Things are falling apart in the final volume of The Book of Dust, the next of Philip Pullman's grand trilogies set in a world that manifests, now more than ever, as a intense and skewed version of our own. Organizations are failing, or reorganizing themselves along unfamiliar and disturbing lines. An invisible force "is ruining the air and the seasons"; concurrently, "currency is failing, and no one knows why". Authority is flowing away from states, and pooling in the halls of theocrats, the treasuries of conglomerates, the control of mobs. "An element is at work, very quietly, imperceptibly", says businessman a merchant figure, keeping a vigilant eye on the ancient paths from his post in an city cafe. "Elements we thought were stable and durable are deteriorating and giving way."
Key Puzzle and Lyra's Journey
Precisely what that something might be, and ways to oppose it, is the inquiry that animates this final volume, which picks up where its predecessor left off. This is, reportedly, the author's last excursion into the intricately constructed, infinitely beguiling universe he first unveiled three decades past, with the release of Northern Lights. It's a realm whose landscape maps on to that of this world, but whose past diverges and shifts with ours; where the humans look and reason and act like us, but are paired by daemons, essences in beast form; where the air are filled with witches and gryphons, but below, transports are taken and drinks is sipped, and mature academics carry luxury shopping bags. The protagonist, whom we first encountered as a young girl in the His Dark Materials trilogy, and then met once more as a infant in the prequel, the introductory book with which Pullman began this trilogy, is now a young woman: still recognisably the prickly and persistent protagonist of the prior volumes, but more mature, melancholic, more careful, more doubtful. This circumscription is heightened by her division from her soul companion, Pan – but it was also, paradoxically, the catalyst which caused him to abandon her in the first place.
Merging Narratives
His choice to go off in search of that innocent part of her which she appears to have shed (an quality which he symbolizes as her "imagination"), and her journey to rejoin with him, were the catalysts of The Secret Commonwealth, which followed Lyra undertake a adventurous voyage across the continent and into the Caucasus, facing with wonder and danger on the way. But from the outset, profound shifts were in motion, and sinister powers at work. The Magisterium – the faith's ruling body, and the author's masterfully eerie embodiment of austere, administrative evil – is under recent guidance, and showing its strength. Lyra's uncle – the heroine's relative, who holds responsible her for his sibling's death – has worked himself into the office of president of the Magisterium's High Council, and is determined on using his newfound authority to broaden the church's dominium. Another protagonist, who carried baby the heroine to safety along a overflowing Thames as an child in La Belle Sauvage, is now an university scholar with a sideline in spycraft: he is dispatched to a key location to find out more about the antagonist's aims. And behind all of this is the mystery surrounding the rare and valuable botanical extract which appears mysteriously to be the origin of a societal and economic upheaval emanating out from Central Asia. The oil is seen by certain groups as a commercial good, by different parties as a empirical or esoteric phenomenon, and by others still – the extremist "mountain dwellers" – as a source of darkness; an insult that must be destroyed. The dilemma of where it comes from, its meaning, and whether it should be eliminated or protected is coming rapidly to the fore.
Like the original trilogy, our protagonist's deeds, and her fate, are revealed to be deeply linked with the future of the realm
In its predecessor, these plots ran mostly in parallel. In this final book, they merge. As in His Dark Materials, her movements and her fate are revealed to be deeply linked with the fate of the realm. Her private mission to reconnect with her companion and rediscover her vision becomes the central battleground in a larger battle with an controlling regime which, as these systems always have, is seeking to quell freedom of reason, innovation and expression: all the inner, rebellious ways in which individuals can be liberated.
Atmospheric Fissures and Philosophical Struggles
The book opens with the unveiling of a collection of curious cracks in the structure of the Earth's atmosphere: windows that appear to lead to other worlds. A particular opening seems to be the origin of the fiercely disputed botanical substance. The authority, with the antagonist at its head, labels these windows as a challenge to the institution's beliefs and sets out to destroy them. As Lyra begins to shift from strict reason and back to instinct, nevertheless, her certainty that these sites must be defended – that their meaning and what they offer is mysteriously essential – increases. "Dust, or the extract, or the vision, or the Rose Field, or no matter what we call it," she says, "it is necessary." The setting for a philosophical struggle between innocence and knowledge is set.
Story Tempo and Protagonist Growth
At a substantial length, The Rose Field|this volume|the
