Things are falling apart in the final volume of The Book of Dust, the next of Philip Pullman's masterful trilogies set in a world that manifests, here more than ever, as a energized and skewed version of our own. Organizations are weakening, or reassembling themselves along novel and disquieting lines. An invisible force "is destroying the air and the seasons"; simultaneously, "wealth is decaying, and no one knows why". Authority is draining from authorities, and accumulating in the chambers of theocrats, the vaults of business empires, the control of mobs. "Some force is at work, silently, imperceptibly", says trader Mustafa Bey, keeping a vigilant eye on the ancient paths from his seat in an city cafe. "Aspects we thought were secure and strong are deteriorating and failing."
Key Puzzle and The Protagonist's Path
Just what that force might be, and methods to fight it, is the mystery that drives the concluding book, which resumes where The Secret Commonwealth ended. This is, reportedly, the author's last foray into the elaborately built, deeply captivating world he first unveiled 30 years ago, with the publication of Northern Lights. It's a domain whose geography maps on to that of our world, but whose chronicles tacks and jibes with ours; where the individuals appear and reason and act like us, but are paired by external spirits, souls in animal form; where the air are populated with witches and legendary creatures, but underneath, transports are caught and beverages is drunk, and middle-aged academics carry luxury shopping bags. Our heroine, whom we first encountered as a child in the His Dark Materials trilogy, and then met once more as a infant in the prequel, the prequel with which Pullman began this trilogy, is now a young woman: still clearly the sharp and determined main character of the earlier books, but more mature, more sorrowful, more cautious, more doubtful. This limitation is heightened by her separation from her animal guide, Pantalaimon – but it was also, unexpectedly, the catalyst which led him to leave her in the first place.
Merging Narratives
His choice to go off in quest of that childlike part of Lyra which she seems to have lost (an aspect which he symbolizes as her "imagination"), and her journey to reconnect with him, were the driving forces of its predecessor, which chronicled the protagonist undertake a adventurous voyage across the continent and into the mountain region, meeting with wonder and danger on the way. But from the beginning, profound shifts were in action, and darker forces at work. The Magisterium – the faith's ruling body, and the author's masterfully eerie embodiment of rigid, administrative evil – is under new leadership, and flexing its muscles. The antagonist – the heroine's family member, who blames her for his family member's death – has manoeuvred himself into the role of president of the church's governing body, and is determined on using his recently acquired influence to expand the religion's rule. Malcolm Polstead, who saved young the heroine to safety along a overflowing river as an 11-year-old in the prequel, is now an academic with a secondary role in espionage: he is dispatched to the city to learn more about Delamare's intentions. And behind all of this is the enigma surrounding the rare and precious botanical extract which seems somehow to be the cause of a social and economic crisis rippling out from that area. The oil is viewed by various factions as a tradeable good, by others as a research-based or mystical phenomenon, and by others still – the extremist "highland figures" – as a wellspring of malevolence; an insult that must be obliterated. The question of its source, its significance, and if it should be eliminated or safeguarded is becoming urgent.
As in the original trilogy, our protagonist's actions, and her fate, are revealed to be inextricably connected with the fate of the realm
In its predecessor, these plots ran broadly in parallel. In the conclusion, they merge. Like the original series, her choices and her fate are unveiled to be inseparably woven with the destiny of the realm. Her personal quest to reconnect with her soul and rediscover her creativity becomes the primary battleground in a larger battle with an authoritarian regime which, as these systems often attempt, is attempting to stifle independence of reason, innovation and art: all the inner, resistant ways in which people can be independent.
Dimensional Rifts and Ideological Conflicts
The novel begins with the discovery of a set of strange cracks in the makeup of the planet's sky: gateways that look to lead to alternate realities. An example of a portal seems to be the origin of the fiercely disputed rose oil. The Magisterium, with Delamare at its head, labels these windows as a problem to the church's beliefs and endeavors to destroy them. As Lyra begins to shift from rigid reason and revert to intuition, yet, her belief that these sites must be defended – that their significance and their value is in some way crucial – strengthens. "The substance, or the substance, or the creativity, or the field of roses, or whatever we call it," she says, "we need it." The stage for a poetic struggle between naivety and experience is prepared.
Plot Rhythm and Personal Evolution
At over six hundred pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
