Tings are collapsing in the last installment of The Book of Dust, the second of Philip Pullman's grand trilogies set in a realm that appears, in this volume especially, as a intense and skewed version of our own. Institutions are weakening, or restructuring themselves along new and disturbing lines. An unseen force "is ruining the air and the seasons"; concurrently, "wealth is decaying, and no one knows why". Control is flowing away from authorities, and pooling in the halls of theocrats, the vaults of conglomerates, the control of mobs. "Some force is at work, stealthily, gradually", says merchant a trader character, keeping a watchful eye on the ancient paths from his seat in an Aleppo cafe. "Elements we thought were secure and durable are deteriorating and failing."
The Central Mystery and Lyra's Journey
Exactly what that force might be, and ways to oppose it, is the question that animates the concluding book, which resumes where its predecessor concluded. This is, reportedly, Pullman's last foray into the elaborately built, infinitely beguiling universe he first unveiled three decades past, with the publication of the first trilogy. It's a world whose geography aligns with that of our world, but whose history diverges and shifts with ours; where the individuals appear and think and behave like us, but are accompanied by daemons, beings in creature form; where the air are populated with witches and mythical beasts, but underneath, transports are caught and tea is drunk, and middle-aged professors carry fancy shopping bags. The protagonist, whom we first met as a child in the original trilogy, and then met once more as a infant in La Belle Sauvage, the introductory book with which Pullman began The Book of Dust, is now a mature individual: still distinctly the spiky and tenacious heroine of the prior volumes, but aged, sadder, warier, less certain. This limitation is intensified by her division from her daemon, her daemon – but it was also, ironically, the trigger which caused him to abandon her in the first place.
Merging Narratives
The daemon's resolve to leave in pursuit of that innocent part of Lyra which she seems to have lost (an quality which he represents as her "vision"), and her journey to reconnect with him, were the incitements of its predecessor, which chronicled the protagonist undertake a wandering journey across the continent and into the Caucasus, encountering with amazement and danger on the way. But from the outset, profound shifts were in motion, and sinister powers at work. The religious council – the faith's ruling body, and the author's deliciously chilling incarnation of rigid, administrative wickedness – is under fresh command, and asserting its power. Lyra's uncle – the heroine's family member, who blames her for his family member's death – has positioned himself into the role of head of the church's governing body, and is intent on using his recently acquired power to broaden the religion's rule. A key character, who carried infant Lyra to security along a flooded Thames as an 11-year-old in the prequel, is now an Oxford don with a secondary role in intelligence work: he is dispatched to the city to learn more about the antagonist's aims. And beneath all of this is the enigma surrounding the scarce and precious essential oil which appears mysteriously to be the origin of a societal and economic upheaval emanating out from that area. The substance is seen by various factions as a tradeable product, by alternate groups as a scientific or spiritual miracle, and by others still – the zealous "highland figures" – as a wellspring of evil; an affront that must be destroyed. The dilemma of its source, its meaning, and whether it should be removed or preserved is escalating in importance.
As in the original trilogy, our protagonist's decisions, and her destiny, are demonstrated to be deeply entwined with the destiny of the world
In its predecessor, these plots ran largely in side by side. In the conclusion, they come together. Similar to the first trilogy, the protagonist's choices and her path are unveiled to be inextricably woven with the fate of the world. Her personal quest to reunite with her companion and recover her creativity becomes the key conflict in a wider battle with an authoritarian government which, as such authorities always have, is attempting to quell autonomy of thinking, innovation and art: all the inner, defiant ways in which humans can be liberated.
Cosmic Openings and Philosophical Struggles
The story begins with the finding of a set of curious cracks in the structure of the Earth's air: portals that seem to lead to different dimensions. One such opening appears to be the point of the highly contested mystical extract. The Magisterium, with Delamare at its helm, labels these windows as a problem to the religion's doctrine and sets out to eliminate them. As our protagonist begins to move from rigid reason and back to intuition, nevertheless, her belief that these locations must be preserved – that what they stand for and what they offer is somehow crucial – grows. "The substance, or rose oil, or the creativity, or the Rose Field, or whatever we name it," she says, "we require it." The stage for a philosophical tussle between innocence and knowledge is prepared.
Story Tempo and Personal Evolution
At 640 pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
