Saturday 31 May 2014

After The Empire

"'[The Hermetians]'re good stock; they'll become important again in the Empire...and afterward.'"
-Poul Anderson, Flandry's Legacy (New York, 2012), p. 186.

So we can add Hermes to the list of Nyanza, Dennitza and Avalon, the planets that Flandry hopes will endure when the Empire is gone. Strengthen certain planets so that hopefully they will remain civilized during an interregnum of interstellar travel. That makes much more sense than founding two Foundations at opposite ends of the Galaxy, the Second shrouded in so much secrecy so that the other characters engage in endless detective work to try to find it.

Miriam/Banner says:

"'...I don't want to begin again with another Ramnuan. Our sisterhood, Yewwl's and mine, was wonderful...but it came to be when we were young, and that is gone.'" (p. 187)

Centuries previously, the members of the trader team had realized that they could return home but that it was not the same because they were no longer the same. Anderson vividly shows both beginnings and endings for individuals and societies.

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