Things are collapsing in the final volume of The Book of Dust, the next of the author's grand trilogies set in a world that manifests, here more than ever, as a energized and tilted version of our own. Establishments are failing, or reassembling themselves along new and troubling lines. An invisible force "is destroying the air and the seasons"; concurrently, "money's going bad, and no one knows why". Authority is draining from authorities, and accumulating in the chambers of theocrats, the treasuries of conglomerates, the hands of mobs. "An element is at work, very quietly, imperceptibly", says businessman a merchant figure, keeping a observant eye on the ancient paths from his post in an Aleppo cafe. "Things we thought were secure and solid are weakening and giving way."
The Central Mystery and Lyra's Journey
Precisely what that something might be, and how to counteract it, is the question that animates this final volume, which resumes where the previous book concluded. This is, by all accounts, Pullman's final excursion into the intricately constructed, endlessly enchanting universe he first unveiled in the distant past, with the publication of the first trilogy. It's a realm whose landscape maps on to that of the real world, but whose past tacks and jibes with ours; where the individuals appear and reason and act like us, but are accompanied by external spirits, souls in creature form; where the heavens are populated with enchantresses and mythical beasts, but below, buses are caught and drinks is drunk, and older professors carry fancy shopping bags. Lyra, whom we first encountered as a young girl in the original trilogy, and then revisited as a infant in La Belle Sauvage, the prequel with which the author began The Book of Dust, is now a mature individual: still recognisably the spiky and determined main character of the prior volumes, but older, melancholic, more cautious, more doubtful. This circumscription is heightened by her separation from her soul companion, Pantalaimon – but it was also, paradoxically, the trigger which made him desert her in the first place.
Converging Storylines
Pan's decision to leave in quest of that innocent part of Lyra which she seems to have lost (an trait which he symbolizes as her "creativity"), and her mission to reunite with him, were the incitements of The Secret Commonwealth, which followed Lyra undertake a picaresque trek across the continent and into the mountain region, meeting with marvel and danger on the way. But from the start, profound shifts were in action, and sinister powers at work. The religious council – the religious ruling body, and Pullman's deliciously chilling representation of austere, procedural wickedness – is under new leadership, and flexing its muscles. Marcel Delamare – Lyra's family member, who blames her for his family member's death – has worked himself into the office of head of the church's governing body, and is set on using his newfound influence to expand the church's dominium. Malcolm Polstead, who saved infant Lyra to safety along a flooded river as an 11-year-old in La Belle Sauvage, is now an Oxford don with a sideline in espionage: he is sent to a key location to find out more about his plans. And underlying all of this is the enigma surrounding the uncommon and costly rose oil which manifests mysteriously to be the cause of a social and financial upheaval emanating out from Central Asia. The oil is regarded by some as a marketable good, by others as a scientific or spiritual miracle, and by others still – the extremist "highland figures" – as a source of malevolence; an affront that must be eradicated. The question of where it comes from, its significance, and if it should be eliminated or protected is coming rapidly to the fore.
As in the original trilogy, Lyra's deeds, and her destiny, are revealed to be inextricably connected with the destiny of the universe
In its predecessor, these plots ran mostly in tandem. In The Rose Field, they converge. As in the first trilogy, Lyra's choices and her destiny are shown to be inextricably entwined with the fate of the world. Her individual quest to rejoin with her soul and recover her vision becomes the central struggle in a wider war with an authoritarian system which, as such regimes typically do, is seeking to suppress freedom of thought, innovation and expression: all the internal, rebellious ways in which humans can be liberated.
Atmospheric Fissures and Moral Battles
The novel opens with the discovery of a series of strange openings in the makeup of the world's atmosphere: portals that appear to give on to different dimensions. A particular window manifests to be the point of the much debated rose oil. The Magisterium, with its leader at its head, designates these windows as a threat to the institution's orthodoxy and endeavors to eliminate them. As Lyra begins to shift from rigid reason and return to intuition, nevertheless, her belief that these sites must be preserved – that their significance and what they provide is mysteriously essential – increases. "Dust, or the extract, or the vision, or the field of roses, or whatever we call it," she says, "it is necessary." The scene for a poetic struggle between innocence and knowledge is prepared.
Narrative Pacing and Personal Evolution
At 640 pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
