Tings are unraveling in the final volume of Pullman's latest trilogy, the second of the author's masterful trilogies set in a universe that manifests, here more than ever, as a energized and skewed version of our own. Establishments are crumbling, or restructuring themselves along new and troubling lines. An hidden force "is ruining the air and the seasons"; simultaneously, "wealth is decaying, and no one knows why". Control is draining from states, and accumulating in the halls of religious leaders, the coffers of corporations, the hands of mobs. "Some force is at work, very quietly, gradually", says trader a trader character, keeping a observant eye on the Silk Roads from his seat in an city cafe. "Aspects we thought were secure and strong are faltering and giving way."
Core Enigma and Lyra's Journey
Precisely what that element might be, and how to counteract it, is the inquiry that drives The Rose Field, which picks up where its predecessor ended. This is, by all accounts, Pullman's last foray into the carefully crafted, deeply captivating universe he first revealed three decades past, with the release of the first trilogy. It's a domain whose geography aligns with that of our world, but whose past diverges and shifts with ours; where the people appear and think and act like us, but are joined by daemons, essences in beast form; where the skies are filled with sorceresses and gryphons, but below, vehicles are ridden and beverages is consumed, and middle-aged professors carry Harrods shopping bags. The protagonist, whom we first met as a child in the original trilogy, and then met once more as a baby in the first volume, the introductory book with which Pullman began The Book of Dust, is now a mature individual: still recognisably the sharp and persistent heroine of the previous installments, but aged, more sorrowful, warier, less sure. This circumscription is heightened by her split from her soul companion, her daemon – but it was also, ironically, the catalyst which made him desert her in the first place.
Interwoven Plots
Pan's decision to depart in pursuit of that childlike part of Lyra which she seems to have lost (an aspect which he symbolizes as her "imagination"), and her journey to reconnect with him, were the incitements of The Secret Commonwealth, which followed Lyra undertake a wandering trek across the continent and into the Caucasus, encountering with wonder and peril on the way. But from the start, underlying forces were in play, and sinister powers at work. The religious council – the religious governing authority, and Pullman's masterfully eerie embodiment of austere, administrative evil – is under new leadership, and flexing its muscles. Marcel Delamare – the heroine's family member, who blames her for his family member's death – has worked himself into the office of head of the Magisterium's ruling assembly, and is intent on using his fresh influence to extend the church's dominium. A key character, who saved baby the heroine to safety along a flooded river as an young boy in the prequel, is now an academic with a additional duty in espionage: he is sent to Geneva to learn more about Delamare's aims. And behind all of this is the enigma surrounding the uncommon and valuable botanical extract which appears somehow to be the cause of a social and economic crisis rippling out from that area. The substance is viewed by certain groups as a marketable good, by alternate groups as a empirical or spiritual wonder, and by others still – the extremist "mountain dwellers" – as a origin of evil; an insult that must be obliterated. The dilemma of where it comes from, its meaning, and whether it should be eliminated or preserved is becoming urgent.
As in the first series, the heroine's deeds, and her future, are shown to be inseparably entwined with the destiny of the world
In The Secret Commonwealth, these plots ran mostly in parallel. In the conclusion, they converge. Similar to His Dark Materials, Lyra's actions and her path are revealed to be inextricably linked with the future of the world. Her private mission to reunite with her soul and regain her imagination becomes the primary struggle in a larger war with an oppressive government which, as these systems always have, is seeking to suppress independence of thought, creativity and expression: all the internal, defiant ways in which humans can be liberated.
Cosmic Openings and Philosophical Struggles
The book starts with the unveiling of a set of strange cracks in the fabric of the world's air: gateways that look to lead to alternate realities. An example of a window manifests to be the origin of the fiercely disputed mystical extract. The church, with the antagonist at its helm, designates these windows as a problem to the religion's beliefs and sets out to destroy them. As our protagonist begins to shift from rigid logic and revert to feeling, yet, her conviction that these places must be defended – that their significance and what they offer is somehow essential – grows. "The substance, or the extract, or the vision, or the field of roses, or whatever we name it," she says, "we require it." The setting for a Blakean tussle between purity and knowledge is set.
Narrative Pacing and Character Development
At 640 pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
