Things are unraveling in the last installment of The Dust Trilogy, the second of Philip Pullman's magisterial trilogies set in a world that seems, here more than ever, as a energized and slanted version of our own. Institutions are crumbling, or restructuring themselves along unfamiliar and disturbing lines. An hidden force "is ruining the air and the seasons"; concurrently, "wealth is decaying, and no one knows why". Control is shifting from authorities, and gathering in the offices of religious leaders, the vaults of conglomerates, the hands of crowds. "An element is at work, very quietly, gradually", says businessman a trader character, keeping a watchful eye on the trade routes from his post in an Aleppo cafe. "Elements we thought were firm and strong are faltering and giving way."
Core Enigma and Lyra's Journey
Exactly what that force might be, and how to counteract it, is the question that propels The Rose Field, which picks up where the previous book left off. This is, reportedly, Pullman's final venture into the carefully crafted, endlessly enchanting universe he first revealed 30 years ago, with the publication of His Dark Materials. It's a world whose landscape maps on to that of the real world, but whose past tacks and jibes with ours; where the individuals appear and think and behave like us, but are paired by daemons, souls in beast form; where the air are filled with witches and gryphons, but beneath those skies, transports are caught and drinks is consumed, and older academics carry luxury shopping bags. The protagonist, whom we first encountered as a 12-year-old in the His Dark Materials trilogy, and then saw again as a toddler in the first volume, the origin story with which Pullman began this trilogy, is now a adult: still recognisably the spiky and persistent protagonist of the earlier books, but more mature, more sorrowful, more cautious, less certain. This restraint is amplified by her division from her animal guide, Pantalaimon – but it was also, paradoxically, the catalyst which caused him to abandon her in the first place.
Interwoven Plots
The daemon's resolve to depart in pursuit of that innocent part of Lyra which she seems to have lost (an aspect which he represents as her "creativity"), and her quest to rejoin with him, were the catalysts of its predecessor, which chronicled the protagonist undertake a picaresque trek across Europe and into the Caucasus, meeting with amazement and risk on the way. But from the beginning, deeper currents were in motion, and darker forces at work. The church authority – the religious controlling power, and the author's masterfully eerie embodiment of strict, procedural malice – is under new leadership, and asserting its power. Lyra's uncle – Lyra's family member, who holds responsible her for his sister's death – has manoeuvred himself into the office of leader of the church's governing body, and is intent on using his fresh authority to expand the institution's dominium. Malcolm Polstead, who carried infant Lyra to security along a flooded river as an 11-year-old in the prequel, is now an university scholar with a secondary role in spycraft: he is assigned to Geneva to discover more about his aims. And beneath all of this is the mystery surrounding the rare and valuable essential oil which manifests in some way to be the source of a societal and economic upheaval spreading out from that area. The substance is regarded by certain groups as a marketable product, by others as a research-based or mystical miracle, and by yet others – the fanatical "highland figures" – as a origin of malevolence; an challenge that must be obliterated. The issue of where it comes from, its significance, and whether it should be destroyed or protected is escalating in importance.
As in the original trilogy, the heroine's decisions, and her future, are revealed to be inseparably connected with the future of the world
In its predecessor, these plots ran broadly in parallel. In The Rose Field, they converge. Similar to the first trilogy, Lyra's actions and her destiny are unveiled to be inextricably woven with the destiny of the universe. Her individual quest to reconnect with her daemon and rediscover her vision becomes the key struggle in a larger battle with an controlling government which, as such authorities often attempt, is attempting to stifle freedom of thinking, creativity and expression: all the inner, resistant ways in which people can be free.
Atmospheric Fissures and Philosophical Struggles
The book begins with the discovery of a set of unusual fissures in the fabric of the planet's air: gateways that appear to open into other worlds. One such portal seems to be the source of the highly contested rose oil. The Magisterium, with Delamare at its leadership, classifies these windows as a problem to the religion's orthodoxy and sets out to eliminate them. As Lyra begins to move from strict logic and revert to instinct, however, her certainty that these places must be protected – that their significance and what they provide is mysteriously vital – strengthens. "Cosmic particles, or rose oil, or the creativity, or the field of roses, or whatever we call it," she says, "we require it." The stage for a Blakean tussle between innocence and knowledge is prepared.
Plot Rhythm and Character Development
At 640 pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
