Tings are unraveling in the last installment of Pullman's latest trilogy, the next of the author's magisterial trilogies set in a realm that appears, here more than ever, as a energized and tilted version of our own. Organizations are weakening, or restructuring themselves along novel and troubling lines. An hidden force "is wrecking the air and the seasons"; concurrently, "wealth is decaying, and no one knows why". Power is draining from states, and gathering in the offices of religious leaders, the treasuries of corporations, the grasp of crowds. "An element is at work, stealthily, very subtly", says businessman a trader character, keeping a watchful eye on the Silk Roads from his seat in an city cafe. "Elements we thought were secure and solid are weakening and giving way."
Core Enigma and The Protagonist's Path
Precisely what that something might be, and ways to oppose it, is the inquiry that propels the concluding book, which picks up where its predecessor ended. This is, according to many, Pullman's concluding foray into the intricately constructed, deeply captivating world he first introduced in the distant past, with the launch of the first trilogy. It's a domain whose geography aligns with that of our world, but whose history diverges and shifts with ours; where the people appear and think and behave like us, but are joined by animal souls, beings in animal form; where the air are populated with enchantresses and gryphons, but beneath those skies, buses are caught and drinks is consumed, and middle-aged academics carry luxury shopping bags. Our heroine, whom we first introduced to as a 12-year-old in the His Dark Materials trilogy, and then saw again as a toddler in the first volume, the introductory book with which the author began this trilogy, is now a mature individual: still recognisably the spiky and determined protagonist of the previous installments, but older, more sorrowful, more cautious, more doubtful. This restraint is heightened by her split from her daemon, her daemon – but it was also, ironically, the trigger which made him desert her in the first place.
Interwoven Plots
His choice to leave in search of that innocent part of the heroine which she appears to have shed (an aspect which he symbolizes as her "vision"), and her journey to reunite with him, were the incitements of the prior book, which chronicled the protagonist undertake a wandering trek across the continent and into the mountain region, meeting with marvel and risk on the way. But from the start, deeper currents were in play, and malevolent elements at work. The Magisterium – the church's governing authority, and the author's deliciously chilling representation of austere, procedural wickedness – is under recent guidance, and flexing its muscles. The antagonist – our protagonist's uncle, who blames her for his sibling's death – has manoeuvred himself into the office of president of the Magisterium's governing body, and is determined on using his newfound authority to broaden the church's dominium. Malcolm Polstead, who saved infant the heroine to refuge along a flooded Thames as an 11-year-old in the prequel, is now an academic with a secondary role in intelligence work: he is dispatched to the city to learn more about his intentions. And beneath all of this is the enigma surrounding the scarce and costly rose oil which seems in some way to be the cause of a social and financial crisis spreading out from the region. The extract is regarded by some as a marketable product, by different parties as a scientific or mystical phenomenon, and by further factions – the zealous "mountain dwellers" – as a origin of malevolence; an insult that must be eradicated. The issue of its source, its significance, and if it should be removed or preserved is coming rapidly to the fore.
As in the original trilogy, the heroine's decisions, and her fate, are demonstrated to be inextricably linked with the destiny of the world
In its predecessor, these plots ran mostly in parallel. In the conclusion, they come together. Like the first trilogy, her actions and her fate are shown to be deeply linked with the fate of the world. Her personal quest to reunite with her companion and recover her imagination becomes the central battleground in a larger conflict with an controlling government which, as these systems often attempt, is attempting to stifle freedom of thinking, innovation and expression: all the inner, rebellious ways in which individuals can be liberated.
Cosmic Openings and Philosophical Struggles
The book opens with the discovery of a series of unusual fissures in the makeup of the Earth's air: gateways that seem to lead to other worlds. One such window manifests to be the source of the much debated rose oil. The authority, with Delamare at its helm, classifies these openings as a challenge to the religion's doctrine and sets out to destroy them. As our protagonist begins to turn away from strict rationalism and back to feeling, however, her certainty that these locations must be preserved – that their significance and what they offer is somehow vital – increases. "The substance, or the substance, or the creativity, or the Rose Field, or whatever we label it," she says, "we require it." The stage for a Blakean conflict between naivety and maturity is established.
Narrative Pacing and Protagonist Growth
At 640 pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
