Things are falling apart in the concluding book of Pullman's latest trilogy, the second of the author's magisterial trilogies set in a universe that seems, here more than ever, as a charged and skewed version of our own. Establishments are weakening, or reorganizing themselves along new and disturbing lines. An unseen force "is destroying the air and the seasons"; at the same time, "wealth is decaying, and no one knows why". Control is draining from states, and gathering in the offices of theocrats, the vaults of conglomerates, the control of rioters. "Some force is at work, silently, very subtly", says merchant a trader character, keeping a observant eye on the Silk Roads from his seat in an city cafe. "Things we thought were secure and strong are weakening and failing."
Key Puzzle and Her Quest
Just what that force might be, and how to counteract it, is the question that drives this final volume, which resumes where the previous book left off. This is, according to many, Pullman's final foray into the intricately constructed, deeply captivating universe he first introduced 30 years ago, with the publication of the first trilogy. It's a world whose geography corresponds to that of the real world, but whose chronicles diverges and shifts with ours; where the humans look and reason and act like us, but are joined by daemons, essences in beast form; where the skies are populated with sorceresses and gryphons, but below, vehicles are ridden and drinks is consumed, and middle-aged academics carry Harrods shopping bags. The protagonist, whom we first met as a 12-year-old in the His Dark Materials trilogy, and then revisited as a toddler in La Belle Sauvage, the origin story with which the author began this trilogy, is now a mature individual: still clearly the sharp and persistent heroine of the prior volumes, but aged, melancholic, more cautious, less sure. This restraint is intensified by her split from her soul companion, Pan – but it was also, paradoxically, the catalyst which led him to leave her in the first place.
Converging Storylines
His choice to go off in pursuit of that childlike part of Lyra which she appears to have shed (an quality which he epitomises as her "creativity"), and her journey to rejoin with him, were the driving forces of its predecessor, which followed the protagonist undertake a adventurous trek across Europe and into the mountain region, facing with amazement and peril on the way. But from the beginning, profound shifts were in action, and sinister powers at work. The Magisterium – the church's governing authority, and Pullman's deliciously chilling incarnation of strict, procedural malice – is under new leadership, and showing its strength. Lyra's uncle – the heroine's family member, who faults her for his sibling's death – has worked himself into the office of head of the authority's ruling assembly, and is intent on using his recently acquired authority to extend the church's rule. A key character, who carried young the heroine to security along a flooded Thames as an child in La Belle Sauvage, is now an university scholar with a sideline in intelligence work: he is dispatched to Geneva to find out more about his aims. And beneath all of this is the puzzle surrounding the uncommon and precious botanical extract which manifests in some way to be the origin of a social and financial upheaval emanating out from Central Asia. The extract is regarded by certain groups as a marketable product, by different parties as a empirical or esoteric miracle, and by yet others – the zealous "mountain dwellers" – as a origin of evil; an challenge that must be eradicated. The issue of where it comes from, its meaning, and whether it should be removed or preserved is becoming urgent.
As in His Dark Materials, the heroine's actions, and her destiny, are revealed to be inseparably linked with the fate of the world
In the previous volume, these storylines ran largely in tandem. In The Rose Field, they come together. Similar to His Dark Materials, her movements and her destiny are shown to be inseparably woven with the fate of the world. Her personal mission to reunite with her soul and regain her imagination becomes the key battleground in a wider conflict with an authoritarian system which, as such regimes always have, is striving to stifle autonomy of reason, creativity and expression: all the inner, rebellious ways in which humans can be liberated.
Cosmic Openings and Ideological Conflicts
The story opens with the finding of a collection of strange cracks in the fabric of the world's sky: gateways that look to lead to other worlds. A particular portal manifests to be the origin of the fiercely disputed botanical substance. The church, with its leader at its helm, labels these portals as a challenge to the institution's doctrine and sets out to eradicate them. As our protagonist begins to move from inflexible logic and back to intuition, however, her belief that these locations must be protected – that their significance and what they offer is somehow essential – increases. "Cosmic particles, or the substance, or the imagination, or the botanical realm, or no matter what we name it," she says, "we need it." The setting for a philosophical tussle between naivety and knowledge is set.
Narrative Pacing and Character Development
At 640 pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
