Things are collapsing in the concluding book of The Dust Trilogy, the next of Philip Pullman's masterful trilogies set in a realm that manifests, now more than ever, as a intense and slanted version of our own. Establishments are weakening, or reorganizing themselves along new and disturbing lines. An unseen force "is wrecking the air and the seasons"; concurrently, "money's going bad, and no one knows why". Authority is draining from governments, and accumulating in the offices of religious leaders, the coffers of business empires, the control of rioters. "Something is at work, silently, imperceptibly", says businessman a trader character, keeping a observant eye on the trade routes from his seat in an city cafe. "Aspects we thought were stable and durable are faltering and collapsing."
Core Enigma and Her Quest
Just what that element might be, and how to counteract it, is the inquiry that propels this final volume, which picks up where The Secret Commonwealth left off. This is, according to many, the author's final foray into the intricately constructed, deeply captivating universe he first unveiled 30 years ago, with the release of the first trilogy. It's a domain whose geography corresponds to that of our world, but whose chronicles diverges and shifts with ours; where the individuals appear and think and act like us, but are accompanied by daemons, souls in creature form; where the heavens are populated with enchantresses and gryphons, but below, buses are ridden and tea is sipped, and mature academics carry Harrods shopping bags. The protagonist, whom we first encountered as a child in the original trilogy, and then saw again as a toddler in the prequel, the origin story with which the author began the series, is now a young woman: still recognisably the sharp and persistent protagonist of the earlier books, but aged, sadder, more careful, more doubtful. This restraint is heightened by her split from her soul companion, her daemon – but it was also, paradoxically, the catalyst which led him to leave her in the first place.
Converging Storylines
His choice to go off in search of that innocent part of the heroine which she may have forgotten (an quality which he symbolizes as her "vision"), and her mission to reconnect with him, were the driving forces of The Secret Commonwealth, which saw Lyra undertake a adventurous trek across Europe and into the mountain region, facing with marvel and danger on the way. But from the outset, underlying forces were in play, and sinister powers at work. The church authority – the religious controlling power, and Pullman's masterfully eerie incarnation of austere, administrative malice – is under fresh command, and flexing its muscles. Marcel Delamare – the heroine's relative, who faults her for his family member's death – has positioned himself into the office of head of the Magisterium's governing body, and is intent on using his recently acquired power to broaden the institution's control. Malcolm Polstead, who saved infant Lyra to refuge along a swollen Thames as an child in the prequel, is now an Oxford don with a sideline in espionage: he is assigned to a key location to find out more about his intentions. And beneath all of this is the puzzle surrounding the scarce and valuable essential oil which manifests mysteriously to be the cause of a societal and economic disturbance spreading out from Central Asia. The substance is seen by various factions as a marketable product, by different parties as a research-based or esoteric phenomenon, and by yet others – the zealous "men from the mountains" – as a origin of evil; an insult that must be destroyed. The question of where it comes from, its meaning, and whether it should be eliminated or protected is becoming urgent.
Similar to the original trilogy, Lyra's actions, and her destiny, are shown to be inseparably linked with the fate of the realm
In the previous volume, these narratives ran largely in side by side. In this final book, they converge. Similar to the first trilogy, her actions and her fate are revealed to be inseparably entwined with the fate of the realm. Her personal journey to reconnect with her soul and rediscover her imagination becomes the key struggle in a larger conflict with an controlling government which, as these systems typically do, is attempting to stifle independence of thinking, creativity and culture: all the inner, rebellious ways in which humans can be liberated.
Dimensional Rifts and Ideological Conflicts
The book starts with the finding of a set of curious openings in the structure of the Earth's atmosphere: windows that look to give on to alternate realities. A particular opening appears to be the point of the highly contested rose oil. The church, with Delamare at its helm, classifies these windows as a challenge to the institution's doctrine and sets out to eradicate them. As the heroine begins to turn away from rigid reason and revert to instinct, nevertheless, her conviction that these places must be preserved – that what they stand for and what they offer is mysteriously essential – strengthens. "The substance, or rose oil, or the vision, or the Rose Field, or no matter what we name it," she says, "we require it." The stage for a poetic conflict between naivety and experience is established.
Story Tempo and Character Development
At over six hundred pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
