Tings are collapsing in the final volume of The Dust Trilogy, the second of Philip Pullman's magisterial trilogies set in a universe that seems, now more than ever, as a intense and tilted version of our own. Institutions are failing, or reorganizing themselves along unfamiliar and disturbing lines. An unseen force "is wrecking the air and the seasons"; at the same time, "money's going bad, and no one knows why". Power is draining from states, and gathering in the offices of religious leaders, the coffers of corporations, the grasp of mobs. "Something is at work, stealthily, gradually", says merchant Mustafa Bey, keeping a observant eye on the ancient paths from his place in an city cafe. "Aspects we thought were firm and durable are weakening and collapsing."
Core Enigma and Lyra's Journey
Precisely what that something might be, and ways to oppose it, is the mystery that propels this final volume, which continues where its predecessor ended. This is, reportedly, Pullman's final venture into the carefully crafted, endlessly enchanting realm he first revealed three decades past, with the release of the first trilogy. It's a domain whose landscape maps on to that of the real world, but whose past veers and changes with ours; where the individuals look and think and behave like us, but are paired by animal souls, essences in animal form; where the skies are filled with enchantresses and mythical beasts, but beneath those skies, buses are ridden and drinks is consumed, and mature professors carry luxury shopping bags. Our heroine, whom we first introduced to as a child in the His Dark Materials trilogy, and then saw again as a toddler in the first volume, the introductory book with which the author began this trilogy, is now a adult: still recognisably the spiky and persistent heroine of the earlier books, but more mature, more sorrowful, more cautious, more doubtful. This restraint is amplified by her split from her animal guide, Pantalaimon – but it was also, unexpectedly, the catalyst which made him desert her in the first place.
Merging Narratives
Pan's decision to leave in quest of that youthful part of Lyra which she seems to have lost (an quality which he symbolizes as her "vision"), and her journey to reunite with him, were the driving forces of The Secret Commonwealth, which saw the protagonist undertake a adventurous trek across Europe and into the Caucasus, facing with amazement and risk on the way. But from the beginning, underlying forces were in motion, and malevolent elements at work. The religious council – the faith's ruling body, and Pullman's brilliantly sinister incarnation of strict, administrative wickedness – is under new leadership, and showing its strength. Marcel Delamare – the heroine's uncle, who holds responsible her for his sister's death – has worked himself into the office of head of the church's governing body, and is intent on using his recently acquired influence to extend the church's dominium. Malcolm Polstead, who rescued baby the heroine to security along a swollen river as an 11-year-old in the prequel, is now an Oxford don with a secondary role in espionage: he is sent to the city to discover more about the antagonist's intentions. And beneath all of this is the enigma surrounding the rare and precious botanical extract which manifests in some way to be the origin of a social and financial disturbance emanating out from Central Asia. The extract is seen by some as a marketable commodity, by different parties as a research-based or esoteric phenomenon, and by yet others – the zealous "highland figures" – as a source of evil; an insult that must be obliterated. The question of its origins, its significance, and whether it should be destroyed or safeguarded is escalating in importance.
Like His Dark Materials, our protagonist's actions, and her future, are revealed to be inextricably linked with the future of the world
In its predecessor, these storylines ran largely in side by side. In the conclusion, they come together. Similar to the first trilogy, her movements and her fate are unveiled to be deeply linked with the future of the universe. Her private journey to reconnect with her daemon and recover her creativity becomes the primary struggle in a wider war with an oppressive regime which, as these systems often attempt, is striving to suppress freedom of reason, innovation and art: all the personal, resistant ways in which individuals can be independent.
Dimensional Rifts and Moral Battles
The story starts with the finding of a collection of unusual cracks in the structure of the world's sky: gateways that appear to open into other worlds. An example of a window appears to be the source of the fiercely disputed mystical extract. The Magisterium, with the antagonist at its head, labels these openings as a problem to the religion's doctrine and endeavors to eradicate them. As Lyra begins to move from rigid rationalism and back to instinct, yet, her certainty that these places must be preserved – that their meaning and their value is in some way crucial – strengthens. "Dust, or rose oil, or the imagination, or the botanical realm, or no matter what we name it," she says, "we require it." The setting for a Blakean conflict between innocence and knowledge is prepared.
Narrative Pacing and Personal Evolution
At over six hundred pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
