Tings are unraveling in the final volume of Pullman's latest trilogy, the second of the author's grand trilogies set in a universe that seems, in this volume especially, as a charged and skewed version of our own. Institutions are crumbling, or restructuring themselves along unfamiliar 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". Authority is shifting from governments, and accumulating in the offices of religious leaders, the vaults of corporations, the grasp of mobs. "Something is at work, stealthily, gradually", says businessman a trader character, keeping a observant eye on the trade routes from his post in an Aleppo cafe. "Things we thought were secure and strong are faltering and giving way."
Key Puzzle and Her Quest
Precisely what that something might be, and methods to fight it, is the inquiry that drives The Rose Field, which picks up where its predecessor concluded. This is, by all accounts, the author's final venture into the intricately constructed, deeply captivating universe he first introduced in the distant past, with the release of Northern Lights. It's a domain whose landscape corresponds to that of this world, but whose chronicles tacks and jibes with ours; where the humans appear and reason and act like us, but are paired by animal souls, essences in animal form; where the air are filled with witches and mythical beasts, but underneath, transports are caught and beverages is sipped, and older academics carry fancy shopping bags. The protagonist, whom we first encountered as a young girl in the first trilogy, and then revisited as a toddler in the first volume, the origin story with which Pullman began this trilogy, is now a adult: still clearly the sharp and determined protagonist of the earlier books, but more mature, more sorrowful, more cautious, less certain. This limitation is amplified by her division from her soul companion, her daemon – but it was also, ironically, the catalyst which made him desert her in the first place.
Merging Narratives
Pan's decision to go off in pursuit of that innocent part of the heroine which she may have forgotten (an quality which he epitomises as her "imagination"), and her journey to rejoin with him, were the driving forces of its predecessor, which followed the protagonist undertake a wandering trek across Europe and into the mountain region, facing with wonder and danger on the way. But from the outset, underlying forces were in play, and darker forces at work. The Magisterium – the religious governing authority, and the author's brilliantly sinister incarnation of austere, procedural evil – is under fresh command, and asserting its power. Lyra's uncle – the heroine's relative, who blames her for his sister's death – has worked himself into the role of leader of the church's ruling assembly, and is determined on using his fresh authority to extend the religion's control. A key character, who saved young Lyra to safety along a flooded river as an 11-year-old in the first book, is now an Oxford don with a secondary role in espionage: he is assigned to a key location to learn more about Delamare's intentions. And underlying all of this is the puzzle surrounding the scarce and costly essential oil which appears mysteriously to be the source of a social and economic crisis rippling out from that area. The extract is seen by some as a commercial product, by others as a empirical or mystical phenomenon, and by yet others – the extremist "mountain dwellers" – as a wellspring of malevolence; an affront that must be eradicated. The issue of its source, its meaning, and whether it should be eliminated or preserved is escalating in importance.
Similar to the original trilogy, our protagonist's decisions, and her future, are revealed to be inextricably linked with the destiny of the universe
In its predecessor, these storylines ran broadly in tandem. In this final book, they converge. Like the first trilogy, Lyra's choices and her destiny are shown to be inseparably linked with the fate of the realm. Her individual quest to reconnect with her soul and recover her vision becomes the primary conflict in a wider battle with an authoritarian system which, as such regimes typically do, is attempting to quell independence of thought, innovation and art: all the internal, resistant ways in which humans can be free.
Atmospheric Fissures and Philosophical Struggles
The story starts with the unveiling of a series of strange openings in the structure of the world's air: windows that appear to lead to alternate realities. A particular window appears to be the point of the fiercely disputed mystical extract. The authority, with its leader at its helm, labels these windows as a problem to the institution's orthodoxy and aims to eradicate them. As Lyra begins to move from strict reason and revert to instinct, nevertheless, her conviction that these locations must be preserved – that their significance and what they provide is in some way vital – increases. "Dust, or the extract, or the imagination, or the field of roses, or no matter what we name it," she says, "it is necessary." The stage for a philosophical tussle between naivety and maturity is established.
Story Tempo and Character Development
At a substantial length, The Rose Field|this volume|the
