Sunday 27 December 2015

A Complete Psychotechnic History?

Baen Books' seven volume Poul Anderson The Technic Civilization Saga, compiled by Hank Davis, contains one previously uncollected story. Thus, we enjoyed rereading the entire History of Technic Civilization in chronological order of fictitious events and, as part of this, reading one installment for the first time.

A comparable collection of the earlier Psychotechnic History:

might perhaps fill two volumes;
would contain two previously uncollected short stories;
could retain Sandra Miesel's interstitial material from the earlier incomplete three volume collection.

However, Miesel's material would, I think, need to be expanded in order to harmonize the concluding story, "The Chapter Ends," more effectively with the rest of the history. Also, it would be possible to incorporate more of the historical events and periods into the Chronology and in particular to show:

that the First and subsequent interstellar Empires emerged from the Third Dark Ages;
that the Nomads endured through the Dark Ages and Imperial periods;
that the later Galactic civilization lies much further in the future than is implied by the present Chronology.

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