rose Field, they converge. Similar to His Dark Materials, her actions and her fate are unveiled to be inseparably woven with the future of the universe. Her individual quest to reunite with her companion and recover her creativity becomes the key struggle in a wider battle with an authoritarian regime which, as such authorities often attempt, is seeking to suppress freedom of thinking, creativity and art: all the inner, defiant ways in which people can be liberated.
Dimensional Rifts and Moral Battles
The book begins with the unveiling of a set of unusual openings in the makeup of the Earth's atmosphere: gateways that appear to open into other worlds. An example of a window seems to be the point of the highly contested botanical substance. The church, with its leader at its head, designates these windows as a threat to the church's doctrine and endeavors to eradicate them. As the heroine begins to move from strict rationalism and back to feeling, however, her certainty that these places must be protected – that their significance and their value is mysteriously crucial – strengthens. "The substance, or rose oil, or the imagination, or the field of roses, or whatever we label it," she says, "we require it." The setting for a Blakean conflict between naivety and knowledge is set.
Plot Rhythm and Protagonist Growth
At a substantial length, The Rose Field|this volume|the
