Tings are unraveling in the last installment of Pullman's latest trilogy, the next of Philip Pullman's grand trilogies set in a realm that manifests, here more than ever, as a energized and tilted version of our own. Establishments are crumbling, or restructuring themselves along unfamiliar and troubling lines. An invisible force "is wrecking the air and the seasons"; concurrently, "currency is failing, and no one knows why". Control is draining from governments, and pooling in the halls of religious leaders, the vaults of business empires, the hands of crowds. "Some force is at work, stealthily, gradually", says trader Mustafa Bey, keeping a watchful eye on the ancient paths from his place in an Aleppo cafe. "Elements we thought were firm and strong are weakening and failing."
The Central Mystery and The Protagonist's Path
Just what that element might be, and how to counteract it, is the inquiry that propels The Rose Field, which continues where the previous book left off. This is, reportedly, the author's concluding excursion into the elaborately built, endlessly enchanting realm he first revealed three decades past, with the launch of the first trilogy. It's a domain whose geography corresponds to that of this world, but whose chronicles tacks and jibes with ours; where the humans appear and think and act like us, but are paired by animal souls, beings in beast form; where the skies are teeming with enchantresses and mythical beasts, but below, vehicles are caught and drinks is drunk, and mature scholars carry luxury shopping bags. The protagonist, whom we first encountered as a child in the original trilogy, and then met once more as a infant in the prequel, the prequel with which Pullman began The Book of Dust, is now a adult: still clearly the sharp and tenacious protagonist of the prior volumes, but older, melancholic, more careful, less certain. This limitation is amplified by her separation from her soul companion, Pantalaimon – but it was also, paradoxically, the trigger which led him to leave her in the first place.
Interwoven Plots
The daemon's resolve to leave in pursuit of that childlike part of her which she appears to have shed (an aspect which he represents as her "vision"), and her journey to reconnect with him, were the driving forces of its predecessor, which followed Lyra undertake a adventurous journey across the continent and into the mountain region, encountering with amazement and danger on the way. But from the beginning, deeper currents were in action, and malevolent elements at work. The church authority – the faith's governing authority, and Pullman's masterfully eerie incarnation of austere, procedural wickedness – is under recent guidance, and asserting its power. Lyra's uncle – the heroine's uncle, who faults her for his sister's death – has positioned himself into the position of president of the Magisterium's governing body, and is determined on using his newfound influence to broaden the institution's dominium. Another protagonist, who rescued young Lyra to safety along a overflowing Thames as an young boy in the prequel, is now an academic with a secondary role in intelligence work: he is dispatched to a key location to discover more about his plans. And underlying all of this is the enigma surrounding the rare and precious essential oil which manifests in some way to be the source of a societal and financial crisis spreading out from Central Asia. The oil is regarded by certain groups as a tradeable product, by different parties as a research-based or mystical miracle, and by others still – the fanatical "men from the mountains" – as a wellspring of malevolence; an insult that must be destroyed. The question of where it comes from, its significance, and if it should be destroyed or preserved is becoming urgent.
Similar to the original trilogy, Lyra's decisions, and her destiny, are demonstrated to be inextricably connected with the fate of the world
In The Secret Commonwealth, these plots ran largely in side by side. In the conclusion, they merge. As in His Dark Materials, her choices and her destiny are unveiled to be deeply entwined with the destiny of the world. Her personal mission to reconnect with her daemon and regain her creativity becomes the central struggle in a larger battle with an controlling regime which, as these systems often attempt, is attempting to suppress freedom of thought, creativity and expression: all the inner, resistant ways in which individuals can be free.
Dimensional Rifts and Moral Battles
The novel starts with the finding of a series of curious cracks in the structure of the planet's atmosphere: portals that appear to open into alternate realities. One such opening manifests to be the point of the highly contested botanical substance. The authority, with the antagonist at its head, classifies these windows as a problem to the religion's beliefs and aims to destroy them. As the heroine begins to shift from rigid rationalism and back to feeling, yet, her belief that these locations must be protected – that their meaning and their value is somehow crucial – grows. "Cosmic particles, or rose oil, or the vision, or the botanical realm, or whatever we call it," she says, "it is necessary." The setting for a Blakean conflict between innocence and maturity is set.
Plot Rhythm and Personal Evolution
At a substantial length, The Rose Field|this volume|the
