Things are unraveling in the final volume of Pullman's latest trilogy, the second of the author's masterful trilogies set in a world that seems, here more than ever, as a charged and slanted version of our own. Institutions are crumbling, or restructuring themselves along unfamiliar and disquieting lines. An unseen force "is ruining the air and the seasons"; simultaneously, "wealth is decaying, and no one knows why". Power is shifting from governments, and accumulating in the offices of theocrats, the vaults of conglomerates, the hands of mobs. "An element is at work, very quietly, imperceptibly", says trader a merchant figure, keeping a observant eye on the trade routes from his seat in an Aleppo cafe. "Aspects we thought were firm and solid are deteriorating and giving way."
Core Enigma and Lyra's Journey
Exactly what that something might be, and how to counteract it, is the inquiry that drives The Rose Field, which picks up where The Secret Commonwealth ended. This is, according to many, Pullman's last foray into the elaborately built, deeply captivating world he first introduced 30 years ago, with the release of His Dark Materials. It's a world whose geography corresponds to that of this world, but whose history tacks and jibes with ours; where the humans look and think and behave like us, but are joined by external spirits, beings in animal form; where the heavens are populated with witches and gryphons, but beneath those skies, transports are taken and beverages is consumed, and mature scholars carry luxury shopping bags. Lyra, whom we first met as a 12-year-old in the His Dark Materials trilogy, and then saw again as a toddler in the prequel, the introductory book with which the author began the series, is now a mature individual: still recognisably the spiky and determined heroine of the earlier books, but more mature, melancholic, more cautious, less sure. This circumscription is heightened by her split from her daemon, Pantalaimon – but it was also, ironically, the trigger which made him desert her in the first place.
Converging Storylines
His choice to depart in search of that youthful part of her which she appears to have shed (an aspect which he represents as her "creativity"), and her quest to rejoin with him, were the incitements of the prior book, which chronicled the protagonist undertake a adventurous voyage across the continent and into the Caucasus, facing with marvel and risk on the way. But from the outset, profound shifts were in motion, and sinister powers at work. The Magisterium – the faith's governing authority, and the author's brilliantly sinister incarnation of strict, procedural wickedness – is under fresh command, and flexing its muscles. Lyra's uncle – the heroine's family member, who holds responsible her for his sibling's death – has manoeuvred himself into the role of president of the Magisterium's ruling assembly, and is determined on using his fresh authority to broaden the institution's rule. Malcolm Polstead, who carried young Lyra to refuge along a swollen Thames as an child in the first book, is now an Oxford don with a secondary role in intelligence work: he is assigned to the city to discover more about Delamare's plans. And beneath all of this is the enigma surrounding the scarce and precious botanical extract which appears somehow to be the cause of a social and economic disturbance rippling out from Central Asia. The substance is seen by certain groups as a marketable commodity, by alternate groups as a empirical or spiritual wonder, and by others still – the fanatical "men from the mountains" – as a wellspring of evil; an challenge that must be eradicated. The dilemma of its source, its meaning, and if it should be removed or protected is becoming urgent.
Like the original trilogy, Lyra's actions, and her destiny, are demonstrated to be deeply linked with the fate of the universe
In its predecessor, these plots ran broadly in side by side. In The Rose Field, they come together. Like His Dark Materials, her actions and her destiny are shown to be inseparably entwined with the fate of the realm. Her individual mission to rejoin with her daemon and regain her vision becomes the key battleground in a larger war with an oppressive government which, as such regimes often attempt, is attempting to quell autonomy of thinking, originality and expression: all the inner, resistant ways in which people can be free.
Cosmic Openings and Philosophical Struggles
The novel begins with the discovery of a series of unusual openings in the makeup of the Earth's atmosphere: windows that appear to lead to alternate realities. One such portal seems to be the point of the much debated rose oil. The Magisterium, with its leader at its leadership, designates these portals as a problem to the church's orthodoxy and endeavors to eliminate them. As Lyra begins to turn away from strict logic and revert to intuition, however, her certainty that these sites must be preserved – that their significance and their value is mysteriously vital – increases. "Cosmic particles, or the extract, or the vision, or the field of roses, or no matter what we label it," she says, "we need it." The setting for a Blakean conflict between innocence and experience is prepared.
Story Tempo and Personal Evolution
At a substantial length, The Rose Field|this volume|the
