Things are falling apart in the concluding book of Pullman's latest trilogy, the second of Philip Pullman's grand trilogies set in a realm that seems, here more than ever, as a intense and slanted version of our own. Institutions are weakening, or restructuring themselves along new and troubling lines. An hidden force "is ruining the air and the seasons"; concurrently, "currency is failing, and no one knows why". Control is flowing away from authorities, and pooling in the halls of theocrats, the vaults of conglomerates, the grasp of mobs. "An element is at work, stealthily, very subtly", says merchant Mustafa Bey, keeping a observant eye on the trade routes from his seat in an Aleppo cafe. "Things we thought were firm and strong are deteriorating and failing."
Key Puzzle and Lyra's Journey
Precisely what that force might be, and how to counteract it, is the mystery that animates this final volume, which picks up where the previous book ended. This is, according to many, the author's final excursion into the intricately constructed, endlessly enchanting universe he first introduced three decades past, with the launch of His Dark Materials. It's a world whose terrain corresponds to that of the real world, but whose past veers and changes with ours; where the people look and reason and act like us, but are accompanied by daemons, beings in beast form; where the heavens are populated with enchantresses and gryphons, but beneath those skies, buses are ridden and drinks is sipped, and middle-aged academics carry Harrods shopping bags. The protagonist, whom we first met as a child in the His Dark Materials trilogy, and then met once more as a baby in the prequel, the prequel with which Pullman began this trilogy, is now a adult: still clearly the prickly and persistent heroine of the earlier books, but aged, more sorrowful, more careful, less sure. This limitation is amplified by her separation from her soul companion, Pantalaimon – but it was also, ironically, the cause which made him desert her in the first place.
Interwoven Plots
Pan's decision to depart in search of that youthful part of her which she appears to have shed (an trait which he epitomises as her "creativity"), and her quest to rejoin with him, were the driving forces of its predecessor, which followed the protagonist undertake a adventurous journey across Europe and into the mountain region, meeting with wonder and peril on the way. But from the outset, underlying forces were in motion, and malevolent elements at work. The Magisterium – the faith's governing authority, and Pullman's brilliantly sinister representation of strict, bureaucratic malice – is under fresh command, and showing its strength. Marcel Delamare – the heroine's relative, who faults her for his family member's death – has positioned himself into the office of president of the Magisterium's ruling assembly, and is determined on using his recently acquired influence to broaden the institution's rule. A key character, who rescued young the heroine to refuge along a swollen river as an child in La Belle Sauvage, is now an academic with a sideline in intelligence work: he is sent to the city to learn more about his aims. And beneath all of this is the puzzle surrounding the rare and valuable botanical extract which manifests somehow to be the source of a social and economic upheaval spreading out from that area. The substance is regarded by various factions as a marketable product, by alternate groups as a research-based or spiritual wonder, and by yet others – the zealous "highland figures" – as a wellspring of malevolence; an affront that must be destroyed. The dilemma of where it comes from, its significance, and whether it should be destroyed or protected is escalating in importance.
Similar to the original trilogy, Lyra's decisions, and her future, are shown to be inextricably entwined with the future of the realm
In the previous volume, these storylines ran largely in tandem. In this final book, they come together. As in His Dark Materials, her choices and her fate are unveiled to be inseparably woven with the future of the realm. Her individual journey to rejoin with her soul and recover her imagination becomes the primary conflict in a broader conflict with an oppressive government which, as these systems often attempt, is striving to suppress autonomy of thinking, creativity and art: all the internal, resistant ways in which humans can be independent.
Cosmic Openings and Philosophical Struggles
The book begins with the finding of a set of curious openings in the fabric of the Earth's sky: portals that look to open into alternate realities. An example of a portal manifests to be the source of the highly contested botanical substance. The church, with Delamare at its helm, labels these portals as a threat to the religion's beliefs and sets out to eradicate them. As Lyra begins to move from rigid reason and revert to intuition, yet, her belief that these locations must be defended – that their meaning and what they provide is somehow crucial – grows. "The substance, or rose oil, or the imagination, or the botanical realm, or whatever we name it," she says, "we need it." The setting for a poetic conflict between purity and maturity is set.
Plot Rhythm and Character Development
At over six hundred pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
