Tings are unraveling in the concluding book of The Dust Trilogy, the second of Philip Pullman's magisterial trilogies set in a realm that manifests, here more than ever, as a charged and slanted version of our own. Institutions are crumbling, or reorganizing themselves along novel and troubling lines. An unseen force "is ruining the air and the seasons"; simultaneously, "money's going bad, and no one knows why". Power is shifting from states, and pooling in the offices of theocrats, the coffers of business empires, the hands of rioters. "Some force is at work, stealthily, imperceptibly", says merchant a trader character, keeping a watchful eye on the ancient paths from his post in an Aleppo cafe. "Things we thought were secure and solid are weakening and failing."
The Central Mystery and Her Quest
Just what that something might be, and how to counteract it, is the question that drives the concluding book, which continues where The Secret Commonwealth ended. This is, by all accounts, Pullman's concluding foray into the carefully crafted, endlessly enchanting world he first introduced in the distant past, with the publication of His Dark Materials. It's a domain whose landscape corresponds to that of this world, but whose past veers and changes with ours; where the humans appear and reason and behave like us, but are joined by external spirits, beings in beast form; where the skies are filled with witches and mythical beasts, but beneath those skies, buses are caught and tea is drunk, and middle-aged professors carry fancy shopping bags. The protagonist, whom we first encountered as a young girl in the original trilogy, and then met once more as a toddler in the first volume, the introductory book with which the author began the series, is now a adult: still clearly the prickly and determined protagonist of the earlier books, but more mature, melancholic, warier, less certain. This circumscription is intensified by her division from her animal guide, Pan – but it was also, ironically, the cause which led him to leave her in the first place.
Merging Narratives
His choice to go off in quest of that innocent part of Lyra which she may have forgotten (an trait which he represents as her "creativity"), and her mission to reconnect with him, were the catalysts of its predecessor, which followed the protagonist undertake a picaresque trek across the continent and into the Caucasus, meeting with wonder and risk on the way. But from the start, underlying forces were in play, and sinister powers at work. The Magisterium – the religious ruling body, and Pullman's deliciously chilling representation of rigid, bureaucratic evil – is under new leadership, and asserting its power. The antagonist – Lyra's relative, who faults her for his family member's death – has manoeuvred himself into the role of leader of the Magisterium's governing body, and is determined on using his newfound authority to expand the religion's dominium. A key character, who carried infant Lyra to safety along a swollen river as an young boy in the first book, is now an Oxford don with a sideline in intelligence work: he is assigned to Geneva to learn more about Delamare's plans. And beneath all of this is the puzzle surrounding the rare and valuable essential oil which manifests in some way to be the cause of a societal and financial disturbance rippling out from the region. The oil is viewed by some as a marketable commodity, by others as a empirical or mystical phenomenon, and by others still – the zealous "highland figures" – as a wellspring of malevolence; an affront that must be destroyed. The dilemma of where it comes from, its significance, and if it should be eliminated or protected is becoming urgent.
As in the first series, our protagonist's deeds, and her destiny, are shown to be deeply linked with the destiny of the world
In the previous volume, these plots ran mostly in tandem. In the conclusion, they come together. Similar to the original series, her choices and her path are shown to be inextricably entwined with the fate of the realm. Her private quest to reconnect with her companion and regain her imagination becomes the key struggle in a wider war with an controlling government which, as such regimes always have, is attempting to stifle independence of thinking, creativity and expression: all the personal, rebellious ways in which humans can be liberated.
Cosmic Openings and Moral Battles
The book begins with the discovery of a set of strange fissures in the fabric of the Earth's air: portals that seem to lead to other worlds. One such window appears to be the source of the highly contested rose oil. The authority, with its leader at its leadership, classifies these portals as a problem to the institution's doctrine and aims to destroy them. As the heroine begins to shift from rigid reason and return to intuition, nevertheless, her certainty that these sites must be preserved – that their significance and their value is somehow essential – grows. "Cosmic particles, or the substance, or the vision, or the field of roses, or whatever we label it," she says, "we need it." The setting for a philosophical tussle between innocence and experience is prepared.
Narrative Pacing and Personal Evolution
At over six hundred pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
