Things are falling apart in the concluding book of The Book of Dust, the second of Philip Pullman's magisterial trilogies set in a world that manifests, now more than ever, as a intense and skewed version of our own. Establishments are crumbling, or reorganizing themselves along novel and disquieting lines. An unseen force "is wrecking the air and the seasons"; simultaneously, "wealth is decaying, and no one knows why". Control is shifting from states, and accumulating in the halls of theocrats, the vaults of corporations, the control of rioters. "Some force is at work, very quietly, very subtly", says merchant a trader character, keeping a watchful eye on the trade routes from his post in an city cafe. "Aspects we thought were stable and durable are deteriorating and failing."
Key Puzzle and The Protagonist's Path
Just what that element might be, and ways to oppose it, is the inquiry that propels the concluding book, which continues where The Secret Commonwealth left off. This is, reportedly, the author's concluding venture into the intricately constructed, deeply captivating realm he first unveiled in the distant past, with the launch of His Dark Materials. It's a realm whose geography corresponds to that of this world, but whose history veers and changes with ours; where the people appear and reason and act like us, but are joined by animal souls, beings in animal form; where the heavens are filled with sorceresses and mythical beasts, but beneath those skies, vehicles are ridden and drinks is sipped, and middle-aged scholars carry Harrods shopping bags. Our heroine, whom we first encountered as a young girl in the original trilogy, and then saw again as a infant in the first volume, the prequel with which Pullman began The Book of Dust, is now a young woman: still recognisably the spiky and persistent main character of the previous installments, but more mature, sadder, more cautious, less certain. This limitation is intensified by her split from her daemon, Pan – but it was also, ironically, the catalyst which caused him to abandon her in the first place.
Merging Narratives
Pan's decision to depart in quest of that childlike part of Lyra which she seems to have lost (an quality which he symbolizes as her "creativity"), and her journey to rejoin with him, were the catalysts of the prior book, which chronicled the protagonist undertake a wandering trek across Europe and into the Caucasus, facing with marvel and danger on the way. But from the start, profound shifts were in action, and sinister powers at work. The religious council – the religious controlling power, and Pullman's brilliantly sinister incarnation of strict, administrative wickedness – is under recent guidance, and asserting its power. Lyra's uncle – the heroine's uncle, who holds responsible her for his sister's death – has manoeuvred himself into the role of head of the authority's High Council, and is intent on using his recently acquired authority to expand the church's control. Another protagonist, who saved young the heroine to refuge along a swollen Thames as an 11-year-old in the first book, is now an Oxford don with a secondary role in espionage: he is sent to a key location to discover more about his aims. And beneath all of this is the mystery surrounding the scarce and precious rose oil which seems mysteriously to be the source of a social and financial upheaval rippling out from the region. The substance is viewed by various factions as a commercial good, by alternate groups as a scientific or esoteric phenomenon, and by others still – the fanatical "men from the mountains" – as a source of darkness; an insult that must be destroyed. The issue of where it comes from, what it stands for, and if it should be destroyed or preserved is coming rapidly to the fore.
Similar to His Dark Materials, Lyra's actions, and her future, are shown to be inseparably entwined with the future of the world
In the previous volume, these narratives ran broadly in tandem. In the conclusion, they converge. As in the original series, her actions and her destiny are shown to be inextricably woven with the destiny of the realm. Her personal journey to rejoin with her daemon and rediscover her creativity becomes the primary struggle in a broader war with an authoritarian system which, as these systems always have, is seeking to suppress freedom of reason, originality and culture: all the personal, resistant ways in which individuals can be independent.
Dimensional Rifts and Philosophical Struggles
The story starts with the finding of a set of unusual fissures in the makeup of the Earth's air: windows that seem to give on to other worlds. A particular portal appears to be the origin of the fiercely disputed mystical extract. The Magisterium, with its leader at its leadership, labels these portals as a challenge to the religion's orthodoxy and sets out to destroy them. As Lyra begins to turn away from rigid logic and return to instinct, yet, her conviction that these places must be protected – that what they stand for and what they offer is mysteriously essential – increases. "Dust, or the substance, or the creativity, or the botanical realm, or no matter what we label it," she says, "we require it." The setting for a Blakean conflict between innocence and maturity is prepared.
Narrative Pacing and Protagonist Growth
At 640 pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
