Things are falling apart in the final volume of Pullman's latest trilogy, the next of Philip Pullman's masterful trilogies set in a universe that manifests, now more than ever, as a energized and tilted version of our own. Organizations are crumbling, or reorganizing themselves along new and disturbing lines. An unseen force "is wrecking the air and the seasons"; at the same time, "currency is failing, and no one knows why". Control is draining from authorities, and gathering in the chambers of theocrats, the vaults of corporations, the hands of rioters. "Something is at work, very quietly, very subtly", says businessman Mustafa Bey, keeping a observant eye on the trade routes from his place in an city cafe. "Things we thought were secure and solid are deteriorating and giving way."
Core Enigma and The Protagonist's Path
Exactly what that something might be, and methods to fight it, is the inquiry that drives The Rose Field, which continues where its predecessor ended. This is, by all accounts, Pullman's concluding foray into the elaborately built, deeply captivating universe he first revealed in the distant past, with the publication of His Dark Materials. It's a world whose terrain maps on to that of our world, but whose chronicles veers and changes with ours; where the individuals look and think and behave like us, but are joined by animal souls, essences in creature form; where the skies are teeming with sorceresses and legendary creatures, but below, transports are caught and drinks is sipped, and older professors carry Harrods shopping bags. The protagonist, whom we first introduced to as a child in the His Dark Materials trilogy, and then saw again as a baby in La Belle Sauvage, the prequel with which Pullman began this trilogy, is now a adult: still distinctly the spiky and determined protagonist of the prior volumes, but aged, sadder, more careful, less sure. This limitation is intensified by her division from her daemon, Pan – but it was also, ironically, the trigger which made him desert her in the first place.
Interwoven Plots
Pan's decision to go off in pursuit of that innocent part of her which she appears to have shed (an aspect which he symbolizes as her "vision"), and her mission to reconnect with him, were the driving forces of the prior book, which chronicled the protagonist undertake a picaresque voyage across the continent and into the mountain region, facing with amazement and risk on the way. But from the start, profound shifts were in motion, and darker forces at work. The religious council – the faith's controlling power, and the author's deliciously chilling incarnation of rigid, procedural malice – is under recent guidance, and flexing its muscles. The antagonist – Lyra's uncle, who faults her for his family member's death – has manoeuvred himself into the role of head of the Magisterium's High Council, and is set on using his recently acquired influence to broaden the institution's control. Another protagonist, who carried baby Lyra to refuge along a swollen Thames as an 11-year-old in La Belle Sauvage, is now an university scholar with a additional duty in spycraft: he is sent to a key location to find out more about his intentions. And behind all of this is the mystery surrounding the scarce and precious rose oil which seems mysteriously to be the cause of a societal and economic disturbance spreading out from the region. The substance is regarded by certain groups as a commercial product, by others as a empirical or spiritual miracle, and by further factions – the zealous "highland figures" – as a source of darkness; an insult that must be obliterated. The dilemma of its source, its significance, and whether it should be removed or safeguarded is escalating in importance.
Similar to His Dark Materials, our protagonist's decisions, and her destiny, are shown to be deeply entwined with the fate of the realm
In its predecessor, these narratives ran broadly in tandem. In The Rose Field, they converge. As in His Dark Materials, Lyra's actions and her destiny are revealed to be inseparably woven with the destiny of the universe. Her personal journey to rejoin with her companion and rediscover her vision becomes the central battleground in a wider war with an authoritarian regime which, as such regimes always have, is attempting to suppress freedom of thinking, creativity and culture: all the internal, resistant ways in which humans can be free.
Dimensional Rifts and Philosophical Struggles
The book opens with the unveiling of a series of curious fissures in the makeup of the planet's atmosphere: windows that appear to lead to alternate realities. A particular opening manifests to be the point of the highly contested botanical substance. The church, with the antagonist at its leadership, labels these portals as a problem to the institution's orthodoxy and endeavors to eliminate them. As the heroine begins to turn away from strict logic and back to instinct, yet, her certainty that these locations must be preserved – that their significance and what they offer is somehow crucial – increases. "The substance, or rose oil, or the creativity, or the botanical realm, or no matter what we name it," she says, "it is necessary." The setting for a philosophical conflict between innocence and maturity is set.
Plot Rhythm and Personal Evolution
At a substantial length, The Rose Field|this volume|the
