Tings are falling apart in the concluding book of Pullman's latest trilogy, the second of the author's magisterial trilogies set in a universe that appears, here more than ever, as a intense and skewed version of our own. Institutions are failing, or restructuring themselves along unfamiliar and troubling lines. An unseen force "is destroying the air and the seasons"; at the same time, "wealth is decaying, and no one knows why". Control is draining from authorities, and accumulating in the offices of religious leaders, the treasuries of conglomerates, the grasp of crowds. "An element is at work, stealthily, gradually", says businessman Mustafa Bey, keeping a observant eye on the ancient paths from his seat in an city cafe. "Aspects we thought were secure and strong are faltering and failing."
Key Puzzle and Lyra's Journey
Just what that force might be, and how to counteract it, is the question that drives this final volume, which continues where The Secret Commonwealth ended. This is, by all accounts, Pullman's concluding venture into the carefully crafted, infinitely beguiling universe he first introduced 30 years ago, with the publication of Northern Lights. It's a realm whose terrain aligns with that of the real world, but whose history diverges and shifts with ours; where the individuals appear and think and act like us, but are paired by daemons, beings in beast form; where the skies are teeming with sorceresses and gryphons, but below, vehicles are taken and drinks is consumed, and older professors carry luxury shopping bags. Our heroine, whom we first encountered as a 12-year-old in the original trilogy, and then met once more as a baby in the first volume, the introductory book with which Pullman began this trilogy, is now a mature individual: still recognisably the spiky and tenacious heroine of the prior volumes, but more mature, more sorrowful, more careful, less certain. This restraint is heightened by her split from her soul companion, her daemon – but it was also, paradoxically, the catalyst which made him desert her in the first place.
Merging Narratives
His choice to go off in search of that youthful part of the heroine which she may have forgotten (an aspect which he symbolizes as her "creativity"), and her journey to rejoin with him, were the driving forces of the prior book, which saw Lyra undertake a picaresque voyage across the continent and into the mountain region, encountering with wonder and risk on the way. But from the start, underlying forces were in play, and darker forces at work. The Magisterium – the church's governing authority, and Pullman's masterfully eerie incarnation of rigid, bureaucratic malice – is under recent guidance, and asserting its power. Lyra's uncle – Lyra's family member, who holds responsible her for his family member's death – has worked himself into the office of president of the Magisterium's High Council, and is set on using his recently acquired power to expand the institution's control. Another protagonist, who rescued baby Lyra to security along a swollen Thames as an 11-year-old in the first book, is now an university scholar with a secondary role in espionage: he is sent to the city to learn more about his aims. And behind all of this is the mystery surrounding the rare and costly rose oil which seems mysteriously to be the origin of a societal and economic disturbance emanating out from the region. The oil is regarded by certain groups as a commercial product, by alternate groups as a scientific or mystical wonder, and by yet others – the extremist "men from the mountains" – as a origin of evil; an insult that must be eradicated. The dilemma of its origins, its meaning, and if it should be removed or preserved is coming rapidly to the fore.
Like the original trilogy, Lyra's actions, and her fate, are revealed to be inseparably connected with the fate of the universe
In its predecessor, these narratives ran largely in side by side. In this final book, they merge. Similar to His Dark Materials, Lyra's actions and her fate are revealed to be inextricably linked with the fate of the world. Her personal journey to rejoin with her soul and regain her imagination becomes the primary conflict in a wider battle with an oppressive government which, as such regimes typically do, is striving to quell freedom of thinking, creativity and expression: all the inner, rebellious ways in which humans can be independent.
Dimensional Rifts and Moral Battles
The novel starts with the discovery of a collection of curious fissures in the makeup of the planet's air: windows that seem to open into alternate realities. An example of a opening seems to be the point of the fiercely disputed botanical substance. The Magisterium, with Delamare at its head, labels these portals as a challenge to the institution's orthodoxy and aims to destroy them. As Lyra begins to shift from rigid reason and revert to instinct, nevertheless, her belief that these places must be defended – that their meaning and their value is in some way essential – grows. "The substance, or the substance, or the creativity, or the botanical realm, or whatever we call it," she says, "we need it." The stage for a philosophical struggle between naivety and experience is set.
Plot Rhythm and Character Development
At a substantial length, The Rose Field|this volume|the
