Tings are collapsing in the last installment of Pullman's latest trilogy, the next of the author's magisterial trilogies set in a realm that manifests, now more than ever, as a charged and slanted version of our own. Organizations are crumbling, or restructuring themselves along unfamiliar and disquieting lines. An unseen force "is ruining the air and the seasons"; concurrently, "currency is failing, and no one knows why". Power is shifting from states, and gathering in the chambers of theocrats, the treasuries of business empires, the hands of rioters. "An element is at work, silently, imperceptibly", says trader Mustafa Bey, keeping a vigilant eye on the trade routes from his place in an Aleppo cafe. "Things we thought were secure and durable are weakening and failing."
The Central Mystery and Her Quest
Precisely what that something might be, and ways to oppose it, is the mystery that drives this final volume, which continues where The Secret Commonwealth concluded. This is, reportedly, Pullman's last excursion into the carefully crafted, infinitely beguiling world he first revealed 30 years ago, with the release of the first trilogy. It's a realm whose landscape aligns with that of this world, but whose history diverges and shifts with ours; where the people look and think and behave like us, but are accompanied by animal souls, essences in creature form; where the air are filled with witches and gryphons, but beneath those skies, transports are taken and drinks is drunk, and middle-aged professors carry Harrods shopping bags. Our heroine, whom we first introduced to as a 12-year-old in the His Dark Materials trilogy, and then met once more as a infant in La Belle Sauvage, the origin story with which the author began this trilogy, is now a mature individual: still recognisably the prickly and determined heroine of the earlier books, but more mature, sadder, more cautious, less certain. This limitation is heightened by her separation from her daemon, her daemon – but it was also, unexpectedly, the cause which made him desert her in the first place.
Merging Narratives
His choice to leave in search of that youthful part of her which she may have forgotten (an aspect which he represents as her "creativity"), and her journey to reunite with him, were the driving forces of The Secret Commonwealth, which saw the protagonist undertake a adventurous voyage across the continent and into the mountain region, meeting with amazement and danger on the way. But from the outset, underlying forces were in motion, and sinister powers at work. The Magisterium – the church's ruling body, and the author's deliciously chilling representation of strict, procedural malice – is under fresh command, and flexing its muscles. The antagonist – our protagonist's uncle, who blames her for his sister's death – has manoeuvred himself into the role of leader of the church's governing body, and is intent on using his fresh authority to expand the religion's rule. Another protagonist, who carried infant Lyra to refuge along a swollen Thames as an 11-year-old in the first book, is now an Oxford don with a additional duty in espionage: he is sent to Geneva to discover more about Delamare's plans. And underlying all of this is the enigma surrounding the uncommon and precious botanical extract which appears in some way to be the origin of a societal and financial crisis spreading out from Central Asia. The substance is viewed by certain groups as a marketable good, by different parties as a scientific or mystical phenomenon, and by others still – the zealous "mountain dwellers" – as a origin of evil; an challenge that must be eradicated. The issue of its origins, its significance, and if it should be destroyed or safeguarded is becoming urgent.
As in the original trilogy, Lyra's decisions, and her future, are revealed to be inseparably connected with the fate of the universe
In its predecessor, these plots ran largely in tandem. In the conclusion, they converge. As in the original series, the protagonist's movements and her path are revealed to be inextricably linked with the future of the realm. Her personal quest to reunite with her companion and regain her imagination becomes the primary battleground in a wider conflict with an controlling government which, as such regimes always have, is attempting to stifle freedom of thinking, creativity and art: all the internal, rebellious ways in which individuals can be liberated.
Dimensional Rifts and Ideological Conflicts
The novel starts with the unveiling of a collection of curious cracks in the fabric of the Earth's atmosphere: portals that seem to lead to alternate realities. One such opening appears to be the point of the much debated rose oil. The Magisterium, with its leader at its leadership, classifies these windows as a problem to the institution's doctrine and aims to eradicate them. As Lyra begins to move from inflexible logic and revert to feeling, nevertheless, her certainty that these locations must be preserved – that their meaning and what they provide is mysteriously essential – increases. "The substance, or the substance, or the creativity, or the Rose Field, or no matter what we label it," she says, "we need it." The stage for a Blakean tussle between naivety and experience is set.
Plot Rhythm and Personal Evolution
At a substantial length, The Rose Field|this volume|the
