Things are unraveling in the last installment of Pullman's latest trilogy, the next of Philip Pullman's magisterial trilogies set in a universe that manifests, here more than ever, as a charged and slanted version of our own. Institutions are weakening, or reorganizing themselves along new and disquieting lines. An unseen force "is wrecking the air and the seasons"; concurrently, "wealth is decaying, and no one knows why". Authority is flowing away from governments, and pooling in the halls of religious leaders, the coffers of business empires, the hands of mobs. "Some force is at work, silently, gradually", says trader a merchant figure, keeping a watchful eye on the ancient paths from his post in an city cafe. "Aspects we thought were stable and durable are faltering and failing."
Key Puzzle and Her Quest
Precisely what that force might be, and methods to fight it, is the mystery that animates The Rose Field, which continues where The Secret Commonwealth ended. This is, by all accounts, the author's last foray into the intricately constructed, deeply captivating world he first introduced in the distant past, with the launch of Northern Lights. It's a domain whose terrain aligns with that of our world, but whose past tacks and jibes with ours; where the people look and think and act like us, but are accompanied by animal souls, souls in animal form; where the skies are teeming with enchantresses and mythical beasts, but beneath those skies, buses are caught and drinks is consumed, and mature academics carry luxury shopping bags. Our heroine, whom we first met as a young girl in the original trilogy, and then saw again as a infant in La Belle Sauvage, the origin story with which the author began the series, is now a young woman: still clearly the spiky and tenacious main character of the earlier books, but more mature, melancholic, more cautious, less certain. This restraint is heightened by her division from her daemon, her daemon – but it was also, ironically, the trigger which made him desert her in the first place.
Merging Narratives
Pan's decision to leave in search of that innocent part of the heroine which she may have forgotten (an quality which he represents as her "vision"), and her mission to reconnect with him, were the incitements of The Secret Commonwealth, which followed the protagonist undertake a wandering journey across Europe and into the Caucasus, meeting with amazement and peril on the way. But from the start, profound shifts were in action, and darker forces at work. The church authority – the church's ruling body, and Pullman's brilliantly sinister representation of strict, administrative malice – is under new leadership, and showing its strength. Lyra's uncle – Lyra's family member, who faults her for his sister's death – has worked himself into the role of head of the Magisterium's ruling assembly, and is intent on using his newfound power to extend the institution's dominium. Another protagonist, who saved infant the heroine to safety along a swollen Thames as an young boy in the prequel, is now an university scholar with a secondary role in intelligence work: he is assigned to the city to learn more about his plans. And beneath all of this is the puzzle surrounding the scarce and costly rose oil which appears in some way to be the cause of a social and economic upheaval rippling out from Central Asia. The extract is regarded by certain groups as a tradeable good, by others as a research-based or spiritual phenomenon, and by yet others – the fanatical "men from the mountains" – as a origin of darkness; an affront that must be obliterated. The question of its origins, what it stands for, and whether it should be destroyed or safeguarded is escalating in importance.
Like the first series, our protagonist's deeds, and her future, are shown to be inextricably linked with the fate of the world
In The Secret Commonwealth, these storylines ran broadly in side by side. In the conclusion, they converge. Like the original series, her choices and her destiny are shown to be inseparably entwined with the destiny of the realm. Her private journey to reunite with her daemon and rediscover her imagination becomes the primary conflict in a wider war with an controlling system which, as these systems often attempt, is attempting to quell autonomy of reason, originality and culture: all the inner, rebellious ways in which humans can be liberated.
Atmospheric Fissures and Ideological Conflicts
The story begins with the finding of a collection of strange cracks in the makeup of the planet's sky: gateways that seem to give on to other worlds. One such window seems to be the point of the much debated rose oil. The Magisterium, with its leader at its helm, designates these openings as a threat to the church's doctrine and endeavors to eliminate them. As Lyra begins to turn away from inflexible logic and back to feeling, yet, her conviction that these locations must be preserved – that what they stand for and their value is in some way crucial – strengthens. "Dust, or the substance, or the imagination, or the field of roses, or no matter what we name it," she says, "we need it." The setting for a Blakean struggle between naivety and experience is established.
Story Tempo and Personal Evolution
At 640 pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
