Tings are falling apart in the last installment of Pullman's latest trilogy, the second of Philip Pullman's masterful trilogies set in a universe that manifests, here more than ever, as a intense and slanted version of our own. Institutions are weakening, or reorganizing themselves along new and disturbing lines. An unseen force "is wrecking the air and the seasons"; simultaneously, "currency is failing, and no one knows why". Power is shifting from states, and accumulating in the offices of theocrats, the coffers of corporations, the control of rioters. "Some force is at work, stealthily, imperceptibly", says businessman a trader character, keeping a vigilant eye on the Silk Roads from his seat in an Aleppo cafe. "Elements we thought were firm and solid are deteriorating and giving way."
Core Enigma and Her Quest
Exactly what that force might be, and ways to oppose it, is the mystery that propels The Rose Field, which resumes where the previous book ended. This is, according to many, Pullman's last excursion into the elaborately built, deeply captivating universe he first revealed in the distant past, with the release of the first trilogy. It's a world whose geography maps on to that of this world, but whose chronicles veers and changes with ours; where the people look and think and act like us, but are joined by external spirits, souls in beast form; where the heavens are filled with enchantresses and legendary creatures, but underneath, transports are taken and drinks is sipped, and older professors carry Harrods shopping bags. The protagonist, whom we first met as a child in the first trilogy, and then met once more as a infant in the first volume, the origin story with which the author began this trilogy, is now a young woman: still recognisably the prickly and determined heroine of the earlier books, but aged, melancholic, more careful, less sure. This circumscription is intensified by her separation from her animal guide, Pan – but it was also, ironically, the trigger which made him desert her in the first place.
Interwoven Plots
His choice to go off in quest of that youthful part of the heroine which she appears to have shed (an quality which he symbolizes as her "imagination"), and her quest to rejoin with him, were the catalysts of the prior book, which chronicled Lyra undertake a adventurous journey across the continent and into the Caucasus, facing with marvel and danger on the way. But from the outset, profound shifts were in motion, and malevolent elements at work. The religious council – the religious controlling power, and the author's deliciously chilling embodiment of strict, bureaucratic wickedness – is under new leadership, and showing its strength. Lyra's uncle – our protagonist's uncle, who faults her for his sibling's death – has manoeuvred himself into the position of leader of the Magisterium's governing body, and is intent on using his newfound power to broaden the religion's dominium. A key character, who rescued baby Lyra to safety along a flooded river as an 11-year-old in La Belle Sauvage, is now an academic with a additional duty in intelligence work: he is dispatched to Geneva to discover more about his aims. And underlying all of this is the puzzle surrounding the uncommon and valuable rose oil which manifests somehow to be the origin of a societal and economic disturbance emanating out from Central Asia. The extract is regarded by some as a tradeable product, by others as a research-based or spiritual wonder, and by yet others – the zealous "mountain dwellers" – as a source of malevolence; an affront that must be eradicated. The issue of where it comes from, what it stands for, and whether it should be destroyed or preserved is coming rapidly to the fore.
As in the first series, the heroine's decisions, and her future, are shown to be inextricably connected with the future of the universe
In The Secret Commonwealth, these plots ran largely in parallel. In The Rose Field, they come together. Similar to the original series, the protagonist's choices and her destiny are unveiled to be deeply entwined with the destiny of the universe. Her private journey to reconnect with her soul and regain her vision becomes the central conflict in a larger conflict with an controlling regime which, as such regimes always have, is striving to suppress autonomy of thought, innovation and expression: all the internal, defiant ways in which individuals can be liberated.
Cosmic Openings and Ideological Conflicts
The novel starts with the unveiling of a collection of curious cracks in the makeup of the Earth's air: portals that look to give on to other worlds. An example of a opening seems to be the origin of the much debated rose oil. The church, with Delamare at its head, labels these windows as a challenge to the institution's beliefs and sets out to destroy them. As the heroine begins to shift from rigid rationalism and return to intuition, however, her conviction that these sites must be protected – that their meaning and what they offer is mysteriously essential – strengthens. "Dust, or rose oil, or the creativity, or the botanical realm, or whatever we call it," she says, "it is necessary." The setting for a Blakean tussle between purity and maturity is prepared.
Story Tempo and Character Development
At a substantial length, The Rose Field|this volume|the
