Things are collapsing in the final volume of The Book of Dust, the next of Philip Pullman's magisterial trilogies set in a universe that manifests, in this volume especially, as a energized and tilted version of our own. Institutions are weakening, or restructuring themselves along novel and disquieting lines. An unseen force "is wrecking the air and the seasons"; at the same time, "money's going bad, and no one knows why". Authority is draining from states, and accumulating in the chambers of religious leaders, the vaults of corporations, the control of rioters. "Some force is at work, stealthily, gradually", says trader a trader character, keeping a vigilant eye on the trade routes from his seat in an Aleppo cafe. "Elements we thought were secure and solid are weakening and failing."
The Central Mystery and Lyra's Journey
Just what that element might be, and methods to fight it, is the inquiry that propels the concluding book, which resumes where the previous book left off. This is, by all accounts, Pullman's last excursion into the intricately constructed, deeply captivating realm he first introduced three decades past, with the release of His Dark Materials. It's a realm whose landscape corresponds to that of this world, but whose history diverges and shifts with ours; where the individuals look and think and act like us, but are joined by daemons, essences in creature form; where the heavens are populated with witches and gryphons, but underneath, transports are ridden and beverages is drunk, and middle-aged professors carry fancy shopping bags. Lyra, whom we first encountered as a 12-year-old in the His Dark Materials trilogy, and then saw again as a infant in the first volume, the introductory book with which the author began this trilogy, is now a mature individual: still recognisably the sharp and determined heroine of the prior volumes, but older, melancholic, more careful, less sure. This restraint is heightened by her separation from her daemon, Pan – but it was also, ironically, the catalyst which caused him to abandon her in the first place.
Converging Storylines
His choice to go off in pursuit of that childlike part of her which she appears to have shed (an trait which he epitomises as her "creativity"), and her quest to rejoin with him, were the catalysts of the prior book, which chronicled Lyra undertake a picaresque voyage across the continent and into the Caucasus, meeting with marvel and risk on the way. But from the start, underlying forces were in motion, and malevolent elements at work. The church authority – the religious controlling power, and the author's masterfully eerie embodiment of austere, procedural malice – is under new leadership, and showing its strength. Lyra's uncle – the heroine's family member, who faults her for his sibling's death – has worked himself into the office of leader of the Magisterium's ruling assembly, and is intent on using his fresh authority to expand the church's rule. Another protagonist, who carried young the heroine to refuge along a flooded Thames as an child in the prequel, is now an academic with a additional duty in spycraft: he is sent to Geneva to learn more about the antagonist's aims. And underlying all of this is the enigma surrounding the scarce and costly rose oil which appears mysteriously to be the source of a social and financial disturbance emanating out from Central Asia. The extract is seen by various factions as a commercial commodity, by alternate groups as a empirical or esoteric phenomenon, and by others still – the zealous "men from the mountains" – as a source of evil; an insult that must be obliterated. The dilemma of its origins, its significance, and whether it should be eliminated or safeguarded is coming rapidly to the fore.
Similar to the original trilogy, the heroine's decisions, and her future, are demonstrated to be inextricably entwined with the destiny of the world
In its predecessor, these storylines ran mostly in parallel. In the conclusion, they merge. As in the first trilogy, Lyra's choices and her fate are shown to be deeply linked with the future of the universe. Her private quest to reconnect with her daemon and rediscover her creativity becomes the key conflict in a wider battle with an oppressive system which, as such authorities often attempt, is seeking to stifle independence of thought, creativity and expression: all the internal, rebellious ways in which humans can be liberated.
Cosmic Openings and Ideological Conflicts
The story opens with the unveiling of a series of unusual fissures in the structure of the planet's atmosphere: windows that seem to give on to different dimensions. A particular window manifests to be the point of the highly contested rose oil. The Magisterium, with Delamare at its leadership, classifies these portals as a problem to the religion's doctrine and sets out to eradicate them. As the heroine begins to move from rigid rationalism and back to feeling, however, her conviction that these sites must be defended – that their meaning and what they offer is somehow crucial – increases. "Cosmic particles, or rose oil, or the imagination, or the Rose Field, or no matter what we call it," she says, "we require it." The scene for a poetic conflict between naivety and knowledge is set.
Story Tempo and Protagonist Growth
At 640 pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
