Tings are falling apart in the concluding book of The Dust Trilogy, the second of Philip Pullman's masterful trilogies set in a universe that manifests, now more than ever, as a charged and slanted version of our own. Establishments are crumbling, or reorganizing themselves along new and troubling lines. An invisible force "is ruining the air and the seasons"; concurrently, "wealth is decaying, and no one knows why". Authority is shifting from governments, and pooling in the halls of religious leaders, the coffers of corporations, the hands of crowds. "An element is at work, silently, imperceptibly", says businessman a merchant figure, keeping a observant eye on the ancient paths from his seat in an Aleppo cafe. "Aspects we thought were firm and strong are faltering and failing."
Core Enigma and Lyra's Journey
Exactly what that force might be, and ways to oppose it, is the inquiry that propels The Rose Field, which picks up where its predecessor ended. This is, according to many, the author's concluding venture into the elaborately built, infinitely beguiling universe he first revealed three decades past, with the publication of Northern Lights. It's a domain whose landscape maps on to that of the real world, but whose chronicles tacks and jibes with ours; where the people appear and think and act like us, but are accompanied by animal souls, souls in creature form; where the skies are filled with sorceresses and legendary creatures, but beneath those skies, buses are caught and drinks is consumed, and mature scholars carry fancy shopping bags. Our heroine, whom we first introduced to as a young girl in the first trilogy, and then revisited as a infant in La Belle Sauvage, the prequel with which the author began the series, is now a young woman: still distinctly the prickly and persistent protagonist of the earlier books, but aged, sadder, warier, more doubtful. This restraint is intensified by her separation from her daemon, her daemon – but it was also, ironically, the cause which led him to leave her in the first place.
Interwoven Plots
Pan's decision to depart in quest of that childlike part of the heroine which she may have forgotten (an aspect which he symbolizes as her "creativity"), and her quest to reunite with him, were the catalysts of the prior book, which followed the protagonist undertake a adventurous voyage across Europe and into the Caucasus, facing with amazement and risk on the way. But from the start, underlying forces were in action, and darker forces at work. The religious council – the church's governing authority, and Pullman's masterfully eerie embodiment of rigid, bureaucratic malice – is under recent guidance, and flexing its muscles. Lyra's uncle – Lyra's family member, who blames her for his sibling's death – has positioned himself into the office of head of the authority's ruling assembly, and is determined on using his newfound power to expand the religion's control. Malcolm Polstead, who carried young Lyra to refuge along a flooded river as an child in the prequel, is now an university scholar with a additional duty in espionage: he is sent to a key location to find out more about Delamare's intentions. And behind all of this is the puzzle surrounding the uncommon and precious rose oil which seems somehow to be the cause of a societal and financial disturbance rippling out from the region. The extract is viewed by various factions as a commercial product, by different parties as a research-based or spiritual miracle, and by yet others – the fanatical "men from the mountains" – as a wellspring of darkness; an insult that must be obliterated. The question of its source, its significance, and whether it should be removed or protected is becoming urgent.
Like the first series, Lyra's actions, and her fate, are revealed to be inextricably entwined with the fate of the world
In the previous volume, these plots ran broadly in parallel. In the conclusion, they converge. Similar to the original series, her movements and her fate are unveiled to be deeply woven with the future of the universe. Her personal mission to reunite with her companion and regain her vision becomes the central struggle in a broader battle with an controlling regime which, as such authorities often attempt, is attempting to quell independence of reason, innovation and expression: all the personal, resistant ways in which humans can be liberated.
Dimensional Rifts and Ideological Conflicts
The book begins with the finding of a collection of strange fissures in the fabric of the planet's atmosphere: gateways that seem to lead to other worlds. A particular portal seems to be the point of the highly contested rose oil. The Magisterium, with Delamare at its helm, designates these windows as a threat to the religion's orthodoxy and sets out to eradicate them. As our protagonist begins to move from inflexible logic and revert to feeling, yet, her certainty that these places must be protected – that their meaning and what they offer is mysteriously crucial – grows. "Dust, or the substance, or the creativity, or the botanical realm, or no matter what we call it," she says, "it is necessary." The scene for a poetic tussle between innocence and knowledge is prepared.
Story Tempo and Personal Evolution
At over six hundred pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
