Tings are unraveling in the concluding book of Pullman's latest trilogy, the second of Philip Pullman's masterful trilogies set in a universe that manifests, now more than ever, as a energized and skewed version of our own. Organizations are crumbling, or restructuring themselves along unfamiliar and troubling lines. An unseen force "is destroying the air and the seasons"; simultaneously, "wealth is decaying, and no one knows why". Power is shifting from states, and accumulating in the offices of theocrats, the vaults of corporations, the control of rioters. "Something is at work, stealthily, imperceptibly", says merchant a trader character, keeping a watchful eye on the ancient paths from his seat in an city cafe. "Elements we thought were secure and durable are faltering and failing."
Key Puzzle and Her Quest
Exactly what that force might be, and ways to oppose it, is the inquiry that drives The Rose Field, which continues where The Secret Commonwealth left off. This is, reportedly, the author's final venture into the elaborately built, infinitely beguiling universe he first introduced 30 years ago, with the publication of the first trilogy. It's a realm whose terrain corresponds to that of our world, but whose chronicles veers and changes with ours; where the individuals look and reason and act like us, but are joined by daemons, beings in creature form; where the heavens are filled with enchantresses and mythical beasts, but underneath, transports are caught and beverages is consumed, and mature professors carry fancy shopping bags. The protagonist, whom we first introduced to as a 12-year-old in the first trilogy, and then revisited as a infant in the prequel, the introductory book with which the author began this trilogy, is now a young woman: still recognisably the sharp and determined heroine of the prior volumes, but aged, more sorrowful, warier, more doubtful. This restraint is amplified by her separation from her daemon, Pantalaimon – but it was also, paradoxically, the cause which made him desert her in the first place.
Converging Storylines
Pan's decision to go off in quest of that youthful part of her which she seems to have lost (an aspect which he symbolizes as her "creativity"), and her journey to reunite with him, were the catalysts of its predecessor, which chronicled Lyra undertake a picaresque voyage across the continent and into the Caucasus, meeting with marvel and danger on the way. But from the outset, profound shifts were in motion, and sinister powers at work. The Magisterium – the church's ruling body, and Pullman's deliciously chilling embodiment of strict, bureaucratic wickedness – is under recent guidance, and showing its strength. Lyra's uncle – Lyra's family member, who faults her for his family member's death – has worked himself into the role of head of the authority's governing body, and is determined on using his fresh power to extend the religion's dominium. Malcolm Polstead, who rescued baby Lyra to security along a flooded Thames as an young boy in La Belle Sauvage, is now an university scholar with a secondary role in espionage: he is sent to the city to discover more about the antagonist's intentions. And behind all of this is the enigma surrounding the uncommon and valuable essential oil which manifests mysteriously to be the cause of a societal and economic upheaval spreading out from the region. The substance is viewed by certain groups as a tradeable good, by alternate groups as a scientific or mystical phenomenon, and by others still – the zealous "men from the mountains" – as a origin of evil; an insult that must be destroyed. The dilemma of its source, its meaning, and if it should be eliminated or preserved is coming rapidly to the fore.
Similar to the first series, our protagonist's decisions, and her destiny, are shown to be inseparably entwined with the future of the realm
In The Secret Commonwealth, these plots ran largely in side by side. In The Rose Field, they come together. As in the original series, the protagonist's movements and her fate are unveiled to be deeply entwined with the fate of the universe. Her individual quest to reconnect with her soul and regain her imagination becomes the primary struggle in a broader war with an oppressive government which, as these systems often attempt, is striving to quell autonomy of reason, innovation and art: all the internal, rebellious ways in which humans can be free.
Dimensional Rifts and Moral Battles
The book starts with the unveiling of a collection of unusual fissures in the fabric of the planet's sky: portals that seem to open into alternate realities. A particular window manifests to be the origin of the highly contested botanical substance. The church, with the antagonist at its head, classifies these windows as a problem to the institution's doctrine and aims to eliminate them. As Lyra begins to turn away from rigid reason and return to feeling, nevertheless, her certainty that these places must be protected – that what they stand for and their value is in some way crucial – increases. "Dust, or the substance, or the vision, or the Rose Field, or whatever we label it," she says, "we need it." The setting for a Blakean struggle between naivety and knowledge is prepared.
Story Tempo and Personal Evolution
At a substantial length, The Rose Field|this volume|the
