Tings are collapsing in the final volume of The Dust Trilogy, the second of Philip Pullman's masterful trilogies set in a realm that manifests, now more than ever, as a charged and slanted version of our own. Institutions are failing, or reorganizing themselves along novel and troubling lines. An unseen force "is destroying the air and the seasons"; simultaneously, "currency is failing, and no one knows why". Authority is shifting from authorities, and pooling in the halls of theocrats, the vaults of corporations, the grasp of crowds. "Some force is at work, very quietly, imperceptibly", says trader a trader character, keeping a vigilant eye on the ancient paths from his post in an Aleppo cafe. "Aspects we thought were stable and durable are weakening and failing."
Key Puzzle and Lyra's Journey
Precisely what that force might be, and how to counteract it, is the inquiry that animates this final volume, which picks up where its predecessor ended. This is, reportedly, Pullman's last venture into the carefully crafted, endlessly enchanting universe he first introduced 30 years ago, with the publication of Northern Lights. It's a realm whose terrain corresponds to that of our world, but whose history veers and changes with ours; where the people appear and think and behave like us, but are accompanied by daemons, essences in animal form; where the air are filled with witches and legendary creatures, but below, transports are caught and tea is consumed, and older academics carry Harrods shopping bags. Our heroine, whom we first met as a child in the His Dark Materials trilogy, and then saw again as a toddler in the prequel, the prequel with which the author began The Book of Dust, is now a young woman: still clearly the prickly and tenacious main character of the previous installments, but more mature, sadder, warier, less certain. This restraint is heightened by her split from her animal guide, Pan – but it was also, paradoxically, the cause which led him to leave her in the first place.
Interwoven Plots
His choice to leave in pursuit of that innocent part of Lyra which she may have forgotten (an aspect which he represents as her "vision"), and her journey to rejoin with him, were the incitements of its predecessor, which chronicled the protagonist undertake a adventurous trek across Europe and into the mountain region, meeting with marvel and danger on the way. But from the outset, profound shifts were in play, and sinister powers at work. The Magisterium – the faith's ruling body, and Pullman's brilliantly sinister incarnation of austere, bureaucratic evil – is under fresh command, and showing its strength. The antagonist – Lyra's family member, who blames her for his family member's death – has manoeuvred himself into the office of head of the church's High Council, and is intent on using his recently acquired power to broaden the institution's rule. A key character, who saved baby Lyra to refuge along a flooded Thames as an 11-year-old in the first book, is now an Oxford don with a sideline in espionage: he is assigned to the city to find out more about the antagonist's plans. And underlying all of this is the mystery surrounding the uncommon and precious essential oil which appears somehow to be the origin of a societal and financial crisis emanating out from the region. The extract is seen by various factions as a commercial good, by alternate groups as a scientific or spiritual miracle, and by further factions – the zealous "mountain dwellers" – as a source of malevolence; an insult that must be eradicated. The dilemma of its origins, what it stands for, and if it should be eliminated or preserved is escalating in importance.
As in the original trilogy, our protagonist's actions, and her future, are demonstrated to be inseparably linked with the future of the realm
In The Secret Commonwealth, these plots ran largely in parallel. In The Rose Field, they merge. As in His Dark Materials, the protagonist's movements and her fate are shown to be inextricably woven with the fate of the realm. Her personal journey to rejoin with her soul and rediscover her vision becomes the key conflict in a larger conflict with an authoritarian government which, as such authorities typically do, is seeking to stifle autonomy of thinking, innovation and culture: all the internal, defiant ways in which humans can be liberated.
Atmospheric Fissures and Ideological Conflicts
The book begins with the unveiling of a set of unusual fissures in the fabric of the planet's atmosphere: windows that seem to open into other worlds. One such window seems to be the origin of the highly contested rose oil. The church, with Delamare at its helm, designates these openings as a problem to the institution's orthodoxy and sets out to eliminate them. As Lyra begins to turn away from rigid logic and return to feeling, yet, her conviction that these sites must be protected – that what they stand for and their value is mysteriously essential – grows. "Dust, or the substance, or the imagination, or the field of roses, or no matter what we label it," she says, "we require it." The scene for a philosophical conflict between purity and experience is prepared.
Narrative Pacing and Personal Evolution
At over six hundred pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
