Tings are falling apart in the final volume of The Book of Dust, the second of Philip Pullman's grand trilogies set in a world that appears, in this volume especially, as a intense and slanted version of our own. Institutions are failing, or reassembling themselves along novel and disquieting lines. An unseen force "is wrecking the air and the seasons"; concurrently, "currency is failing, and no one knows why". Power is draining from states, and pooling in the chambers of theocrats, the coffers of business empires, the hands of mobs. "An element is at work, silently, imperceptibly", says trader a trader character, keeping a observant eye on the ancient paths from his place in an Aleppo cafe. "Aspects we thought were secure and durable are weakening and collapsing."
Key Puzzle and Her Quest
Just what that element might be, and ways to oppose it, is the inquiry that propels the concluding book, which picks up where its predecessor concluded. This is, reportedly, the author's concluding excursion into the intricately constructed, infinitely beguiling world he first unveiled three decades past, with the publication of His Dark Materials. It's a realm whose geography aligns with that of our world, but whose past tacks and jibes with ours; where the humans appear and reason and act like us, but are joined by animal souls, souls in beast form; where the air are populated with witches and mythical beasts, but beneath those skies, transports are ridden and tea is drunk, and older scholars carry fancy shopping bags. Our heroine, whom we first introduced to as a young girl in the original trilogy, and then saw again as a toddler in the first volume, the origin story with which Pullman began this trilogy, is now a mature individual: still distinctly the spiky and tenacious heroine of the previous installments, but more mature, more sorrowful, warier, less certain. This circumscription is heightened by her split from her soul companion, her daemon – but it was also, paradoxically, the trigger which led him to leave her in the first place.
Merging Narratives
The daemon's resolve to go off in pursuit of that youthful part of Lyra which she seems to have lost (an aspect which he represents as her "imagination"), and her journey to rejoin with him, were the incitements of The Secret Commonwealth, which followed the protagonist undertake a wandering trek across the continent and into the mountain region, facing with wonder and peril on the way. But from the start, underlying forces were in action, and malevolent elements at work. The Magisterium – the religious controlling power, and the author's brilliantly sinister embodiment of strict, bureaucratic evil – is under recent guidance, and asserting its power. Lyra's uncle – Lyra's uncle, who faults her for his family member's death – has positioned himself into the position of president of the authority's governing body, and is determined on using his newfound influence to broaden the church's control. A key character, who carried infant the heroine to safety along a flooded Thames as an 11-year-old in La Belle Sauvage, is now an academic with a secondary role in spycraft: he is sent to Geneva to discover more about his plans. And behind all of this is the puzzle surrounding the uncommon and precious essential oil which appears somehow to be the cause of a societal and economic upheaval emanating out from the region. The oil is viewed by certain groups as a commercial product, by others as a scientific or mystical miracle, and by others still – the extremist "men from the mountains" – as a source of evil; an affront that must be obliterated. The issue of its source, its significance, and whether it should be eliminated or protected is coming rapidly to the fore.
Similar to the first series, the heroine's deeds, and her future, are shown to be inextricably connected with the destiny of the universe
In the previous volume, these narratives ran mostly in tandem. In the conclusion, they merge. As in the first trilogy, the protagonist's choices and her path are revealed to be inextricably linked with the destiny of the world. Her individual mission to reconnect with her soul and regain her creativity becomes the key battleground in a larger battle with an oppressive system which, as such regimes always have, is seeking to suppress freedom of thinking, innovation and art: all the inner, defiant ways in which individuals can be free.
Dimensional Rifts and Ideological Conflicts
The book begins with the unveiling of a series of curious openings in the makeup of the planet's air: portals that seem to lead to other worlds. A particular portal seems to be the point of the highly contested botanical substance. The church, with Delamare at its head, classifies these portals as a problem to the religion's beliefs and sets out to eliminate them. As our protagonist begins to turn away from rigid rationalism and back to instinct, yet, her certainty that these places must be protected – that their meaning and what they offer is in some way essential – increases. "Dust, or the extract, or the creativity, or the botanical realm, or no matter what we label it," she says, "it is necessary." The stage for a Blakean conflict between naivety and maturity is prepared.
Story Tempo and Personal Evolution
At over six hundred pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
