Philip Pullman has announced that The Rose Field, the sixth and final novel centred around Lyra Silvertongue, will be published on 23 October. The book concludes the saga that began with Northern Lights, the first in his award-winning His Dark Materials trilogy, and continued in The Book of Dust series.
The upcoming release will follow Lyra’s story into her early twenties. She was introduced to readers as an 11-year-old in Northern Lights in 1995, a novel that went on to become a global bestseller.
Speaking to BBC Radio 4’s The World At One, Pullman, 78, said he felt “relieved” to have completed the book. “I’ve come out of the end alive and able to see it being made into a book and published,” he said.
The title, The Rose Field, refers to a concept introduced in the early chapters of Northern Lights, where scholars at Lyra’s Oxford college discuss Dust—a mysterious substance tied to human consciousness. Pullman explained that the final instalment would see Lyra on the brink of uncovering the true nature of Dust.
“In this final book, Lyra is on the verge of discovering what Dust is and what it means, and the story is about how that happens,” Pullman said. He also noted that the narrative explores the nature of imagination. “I’ve got a view of what the imagination is, and Lyra discovers what she thinks the imagination is, so we’re talking about that as well.”
While grounded in the fantasy world of Dust and daemons, The Rose Field is also influenced by real-world issues. Pullman said the rise of tech billionaires and the growing influence of powerful industries had shaped his thinking over the last decade.
“It has become clear to me in the last 10 years that the influence of money and the power of the billionaire class, the power of the tech industry and all those extractive things like oil and gas and so on, have a much deeper effect on the world than I had thought,” he said.
Reflecting on wider geopolitical shifts, Pullman added, “The world has changed enormously. We’re either at the end of a long period of American power, which will end, presumably, like the end of any empire, in chaos, destructiveness, and then the gradual coming together of nations in a new form. That’ll be interesting to watch, if I’m still alive to watch it.”
He also remarked on the abundance of historical knowledge now available through digital means. “We’re at an age where we’ve got the wisdom of centuries and millennia to draw on. It’ll be interesting to see if we do or we don’t. I suspect that most of us won’t, but some of us might.”
The Rose Field arrives six years after the publication of The Secret Commonwealth, the second book in The Book of Dust trilogy. According to publisher Midas, the first two titles in the trilogy have sold 49 million copies globally.
With the series drawing to a close, Pullman has revealed that his next focus may be a memoir, provisionally titled Before I Forget.
“I’ve been talking for quite a while about writing a memoir before I forget everything, and that’s something that’s possibly on the horizon,” he said.
Reflecting on his upbringing, he noted, “I was born in 1946. I was brought up as a child of the British Empire, which still existed then. And I’ve seen a very great number of changes, as everyone of my age has.”
He said he hoped to record and celebrate the experiences that had shaped him. “There’s nothing remarkable about that, but I’ve seen a lot of things that I loved, enjoyed, made me happy, made me excited in various ways. And I’d like to remember those and write them down, because I think it’s a shame if they’re not celebrated and remembered.”
