Rose Field Chronicles: Philip Pullman's Nail-Biting Conclusion to the His Dark Materials Saga

Tings are collapsing in the last installment of Pullman's latest trilogy, the next of the author's magisterial trilogies set in a world that manifests, now more than ever, as a intense and tilted version of our own. Institutions are failing, or restructuring themselves along new and disturbing lines. An hidden force "is wrecking the air and the seasons"; simultaneously, "wealth is decaying, and no one knows why". Control is shifting from governments, and pooling in the offices of theocrats, the vaults of corporations, the grasp of crowds. "Something is at work, silently, very subtly", says merchant a merchant figure, keeping a observant eye on the ancient paths from his place in an Aleppo cafe. "Things we thought were stable and strong are deteriorating and failing."

Core Enigma and Lyra's Journey

Just what that element might be, and how to counteract it, is the question that propels the concluding book, which resumes where the previous book left off. This is, according to many, Pullman's concluding venture into the elaborately built, endlessly enchanting realm he first unveiled 30 years ago, with the launch of His Dark Materials. It's a realm whose geography corresponds to that of this world, but whose past veers and changes with ours; where the individuals appear and think and behave like us, but are paired by external spirits, essences in creature form; where the air are populated with enchantresses and legendary creatures, but underneath, vehicles are caught and tea is sipped, and older scholars carry fancy shopping bags. The protagonist, whom we first encountered as a child in the first trilogy, and then met once more as a infant in La Belle Sauvage, the prequel with which the author began this trilogy, is now a adult: still clearly the spiky and determined protagonist of the earlier books, but more mature, melancholic, more cautious, less sure. This circumscription is intensified by her division from her soul companion, Pantalaimon – but it was also, unexpectedly, the cause which caused him to abandon her in the first place.

Interwoven Plots

The daemon's resolve to go off in pursuit of that innocent part of Lyra which she may have forgotten (an aspect which he epitomises as her "creativity"), and her quest to reunite with him, were the catalysts of its predecessor, which saw the protagonist undertake a picaresque trek across the continent and into the mountain region, meeting with marvel and risk on the way. But from the beginning, profound shifts were in motion, and sinister powers at work. The Magisterium – the church's controlling power, and Pullman's brilliantly sinister incarnation of austere, administrative wickedness – is under recent guidance, and asserting its power. Marcel Delamare – our protagonist's family member, who faults her for his sibling's death – has manoeuvred himself into the role of leader of the Magisterium's governing body, and is intent on using his newfound authority to extend the religion's rule. Another protagonist, who rescued baby Lyra to security along a flooded river as an 11-year-old in La Belle Sauvage, is now an university scholar with a additional duty in spycraft: he is dispatched to a key location to learn more about his plans. And underlying all of this is the puzzle surrounding the rare and costly botanical extract which manifests somehow to be the cause of a social and economic upheaval emanating out from that area. The extract is viewed by some as a commercial product, by alternate groups as a empirical or esoteric phenomenon, and by others still – the zealous "highland figures" – as a wellspring of darkness; an challenge that must be eradicated. The question of its origins, its meaning, and if it should be destroyed or protected is coming rapidly to the fore.

Like the first series, the heroine's decisions, and her future, are revealed to be inseparably linked with the fate of the realm

In its predecessor, these plots ran broadly in parallel. In the conclusion, they come together. Similar to the original series, her movements and her path are revealed to be deeply woven with the fate of the realm. Her private journey to reconnect with her daemon and recover her creativity becomes the primary struggle in a larger conflict with an controlling government which, as such authorities typically do, is seeking to quell freedom of reason, originality and expression: all the inner, resistant ways in which people can be independent.

Cosmic Openings and Ideological Conflicts

The story opens with the unveiling of a set of curious cracks in the structure of the Earth's atmosphere: portals that appear to give on to different dimensions. One such opening appears to be the origin of the highly contested rose oil. The authority, with its leader at its head, designates these portals as a problem to the religion's beliefs and endeavors to eliminate them. As our protagonist begins to turn away from rigid logic and return to intuition, yet, her certainty that these locations must be defended – that their significance and their value is mysteriously vital – increases. "The substance, or the extract, or the creativity, or the botanical realm, or whatever we label it," she says, "it is necessary." The stage for a Blakean struggle between naivety and maturity is set.

Narrative Pacing and Protagonist Growth

At 640 pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the