Tings are collapsing in the last installment of Pullman's latest trilogy, the next of Philip Pullman's masterful trilogies set in a universe that manifests, here more than ever, as a intense and skewed version of our own. Organizations are failing, or restructuring themselves along unfamiliar and troubling lines. An unseen force "is destroying the air and the seasons"; concurrently, "wealth is decaying, and no one knows why". Power is shifting from states, and pooling in the offices of theocrats, the treasuries of corporations, the grasp of rioters. "Some force is at work, stealthily, imperceptibly", says trader Mustafa Bey, keeping a watchful eye on the ancient paths from his post in an Aleppo cafe. "Aspects we thought were stable and durable are deteriorating and giving way."
Core Enigma and Lyra's Journey
Just what that element might be, and ways to oppose it, is the inquiry that drives The Rose Field, which resumes where the previous book concluded. This is, reportedly, Pullman's final excursion into the carefully crafted, infinitely beguiling world he first revealed in the distant past, with the launch of the first trilogy. It's a realm whose terrain corresponds to that of the real world, but whose history veers and changes with ours; where the individuals look and think and behave like us, but are paired by external spirits, beings in animal form; where the air are filled with enchantresses and mythical beasts, but beneath those skies, transports are ridden and drinks is consumed, and older scholars carry fancy shopping bags. The protagonist, whom we first met as a 12-year-old in the first trilogy, and then saw again as a baby in La Belle Sauvage, the prequel with which Pullman began the series, is now a young woman: still clearly the sharp and tenacious main character of the prior volumes, but aged, more sorrowful, warier, less certain. This restraint is intensified by her split from her daemon, Pan – but it was also, ironically, the trigger which made him desert her in the first place.
Merging Narratives
The daemon's resolve to go off in quest of that youthful part of her which she seems to have lost (an aspect which he symbolizes as her "imagination"), and her quest to reconnect with him, were the catalysts of the prior book, which saw the protagonist undertake a picaresque voyage across the continent and into the mountain region, encountering with marvel and danger on the way. But from the start, deeper currents were in play, and malevolent elements at work. The Magisterium – the faith's controlling power, and the author's deliciously chilling representation of strict, procedural malice – is under recent guidance, and flexing its muscles. The antagonist – the heroine's family member, who holds responsible her for his family member's death – has worked himself into the role of president of the Magisterium's governing body, and is set on using his recently acquired influence to extend the church's control. A key character, who rescued baby the heroine to safety along a overflowing Thames as an 11-year-old in La Belle Sauvage, is now an academic with a additional duty in espionage: he is sent to a key location to find out more about Delamare's intentions. And beneath all of this is the puzzle surrounding the uncommon and valuable essential oil which seems in some way to be the source of a societal and financial disturbance emanating out from the region. The extract is viewed by some as a commercial commodity, by alternate groups as a scientific or esoteric wonder, and by yet others – the extremist "highland figures" – as a origin of darkness; an insult that must be destroyed. The dilemma of its origins, what it stands for, and whether it should be removed or safeguarded is escalating in importance.
As in His Dark Materials, our protagonist's actions, and her destiny, are demonstrated to be inseparably entwined with the future of the world
In its predecessor, these storylines ran broadly in side by side. In The Rose Field, they come together. Like His Dark Materials, the protagonist's choices and her path are unveiled to be inseparably entwined with the destiny of the world. Her private mission to reunite with her soul and recover her vision becomes the key conflict in a wider war with an oppressive government which, as such authorities often attempt, is attempting to suppress autonomy of thought, creativity and art: all the personal, defiant ways in which humans can be free.
Atmospheric Fissures and Ideological Conflicts
The novel begins with the finding of a series of strange fissures in the structure of the Earth's atmosphere: portals that look to give on to alternate realities. An example of a window seems to be the source of the highly contested rose oil. The authority, with its leader at its helm, classifies these windows as a threat to the religion's beliefs and aims to destroy them. As our protagonist begins to move from inflexible rationalism and revert to instinct, nevertheless, her certainty that these places must be preserved – that their significance and their value is in some way vital – strengthens. "Cosmic particles, or rose oil, or the creativity, or the botanical realm, or no matter what we name it," she says, "it is necessary." The stage for a poetic struggle between innocence and experience is set.
Story Tempo and Personal Evolution
At 640 pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
