Tings are unraveling in the final volume of The Dust Trilogy, the second of Philip Pullman's grand trilogies set in a realm that seems, now more than ever, as a energized and skewed version of our own. Institutions are failing, or reorganizing themselves along novel and disquieting lines. An unseen force "is ruining the air and the seasons"; concurrently, "money's going bad, and no one knows why". Authority is draining from states, and gathering in the offices of religious leaders, the treasuries of business empires, the grasp of rioters. "An element is at work, stealthily, imperceptibly", says trader a merchant figure, keeping a vigilant eye on the ancient paths from his seat in an city cafe. "Aspects we thought were firm and solid are faltering and failing."
The Central Mystery and The Protagonist's Path
Just what that force might be, and ways to oppose it, is the mystery that animates The Rose Field, which resumes where the previous book concluded. This is, according to many, the author's concluding foray into the carefully crafted, endlessly enchanting realm he first revealed in the distant past, with the release of Northern Lights. It's a realm whose geography aligns with that of the real world, but whose past veers and changes with ours; where the individuals look and think and act like us, but are accompanied by daemons, essences in beast form; where the heavens are populated with witches and gryphons, but beneath those skies, transports are taken and drinks is sipped, and middle-aged professors carry Harrods shopping bags. The protagonist, whom we first introduced to as a 12-year-old in the His Dark Materials trilogy, and then revisited as a infant in La Belle Sauvage, the origin story with which the author began this trilogy, is now a mature individual: still recognisably the sharp and persistent main character of the prior volumes, but aged, sadder, more careful, less certain. This restraint is heightened by her split from her soul companion, her daemon – but it was also, paradoxically, the trigger which led him to leave her in the first place.
Interwoven Plots
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 quest to reunite with him, were the driving forces of The Secret Commonwealth, which saw Lyra undertake a adventurous voyage across Europe and into the mountain region, facing with marvel and risk on the way. But from the beginning, deeper currents were in action, and darker forces at work. The religious council – the faith's ruling body, and the author's deliciously chilling representation of austere, procedural malice – is under new leadership, and asserting its power. Marcel Delamare – the heroine's family member, who faults her for his sibling's death – has worked himself into the position of head of the church's High Council, and is determined on using his recently acquired authority to expand the religion's dominium. Another protagonist, who saved infant the heroine to refuge along a overflowing Thames as an young boy in the prequel, is now an Oxford don with a secondary role in spycraft: he is assigned to a key location to discover more about his aims. And behind all of this is the mystery surrounding the scarce and valuable essential oil which appears mysteriously to be the source of a social and financial disturbance rippling out from that area. The substance is seen by certain groups as a commercial product, by others as a research-based or mystical miracle, and by further factions – the zealous "men from the mountains" – as a origin of malevolence; an affront that must be eradicated. The issue of where it comes from, its significance, and whether it should be destroyed or safeguarded is becoming urgent.
As in the first series, our protagonist's actions, and her fate, are shown to be deeply entwined with the future of the realm
In the previous volume, these narratives ran broadly in parallel. In the conclusion, they come together. Similar to the first trilogy, the protagonist's movements and her fate are unveiled to be inextricably entwined with the destiny of the realm. Her personal mission to reunite with her soul and regain her imagination becomes the key struggle in a broader conflict with an authoritarian system which, as these systems often attempt, is striving to stifle autonomy of thinking, innovation and culture: all the personal, defiant ways in which humans can be independent.
Cosmic Openings and Moral Battles
The book opens with the unveiling of a collection of strange cracks in the structure of the world's air: gateways that seem to open into alternate realities. A particular window manifests to be the origin of the highly contested mystical extract. The authority, with Delamare at its head, labels these openings as a threat to the church's doctrine and sets out to destroy them. As our protagonist begins to turn away from strict rationalism and revert to instinct, yet, her conviction that these locations must be defended – that what they stand for and what they provide is in some way vital – strengthens. "Cosmic particles, or rose oil, or the imagination, or the field of roses, or no matter what we call it," she says, "we require it." The setting for a poetic tussle between purity and maturity is established.
Plot Rhythm and Personal Evolution
At a substantial length, The Rose Field|this volume|the
