Things are falling apart in the last installment of Pullman's latest trilogy, the second of Philip Pullman's grand trilogies set in a realm that appears, now more than ever, as a charged and skewed version of our own. Organizations are failing, or reorganizing themselves along unfamiliar and disquieting lines. An hidden force "is wrecking the air and the seasons"; concurrently, "wealth is decaying, and no one knows why". Control is shifting from governments, and pooling in the chambers of theocrats, the coffers of conglomerates, the hands of mobs. "Some force is at work, stealthily, gradually", says merchant a trader character, keeping a vigilant eye on the trade routes from his seat in an Aleppo cafe. "Things we thought were secure and durable are weakening and collapsing."
Core Enigma and Her Quest
Just what that force might be, and methods to fight it, is the mystery that propels The Rose Field, which resumes where its predecessor left off. This is, by all accounts, Pullman's concluding foray into the intricately constructed, infinitely beguiling universe he first introduced in the distant past, with the launch of the first trilogy. It's a world whose geography aligns with that of our world, but whose past tacks and jibes with ours; where the humans appear and think and behave like us, but are accompanied by animal souls, beings in creature form; where the skies are filled with witches and mythical beasts, but beneath those skies, transports are ridden and beverages is consumed, and older academics carry Harrods shopping bags. The protagonist, whom we first met as a 12-year-old in the first trilogy, and then revisited as a baby in the first volume, the origin story with which Pullman began The Book of Dust, is now a young woman: still distinctly the prickly and tenacious main character of the prior volumes, but older, melancholic, more careful, less sure. This restraint is intensified by her division from her soul companion, Pantalaimon – but it was also, ironically, the catalyst which led him to leave her in the first place.
Merging Narratives
Pan's decision to depart in search of that youthful part of her which she may have forgotten (an trait which he represents as her "vision"), and her quest to rejoin with him, were the catalysts of The Secret Commonwealth, which followed the protagonist undertake a adventurous trek across the continent and into the mountain region, meeting with amazement and risk on the way. But from the beginning, underlying forces were in motion, and darker forces at work. The Magisterium – the religious ruling body, and the author's deliciously chilling representation of strict, bureaucratic wickedness – is under fresh command, and asserting its power. Lyra's uncle – Lyra's family member, who blames her for his family member's death – has manoeuvred himself into the position of head of the church's High Council, and is intent on using his fresh power to broaden the church's dominium. Malcolm Polstead, who saved young the heroine to safety along a flooded Thames as an 11-year-old in La Belle Sauvage, is now an Oxford don with a secondary role in spycraft: he is sent to a key location to learn more about Delamare's aims. And underlying all of this is the enigma surrounding the rare and valuable rose oil which manifests mysteriously to be the origin of a social and economic crisis rippling out from Central Asia. The extract is regarded by various factions as a marketable product, by others as a research-based or spiritual phenomenon, and by further factions – the fanatical "highland figures" – as a wellspring of malevolence; an challenge that must be eradicated. The dilemma of where it comes from, what it stands for, and whether it should be eliminated or safeguarded is coming rapidly to the fore.
As in the original trilogy, our protagonist's decisions, and her fate, are demonstrated to be inextricably connected with the fate of the world
In The Secret Commonwealth, these plots ran broadly in parallel. In the conclusion, they converge. Like the first trilogy, her choices and her fate are revealed to be inseparably woven with the future of the realm. Her personal mission to reconnect with her soul and regain her imagination becomes the central conflict in a broader war with an authoritarian system which, as such authorities always have, is seeking to suppress autonomy of reason, creativity and expression: all the internal, rebellious ways in which individuals can be independent.
Dimensional Rifts and Philosophical Struggles
The novel begins with the unveiling of a collection of strange fissures in the makeup of the world's sky: portals that appear to open into different dimensions. An example of a portal appears to be the source of the highly contested rose oil. The church, with Delamare at its head, labels these windows as a challenge to the religion's beliefs and endeavors to destroy them. As Lyra begins to shift from rigid rationalism and back to intuition, however, her belief that these places must be protected – that what they stand for and their value is mysteriously essential – increases. "The substance, or the substance, or the imagination, or the botanical realm, or whatever we call it," she says, "it is necessary." The scene for a Blakean struggle between naivety and knowledge is established.
Narrative Pacing and Protagonist Growth
At a substantial length, The Rose Field|this volume|the
