Human consciousnesses are resurrected in The Harvest Of Stars Tetralogy and Genesis;
we expect Hanno to die near the end of The Boat Of A Million Years and Flandry to die near the end of A Stone In Heaven but both are rescued.
Holmes and Bond each seemed to die at the end of a volume but the sequels explained how they had survived.
I mention this because I have read two works in which we are made to think that a central character is unequivocally physically dead - shot and buried in one case; drowned in the other - and yet they live. The authors are Stieg Larsson and Dan Brown.
In how many works does a villain devise an insane scheme that involves his own death? This is unusual and I do not think that any work by Anderson qualifies?
8 comments:
Paul:
There's a fantasy novel by Steven Brust, *Jhereg*, in which it turns out one character has a scheme to trigger a WAR which will do major damage to two powerful groups (referred to as Houses although they're more like nations) that killed his father and treated his mother (and him) badly. It'll also cause enormous embarrassment to a third such group. A key point comes when the main character/narrator realizes that the scheme REQUIRES the plotter's death. It's such a brilliant and courageous plan that our hero almost doesn't WANT to stop it.
He explains to his lieutenant:
"The whole thing was done for revenge, Kragar—revenge for the way a cross-breed is treated and revenge for the death of his father.
"Revenge as courageous as a Dzur, as vicious as a Dragon, and as cunning as a Jhereg. That's what this is all about, Kragar."
David,
Thank you. I have a couple of other examples in mind.
Paul.
Kaor, DAVID and Paul!
David: a very cool story! Alas, this is yet another of the many gaps in my SF reading. I don't think I've ever read any of Steven Brust's works.
Paul: No, I don't recall Poul Anderson using the motifs of death and resurrection in his works for any of his works. The closest I can think of is what happened to Dahut, at the end of the third volume of THE KING OF YS where she was drowned by the cruel gods of Ys and transformed into a siren. But that was a very limited "resurrection" with severe limits on what Dahut could do (she had to always stay near salt water). And could never stay long on land or go far inland. We see the siren's cruel activities in THE DOG AND THE WOLF.
And as almost all Sherlockians knows, Sir Arthur tried to kill off the Great Detective because he wanted to go on to other books. BUT, popular demand forced him to"resurrect" Holmes. I assume something similar happened to Fleming as regards his James Bond character.
Sean
Sean,
It was exactly the same with Fleming.
Paul.
David,
Check out SEVEN, a 1995 film with Brad Pitt and Morgan Freeman - and others.
Paul.
Kaor, Paul!
Ha! Ian Fleming tried to kill off 007 and was forced by protesting fans to "resurrect" James Bond? Amusing and A. Conan Doyle would sympathize with Fleming!
Sean
Sean,
Well no, that wasn't it. The similarity was that, just as Doyle had intended Holmes to die at Reichenbach, Fleming had intended Bond to die at the end of FROM RUSSIA, WITH LOVE. However, while Fleming was still writing FROM RUSSIA..., Raymond Chandler (I think it was) persuaded Fleming to continue the Bond series after FROM RUSSIA... Fleming agreed but still wrote the intended ending for FROM RUSSIA..., with an apparent death. I was surprised when I read it but I already knew that the series continued so I just had to read the next volume, DR NO.
Paul.
Kaor, Paul!
Got it, Raymond Chandler, ONE fan, persuaded Fleming to continue the James Bond books. And FROM RUSSIA WITH LOVE and DR. NO are two of the best Bond books, IMO.
Sean
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