Tings are collapsing in the concluding book of The Dust Trilogy, the second of Philip Pullman's grand trilogies set in a universe that manifests, in this volume especially, as a energized and tilted version of our own. Organizations are failing, or reassembling themselves along novel and disquieting lines. An unseen force "is wrecking the air and the seasons"; simultaneously, "currency is failing, and no one knows why". Power is flowing away from governments, and accumulating in the chambers of religious leaders, the vaults of conglomerates, the hands of mobs. "Something is at work, very quietly, gradually", says trader Mustafa Bey, keeping a vigilant eye on the ancient paths from his place in an Aleppo cafe. "Things we thought were secure and strong are faltering and collapsing."
Core Enigma and The Protagonist's Path
Just what that force might be, and ways to oppose it, is the mystery that propels this final volume, which continues where the previous book ended. This is, according to many, the author's final venture into the carefully crafted, endlessly enchanting realm he first unveiled three decades past, with the publication of the first trilogy. It's a world whose geography corresponds to that of this world, but whose past diverges and shifts with ours; where the individuals appear and think and behave like us, but are accompanied by daemons, essences in animal form; where the skies are teeming with sorceresses and gryphons, but beneath those skies, transports are caught and tea is sipped, and older scholars carry Harrods shopping bags. The protagonist, whom we first encountered as a 12-year-old in the His Dark Materials trilogy, and then met once more as a baby in La Belle Sauvage, the origin story with which Pullman began this trilogy, is now a mature individual: still clearly the spiky and tenacious main character of the prior volumes, but aged, sadder, warier, more doubtful. This restraint is intensified by her separation from her daemon, Pantalaimon – but it was also, paradoxically, the catalyst which made him desert her in the first place.
Merging Narratives
The daemon's resolve to go off in pursuit of that childlike part of her which she seems to have lost (an aspect which he represents as her "creativity"), and her quest to rejoin with him, were the incitements of its predecessor, which saw Lyra undertake a adventurous voyage across Europe and into the mountain region, meeting with wonder and danger on the way. But from the outset, underlying forces were in motion, and malevolent elements at work. The Magisterium – the church's controlling power, and Pullman's deliciously chilling incarnation of strict, administrative evil – is under fresh command, and asserting its power. Lyra's uncle – our protagonist's family member, who blames her for his family member's death – has manoeuvred himself into the office of leader of the church's High Council, and is intent on using his newfound influence to broaden the church's rule. Another protagonist, who carried baby Lyra to security along a flooded Thames as an young boy in the prequel, is now an Oxford don with a secondary role in intelligence work: he is assigned to a key location to discover more about Delamare's intentions. And underlying all of this is the enigma surrounding the uncommon and costly essential oil which appears somehow to be the cause of a societal and financial crisis spreading out from Central Asia. The extract is seen by certain groups as a commercial good, by others as a empirical or esoteric miracle, and by others still – the extremist "men from the mountains" – as a origin of malevolence; an insult that must be obliterated. The question of its source, its significance, and whether it should be removed or protected is becoming urgent.
Like the original trilogy, Lyra's decisions, and her future, are revealed to be inextricably linked with the fate of the realm
In its predecessor, these storylines ran broadly in side by side. In the conclusion, they converge. As in the original series, Lyra's actions and her path are revealed to be inseparably woven with the destiny of the world. Her private mission to rejoin with her daemon and rediscover her vision becomes the primary struggle in a larger battle with an oppressive regime which, as such regimes typically do, is attempting to suppress independence of reason, originality and culture: all the inner, resistant ways in which individuals can be independent.
Dimensional Rifts and Ideological Conflicts
The story starts with the finding of a collection of unusual cracks in the fabric of the world's atmosphere: gateways that appear to give on to different dimensions. An example of a portal seems to be the source of the fiercely disputed mystical extract. The church, with Delamare at its leadership, designates these portals as a threat to the religion's doctrine and aims to eliminate them. As our protagonist begins to turn away from inflexible rationalism and return to instinct, nevertheless, her certainty that these sites must be protected – that their meaning and what they offer is somehow crucial – increases. "Cosmic particles, or the substance, or the vision, or the field of roses, or no matter what we call it," she says, "we require it." The stage for a philosophical tussle between naivety and maturity is established.
Plot Rhythm and Protagonist Growth
At a substantial length, The Rose Field|this volume|the
