I am now in an ambiguous relationship with Poul Anderson's The Devil's Game. I last read it so long ago that characters, details and plot outcome have faded from memory. Thus, it should be good to reread and post about the novel. However, some existing posts (scroll down) already recount much of its narrative. I will reread and post but not repeat any information. Experience shows that there is always more to be found in a Poul Anderson text. We will now prove, or disprove, the point.
The Devil of the title calls himself Samael. Check out the significances of that name.
1980 Conan The Rebel by Poul Anderson
1980 The Devil's Game by Poul Anderson
1980 The Golden Horn by Poul Anderson
1980 The Road of the Sea Horse by Poul Anderson
1980 The Sign Of The Raven by Poul Anderson
-copied from Significant Dates
Five novels by Poul Anderson published in 1980! (But three of them are a trilogy comprising a single narrative.) 1980 was the year when I became a school teacher in Bentham Grammar School. Each of us can remember what s/he was doing in any given year of publication, if alive then. It shows that Anderson was still producing quality work while we were reading him.
Surgam: "I will arise." (The Bentham Grammar School motto.)
3 comments:
Kaor, Paul!
Maybe I should reread THE DEVIL'S GAME? It's been a long enough time since I last reread that book.
Finished rereading Boethius' THEOLOGICAL TRACTATES, which I found surprisingly interesting. Now I'm rereading THE CONSOLATION OF PHILOSOPHY. A Time Patrol scenario: what might have happened if someone from the future, for whatever reason, had tried to prevent Boethius' unjust execution? The Time Patrol would have been compelled to make sure he was indeed executed (no matter how much its agents hated that).
Ad astra! Sean
Kaor, Paul!
In 1980, I was graduated from high school, aged fifteen, and audited some physics courses at Penn State, where I encountered serious difficulties. Still, in the long run, it was better for me than going off to college elsewhere at considerable expense, and flunking out. In the autumn of 1981, I went to Amherst College, and mostly did well.). I had been a reader of Poul Anderson books for several years, but I don’t believe I read any of the five books listed back then. I would find paperbacks of THE DEVIL’S GAME and the three LAST VIKING books later, and I believe that the same was true of CONAN THE REBEL. I found the books of the trilogy in used book stores (I bought a new paperback of THE DEVIL’S GAME) later, in the order: SEA HORSE ROAD, THE SIGN OF THE RAVEN, and then THE GOLDEN HORN. However, I believe I bought a paperback of BRAIN WAVE around 1980.
Best Regards,
Nicholas
Kaor, Nicholas!
At least you seem to have done better at physics than I or most of the people I knew probably had done!
And the very first of Anderson's books that I read was library copy of the 1965 Chilton Books edition of AGENT OF THE TERRAN EMPIRE, which was enough to get me hooked on his stories. No longer sure which of Anderson's paperbacks was the first I purchased. Possibly THREE HEARTS AND THREE LIONS?
Regards! Sean
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