Foreigners And Oneness

Orion Shall Rise, CHAPTER SIX.

Foreigners that visit the Domain ruled by Skyholm:

Maurai

Northwesterners

Mericans

Beneghalis

Mong

By now, we are familiar with all these groups. The Maurai sequence becomes a substantial future history series.

Talence Jovain Aurillac, a Gaean, says:

"'Gaea is not Deu. Gaea is the life on Earth. There must be other living worlds, and there may well be an ultimate cosmic Oneness, but the universe is too big and strange for us.'" (2, p. 84)

The cosmos is One because it is a universe. Mystics have intuited its Oneness since the Upanishads. The universe is bigger than us and is strange in the sense that it differs from our immediate environment as we have evolved to perceive and conceptualize it. However, it is not beyond the ability of human scientists to comprehend the universe.

If there are two or more completely unrelated existent realms, then the inhabitants of any such realm cannot be affected by any of the others and cannot even know that they exist because to confirm their existence would be to interact with them. A multiverse would be a trans-cosmic oneness.

Fictional FTL

In 1956, Poul Anderson's first Nicholas van Rijn story, "Margin of Profit," was published and I began to attend a boarding school in Scotland where I read my first sf novel set in a civilization with faster-than-light (FTL) interstellar travel, Starman Jones by Robert Heinlein. It was in a large-format multi-authored omnibus volume and I neither knew nor cared about authors' names although I soon afterwards learned the names of Heinlein, Anderson etc.

We have become very familiar with fictional FTL, the cleverest version, I think, being the hyperspace in Anderson's Technic History. I have recently started to read CJ Cherryh's Downbelow Station which also has FTL spaceships entering planetary systems and docking at space stations. This has become a familiar piece of background backage.

I predict that:

FTL will not be discovered in our lifetimes;

if and when it ever is discovered, it will be completely unlike what anyone has imagined.

Gaeanity VI

Orion Shall Rise, CHAPTER SIX.

See Gaeanity V.

"'Some faiths, most notably in Hinja, have maintained from time immemorial that existence has a fundamental unity.'" (p. 74)

Yes, all of existence, not just one planet.

"'The brain that humanity has provided life with is primitive.'" (ibid.)

We are the self-conscious, thinking part of life but as such we, individually and collectively, decide and lead. We do not "'...serve the supreme organism...'" (ibid.)

"'Intelligence went horribly astray in the Age of Plenty, when a recklessly exploitative industrial civilization degraded the biosphere and could have destroyed it, like a cancer destroying a man.'" (ibid.)

In James Blish's and Norman L. Knight's A Torrent Of Faces, the Age of Plenty is the Age of Waste.

"Cancer," like "fever" and "Judgment," is a powerful metaphor. 

Gaeanity V

Orion Shall Rise, CHAPTER SIX.

See Gaeanity IV.

"Evolution has thus far been the working of a blind force..." (p. 74)

Evolution is not a single force but interactions between many organisms and their environments. A blind force might develop intelligent organisms by accident but not "'...in order that She may think.'" (p. 74) (My emphasis.)

"'...often going wrong though always in the end correcting itself.'" (ibid.)

Blindness is a defect in a sighted organism but not in a natural force. Such forces are unconscious but not "blind." Unconscious natural forces like gravitation, electromagnetism and the strong and weak nuclear forces, function according to physical laws but not toward any end and therefore have no need to "correct" themselves. Natural selection generates apparent purpose which is what confuses the Gaeans. When naturally selected organic sensitivity to environmental alterations has quantitatively increased until it is qualitatively transformed into conscious sensation, then two purposes, pursuit of pleasure and avoidance of pain, begin to exist.

Gaeanity IV

Orion Shall Rise, CHAPTER SIX.

See Gaeanity III.

"'...the Life Force may well cast us off entirely, as it cast off the dinosaurs, and spend the next few millions of years evolving a creature that is both sentient and sane.'" (p. 74)

Natural selection explains evolution without reference to a Life Force. An accident wiped out the dinosaurs. If conditions had continued to favor large reptiles with small brains, then no organisms would have been selected for manipulation and conceptualization. If mankind becomes extinct, then re-evolution of intelligence is not inevitable.

"'Our part is to serve the supreme organism of which we are a part. Ours is to revere life, while developing ourselves as human beings because that is to develop an aspect of Gaea.'" (pp. 74-75)

Gaeanity and Cosmenosis sound like planetary and cosmic versions of the same philosophy.

All life must be revered because it is part of the environment that sustains us. At last, human development is recognized although not as an end-in-itself.  

Gaeanity III

Orion Shall Rise, CHAPTER SIX.

See Gaeanity II.

"'...Gaea, our living planet, is a single organism... The War of Judgment...was a fever whereby Gaea freed Herself of a disease.'" (p. 74)

Earth is an environment that sustains many organisms. Does the entire system of environment and organisms function like a single organism? That is an empirical question. There are at least similarities in that the whole system responds to changes or disruptions in any part of it. Is "Gaea" a scientific description or a metaphor? The "fever," like the "Judgment," is at least a powerful metaphor for the consequences of collective human actions. 

Gaeanity II

Orion Shall Rise, CHAPTER SIX.

See Gaeanity.

"'We are organs, or rather organelles, that She has developed in order that She might think. We no more exist separately from Her than the cells of our body exist, in any viable fashion, separately from us. We live because we belong; we serve the immense Oneness, as does every animal, plant, or lowliest microbe.'" (p. 74)

Oneness is cosmic and even trans-cosmic, not just planetary. We are not organs. An organ functions only as part of a body whereas a human being functions both as part of a society and an ecology and as a self-conscious individual capable of free development. Oneness serves the free development of each individual, not vice versa.

We evolved so we were not developed to serve any purpose. Brains and thought evolved because mobile organisms acted on their environments. Thought generates purposes, not vice versa.

Gaeanity

Orion Shall Rise, CHAPTER SIX.

Gaeanity originated among the Mong and has many Espaynan converts. According to Principles Of Gaean Thought:

"...a force within life has made it bring about its own evolution toward ever greater majesty and meaning." (p. 74)

No, it hasn't. Interaction with external environmental forces has naturally selected organisms, thus causing them to evolve, and not necessarily toward greater majesty or meaning.

"Life upon Earth is One." (ibid.)

That is true but an entirely different point.

The Yuanese philosopher-ecologist, Karakan Afremovek, inspired by religious traditions and applying scientific principles, founded Gaeanism which, however, contradicts Darwinism.

Which Side Are We On?

Orion Shall Rise, CHAPTER FOUR.

A Northwest Union Intelligence officer, Mikli Karst, reports to Lodgemaster Benyo Smith that he has tried to kill several Maurai and succeeded - with one exception, Terai Lohannaso! Do we agree that Lohannaso should be killed? Karst is concealing "Orion" from Maurai Inspectors and we have not yet been told what it is.

It was Karst who invented the idea that references to Orion could be made to sound like a defeated nation's standard legend of a liberator who is come. In fact, Ronica Birken as a child repeated the overheard phrase, "Orion shall rise!," to defy Terai Lohannaso, without as yet understanding it. When, as a young adult, she is asked by Benyo Smith whether she knows what is going on, she more knowledgeably repeats the phrase and Smith responds:

"'Let's not say anything more just yet.'" (p. 54)

It is as if they know that the readers must not be told yet. But we cannot judge the rights or wrongs of Orion until we know what it is. It might be a genocidal device of some sort.

CHAPTER FIVE is yet another change of scene, back to Skyholm, and again I cannot cope with that at this time of night. Also, the Gaeans have been mentioned a few times but have not come on stage yet. The world will not end but "We will all be changed." (This time, the Biblical quotation is mine, not Anderson's.)

Eagles With Golden Wings

Orion Shall Rise, CHAPTER FOUR.

Hovering birds of prey in Poul Anderson's works have become another regular blog theme. When Ronica Birken walks back down into civilization, she sees:

woodlots;

pastures;

"Cook Inlet aglitter"; (p. 55)

snowpeaks;

yellow aspen and birch;

dark spruce;

timbered houses;

chimney smoke;

hovering eagles with golden wings;

sky and clouds;

peninsula ramparts;

sea;

rain;

hospitable dwellings.

We suspect that she has been on a mission for Wolf Lodge but first we enjoy the account of her journey. I have summarized only the return because it includes the eagles.

Some Indirect References In Other Authors' Works

See "Orion Shall Rise!"

 

"I did not even doubt the reality of that mysterious being whom the eldila call Maleldil and to whom they appear to give a total obedience such as no Tellurian dictator can command. I knew what Ransom supposed Maleldil to be."

-CS Lewis, Perelandra IN Lewis, The Cosmic Trilogy (London, 1990), pp. 145-348 AT 1, p. 155.

But the identity of Maleldil is not spelt out for us just yet.

In Frank Miller's Batman: The Dark Knight Returns, when something blue accompanied by a disembodied voice and apparently more powerful than a locomotive has crossed the city faster than a speeding bullet and leapt a tall building with a single bound, Robin asks: "...but back there - - was that him?"

When Miller wrote Marvel characters, a panel caption declared: "Suddenly they were there... A voice that could command a god..." Next: "And does." Speech balloon: "Thor! Deal with that fire!" But the speaker is not named.

In The Prisoner TV series, elaborate circumlocations were used to avoid naming the title character, e.g.:

Young woman: You know where he is, don't you? You were involved in his disappearance, weren't you?

Her father: I take it you are referring to your fiancee?

"Orion Shall Rise!"

Orion Shall Rise, CHAPTER FOUR.

Sometimes an author refers to someone or something without directly stating who or what is being referred to. This can be for either of two reasons. Either the information is being temporarily withheld, to be disclosed later, or the reader understands the reference but appreciates the dramatic effect generated by this indirect allusion.

In Poul Anderson's Orion Shall Rise, the title phrase is repeated many times before the reader learns its meaning although we gather that it is highly significant.

In Anderson's A Stone In Heaven, Dominic Flandry refers to a lady that died on Dennitza. In The Game Of Empire, Flandry refers to the one being, neither human nor Merseian, whose destruction he had regarded as an end in itself. We are not told the names but, if we have been reading the series consecutively, then we do not need to be told.

Notice that, in the first version of the song quoted in the previous post, we are not told the boy's name - because we already know it. I have several really good examples of indirect references in the works of other authors but maybe this time I should confine my attention to the works of Poul Anderson?

Trios

 

See Triad.

Sometimes, a line of thought begins in one of Poul Anderson's works but then takes us way outside it but we return to base in the next post. There are triple gods and trios of gods, e.g., Odin, Vili and Ve, who are also Odin, Hoenir and Lodur or Odin, Hoenir and Loki. (See here.)

I think of Krishna, the Buddha and Jesus as three spiritual teachers and human manifestations of transcendent reality.

Another trio is the Holy Family, Jesus, Mary and Joseph. See here and here. Note: the song is English, not Irish, as wrongly stated in the first link. Secondly, notice a change in the wording:

Original version

"My name is Joseph

"This is Mary my wife

"And this is our young son

"Our pride and delight."

 

Altered version

 

"Our names they mean nothing...

"They change throughout time..."

 

Finally, here are these two versions of the song:

 

Original

Altered

Cat And Raven

Orion Shall Rise, CHAPTER TWO.

When Terai Lohannaso, a Maurai conqueror, walks along a village street to visit his honorable enemy's widow, adults stiffen, children stop playing and dogs snarl.

"None ignored him but a cat sunning itself on a porch and a raven that flapped hoarse overhead." (4, p. 39)

Of course. Cats are independent of human conflicts. Ravens see and hear for Odin. (We can remember that even when reading hard sf.)

Anneth Birken stands "...for a number of raven-croaks..." (p. 40) at her door before inviting him in. Thus, the raven comments on the action and counts the time.

Launy's and Anneth's young daughter, Ronica, accuses the Maurai of killing her father and yells defiantly:

"'But we'll kill you! Orion shall rise!'" (p. 41)

Orion the Hunter, a Giant in Chains, a winter constellation...

Terai, an intelligence officer, must spend twenty years watching for the meaning of that phrase and we must read most of the novel before we learn its meaning.

CHAPTER THREE begins with over a page of verse followed by another complete change of scene and characters. That is too much for me to handle at this time of night. I return to the adventures of Mikael Blomkvist and Lisbeth Salander without any obligation to post about them...

Downbelow Station is also in the background and should make further appearances here. Some time is also spent watching events on Earth Real in 2020 which currently seems a madder world than any of the imaginary ones.

Wind And Rain

Orion Shall Rise, CHAPTER TWO.

The Maurai ships, instruments and weapons are far superior to those of the Northwest Union:

"The battle was done in less than two hours. Afterward the wind died away, as if awed into silence, and the rain fell softly, as if weeping for men dead and treasures lost, hope lost." (3, p. 37)

Well... Quite often, Poul Anderson writes (something like) "wind died, rain fell." From such an account, I would infer that the dying of the wind matches the cessation of hostilities while rain falling suggests nature mourning. Here, however, we are explicitly told that the wind dies as if in response to the end of the battle and that the rain falls as if weeping. Always watch what wind does in works by Anderson.

Before declaring war, the Maurai:

"...had made ready for a conflict that the realists among them knew was ineluctable." (1, p. 29)

There is a self-fulfilling prophecy: this war is inevitable so let's wage it.

Two Mighty Rivers

"Where the mighty Sagittarius flows into the Gulf of Centaurs, Avalon's second city - the only one besides Gray which rated the name - had arisen as riverport, seaport, spaceport, industrial center, and mart."

-Poul Anderson, The People Of The Wind IN Anderson, Rise Of The Terran Empire (Riverdale, NY, 2011), VI, p. 499.

This is one of my favorite passages in Poul Anderson's works so I need scant pretext to quote it again. See here.

"The armadas clashed off the mouth of the mighty Columma River, on a day when half a gale drove icy rain mingled with sleet out of the west."

-Orion Shall Rise, CHAPTER TWO, 3, p. 36.

"Mighty" is an appropriate adjective for a river but it has to be a really big river, much bigger, I think, than our River Lune. Meanwhile, here, we are housebound as the Lune is swollen by a day of non-stop rain so, after meditating in the attic, I will probably return to blogging.

Barely In Time?

Jack Havig:

"'I have this nightmare notion that [the War of Judgment] came not just as a result of huge areas turning into deserts, but came barely in time."

-Poul Anderson, There Will Be Time (New York, 1973), V, p. 53.

 

Terai Lohannaso:

 

"'Sometimes I wonder if the Downfall didn't come barely in time, to save the whole biosphere from what the old industry was doing to it.'"

-Orion Shall Rise, CHAPTER TWO, p. 33.

 

A social collapse that prevents a worse ecological collapse? Have we gone too far down the road to be saved in this way?

More About Names

Orion Shall Rise, PROLOGUE and CHAPTERs ONE and TWO.

We notice that a Northwest Union man is called "Launy Birken," not "Launy sunna -." Thus, the Mericans have lost the patronymics and regained surnames if indeed they did lose them in this slightly different version of the Maurai History.

The Aerogens Coordinator in Kemper is called "Talence Donal Ferlay." Talence is one of the Thirty Clans. Donal is a personal name. Ferlay is a surname. Thus, Donal's son is Talence Iern Ferlay and their kinsmen include Talence Jovain Aurillac.

Mael the Red is a pysan but also the bailli of his district and thus knows the Coordinator. Iern's mother, Catan, is Mael's youngest daughter.

(We would have to understand all this if we were there.)

Later: Belay that. Reading further, I learn that the Mericans, who were civilized by the Maurai, are to the south of the Norries.

Triad

Orion Shall Rise, CHAPTER TWO.

The main prow of a civilian Maurai trimaran usually bears a figurehead of:

"...the carven Triad, Tanaroa the Creator, Lesu Haristi the Savior on His right, shark-toothed Nan the Destroyer on His left." (2, p. 30) 

This Triad corresponds to the Hindu Trimurti ("triple form"): Brahma, creator; Vishnu, preserver; Shiva, destroyer. Back in the Maurai short trilogy, which I cannot consult right now because I am sitting with my feet in water, Lesu Haristi is described as the Son of Tanaroa.

I noticed a curious parallel between the Christian Trinity and Trimurti. In the former, Christ is the Incarnation of the Second Person of the Trinity whereas, in the latter, Krishna is an incarnation of the second member of Trimurti. Because of the activities of Christian missionaries, some Indians felt faced with a choice: Christ or Krishna, Gospel or Gita. I value the Bhagavad Gita for its teaching of karma yoga.

Two Other Trinities 

The Three of Ys: male, female, inhuman.

The Triple Goddess: Maiden, Mother, Crone.

Honorable Enemies In Two Timelines

After the negotiations that ended the Jihannath crisis, Chunderban Desai of the planet Ramanujan and the Terran Empire and Uldwyr of the Vach Hallan and the Merseian Roidhunate had dinner in a private room at a restaurant.

"It became a memorable evening."

-Poul Anderson, The Day Of Their Return IN Anderson, Captain Flandry: Defender Of The Terran Empire (Riverdale, NY, 2010), pp. 74-238 AT 3, p. 85.

 

Desai, as high Commissioner of the Virgilian System in Sector Alpha Crucis of the Terran Empire, interviews Aycharaych, supposedly of the planet Jean-Baptiste in Sector Aldebaran but really from Chereion in the Roidhunate.

 

"It became a memorable afternoon." (ibid., p. 95)

After the Whale War, Laury Birken of the Northwest Union and Terai Lohannaso of the Maurai Federation have a gourmet meal in a dining room in the Seattle chapter of the Wolf Lodge, then attend a strip dance.

"It became a memorable evening."

-Orion Shall Rise, CHAPTER TWO, p. 29.

The Iron Men

Orion Shall Rise, CHAPTER TWO.

Sometimes a single word or phrase links two texts in some readers' minds even though the texts and their contexts bestow almost unrelated meanings. Thus, "Superman" is a German philosophical concept and the first American superhero. In Poul Anderson's Maurai History, Jack Havig refers to the American Superman and Launy Birken of the Northwest Union makes a surprising claim about his own father:

"'My father was an Iron Man...'" (p. 26)

Really? We soon learn that:

"The Iron Men were picturesque, and their early exploits had been heroic..."

This sounds interesting.  

"...in a raw fashion as they fought, sneaked, or bargained their way across the Mong-occupied plains in search of metal." (ibid.)

OK. In fact, superheroes can exist in very different versions, sometimes non-super-powered.

Birken and a Lohannaso carry on the by now familiar argument for or against Maurai conservationist policies. This time the focus is on whales: to kill or not to kill.

I have heard one American perspective parodied as: "Go, nuke a gay whale for Jesus!" 

Autumn Evening

Orion Shall Rise. 

In CHAPTER ONE, Iern fights a storm. See Man Versus Nature. Before that, he and his attendants had ridden back from a seasonal circuit of his family's lands:

autumnal forests;

long steep valley;

river road;

slanting sunlight;

shining cliffs;

glistening stream;

sweet, mild air;

an echoing horn;

thumping hooves;

vivid cloaks;

swirling dust "...like firelit smoke." (p. 10)

Details, when listed, are more numerous than expected. The storm held the stage on a previous reading. However, rereading aids appreciation of this autumn evening colorfully described in a single paragraph.

Problems II

 There are reasons for this repetition. One is that I have just proved that, if I try to publish a post on another blog, it winds up on this one.

I had better give notice here that, since "Blogger" changed, I have been having problems with posting. Currently, if I click to create a new post on any of my other blogs, the screen changes to allow me to create a post on this, the Poul Anderson Appreciation, blog, not on the blog where I want to post. If this situation persists, then I will not, for example, be able to transfer articles to the Poul Anderson: Contributor Articles blog. I have, of course, gone onto a "Help" page and tried to communicate the problem but am not sure whether my message has been sent and, in any case, based on past experience, do not expect any reply. I am taking this opportunity to inform blog readers that there are problems just in case the problems get worse and I become unable to post here as well. I will switch the lap top off for a while and switch back on again later for what that is worth.

Problems

I had better give notice here that, since "Blogger" changed, I have been having problems with posting. Currently, if I click to create a new post on any of my other blogs, the screen changes to allow me to create a post on this, the Poul Anderson Appreciation, blog, not on the blog where I want to post. If this situation persists, then I will not, for example, be able to transfer articles to the Poul Anderson: Contributor Articles blog. I have, of course, gone onto a "Help" page and tried to communicate the problem but am not sure whether my message has been sent and, in any case, based on past experience, do not expect any reply. I am taking this opportunity to inform blog readers that there are problems just in case the problems get worse and I become unable to post here as well. I will switch the lap top off for a while and switch back on again later for what that is worth.

Addendum, later the same day: This problem has been resolved with help but there can be others.

Time As An Endless Storm-Wind

Orion Shall Rise.

These things are important in Poul Anderson's works: time, wind, men, nations, gods and seasons, so it is striking to find all six in a single phrase:

"...a sense of time as an endless storm-wind, on which men and nations and gods were blown like autumn leaves, forever." (PROLOGUE, p. 8)

My next thought was that I must have quoted this phrase before and I find that I did on 3 July 2012. See From Maurai To Skyholm. This post imparts more information about Orion Shall Rise which therefore need not be repeated here.

What better image for a future history than an endless storm-wind blowing men and gods forever?

Prologue

Poul Anderson, Orion Shall Rise (London, 1988).

I think that this is a world map in the Maurai period.

If the introductory AUTHOR'S NOTE had not let the cat out of the bag, then we would not have known, when reading the PROLOGUE, that the Maurai are involved although the following passage might have served as a clue:

"...many dwellers hereabouts, who had never been far from their birthplaces, still believed that Deu Himself had placed [Skyholm] in heaven, as an unmoving moon, to watch lest humans bring a new Judgment on the world." (p. 3)

Skyholm is also called "Ileduciel," (p. 3) sky island. The War of Judgment preceded and initiated the Maurai period.

The PROLOGUE describes a day in early spring:

white snow on brown ground;

gurgling, glimmering water;

budding orchard;

hastening cloud shadows;

pale sky;

chilling, whooping, damp-smelling wind;

wheeling, cawing rooks.

 

A sensory overload.

Beginning Orion Shall Rise

How much can we know about a book before starting to read it? Poul Anderson's Orion Shall Rise has 468 pages of text. The blurb on the back of my copy says that "...four opposing pockets of civilization vie for control of the planet..." Which four? Europe, North America, the Maurai? Where else?

The opening quotation reads:

"When you stand on the peak of time it is time to perish

-Robinson Jeffers, 'The Broken Balance'"

 

I have encountered some difficulty in googling the text of this poem. Does Jeffers mean that there is no peak of time and, if you think there is, then you're finished?

 

We are in for a long haul which suits me fine.

Finishing "Windmill"

Another surprise: the text of Poul Anderson's "Windmills" is itself a part of the story because it is an extract from a letter in which the narrator, Toma Nakamuha, urges a Member of Parliament's daughter to support his promotion of a new policy. "Windmills" is in part a detective story because Nakamuha investigates his predecessor's disappearance, in fact murder. The story does not show successful resistance to Maurai policies but does end with the threat that this will happen in a generation or two. This logical next step paves the way for the two related novels.

Having now reread all three Maurai short stories, what can we say about the series so far? 

There is:

historical progression;

 

an unusual amount of argument about the issues between the characters;

 

also unusually, in this literary context, a future history series with no hint of space travel except as an occasionally mentioned aspiration.

 

Future religion:

 

the Californians have thrown out the Mong and also, by implication, their Asian gods;

in Sannacruse, it is fashionable to worship the Maurai Tanaroa, Lesu Haristi etc;

the Meycans still worship Esu Carito;

there are also scientifically oriented secularists.

 

Incidentally, we have previously commended Anderson's respect for religion and his sympathetic treatment of different kinds of religious believers and have compared some of his works to those of CS Lewis but, for a truly dreadful version of Christianity in futuristic fiction, check out the Left Behind series some time.

At Your Service

In the James Bond novels, "the Service" is the Secret Intelligence Service, SIS, also known as the Secret Service or as MI6. Thus, when, in other fictional narratives, a spy or intelligence agent works for "the Service," we expect this organization to be a Secret Service or something similar.

This expectation enables James Blish and Poul Anderson to surprise us with alternative meanings. In Blish's "Beep"/The Quincunx Of Time, the outfit called "the Service," is simply "the Service," nothing else, and is not a branch or arm of the government but the entire government - but it is a while before we realize this.

In Anderson's "Windmill," the narrator works for "The Service..." (p. 142) and is "'...a Maurai spy...'" (p. 143) but we then learn that he is "...an agent of the Ecological Service...," (p. 151) which makes sense in the light of the Maurai assumption of global environmental stewardship.

Jets And Nakamuha

"Windmill."

Another sign of progress and the passage of time: the Maurai now have some jet aircraft although they are few and reserved for the Air Force.

The narrator is called Toma Nakamuha, recalling, to my mind, Tom Nomura of the Time Patrol, although the two names are not quite as similar as I had thought at first.

Like a Time Patrolman, Nakamuha reflects on:

"...how undermanned we are, in this work which matters more than any other..." (p. 142)

A familiar refrain: civilization is fragile; its guardians are few.

Getting Into "Windmill"

"Windmill."

Again, characters' names are unfamiliar. They wear sarongs so they are probably Maurai. Their aircraft passes over Losanglis, lit at night by the few fires of its squatters who:

"...are known to be robbers and said to be cannibals." (p. 140)

This long after the War of Judgment, barbarism persists in parts of Merica despite the civilization that we know from the previous stories has been restored elsewhere.

The narrator is of the Sea People, i.e., the Maurai. The text begins in mid-sentence because it is an extract from a letter to Elena Kalakaua, daughter of a Member of Parliament in the Maurai Federation. As in the previous story, this journey is a spying expedition. In "Progress," the Maurai spied out and destroyed a clandestine fusion power plant. What damage will they perpetrate in "Windmill"? Surely they cannot object to windmills?

See More About The Maurai II.

Trade Or War

Are trade or war plausible over interstellar distances even with FTL?

Trade

Heinlein: Free Traders;

Asimov: Foundation Traders and Merchant Princes;

Blish: Okie cities;

Anderson: the Polesotechnic League, Kith, Nomads;

Cherryh: merchanters.

War

Do I need to write a list?

Sf writers project their own civilization onto the galaxy. I think that peaceful exploration and colonization are more probable. Since interstellar travelers must carry their environment with them, colonization need not be of planetary surfaces although the number of exo-planets now being discovered makes planetary colonies more plausible.

Unusual

"Progress" is an unusual Poul Anderson story. As usual, there are colorful characters, interesting ideas, fight scenes, descriptive passages and ideological arguments. Unusually, the action ends abruptly and the remaining ten and a half pages recount a meeting, several years later, between two of the antagonists who again thrash out the rights or wrongs of the Maurai suppression of nuclear fusion. This future history series, more than other work by Anderson, consists of stories of ideas. In the opening story, the Maurai Federation embarks on a particular foreign policy. In this second story, they have been enforcing that policy for several centuries. The third story, "Windmill," almost has to be about the policy beginning to fall apart.

The transition to "Windmill" is another wrench. This story unaccountably begins the middle of a sentence:

"-and though it was night, when land would surely be colder than sea, we had not looked for such a wind as sought to thrust us away from Californi. Our craft shuddered and lurched."

-Poul Anderson, "Windmill" IN Anderson, Maurai And Kith (New York, 1982), pp. 139-168 AT p. 139.

The first person narration is also a departure in the series. The craft has wickerwork, a gondola and a gasbag and approaches Californi. These are indications that the story is set some time in the Maurai History.

I have no recollection from previous readings of "Windmill" so we will have to tackle its intricacies tomorrow.

Maurai Policies And Other Controversial Issues

The Maurai Captain Rewi Lohannaso tells Jack Havig:

"'We need all the diversity, all the assorted ways of living and looking and thinking, we can get!'"

-There Will Be Time, XI, p. 119.

 

This was Poul Anderson's view. In some of his works, extra-solar colonization is presented as an opportunity to maximize human diversity.

 

The Maurai want to prevent the kind of progress that led to the War of Judgment but do they go too far in retarding progress? Readers can suspend judgment or adopt opposite views as in some other works by Anderson:

 

the characters in "Progress" discuss this Maurai policy;

 

in "Time Patrol," Stane wants to build a peaceful civilization but is prevented by the Time Patrol;

 

in Lodestar," Nicholas van Rijn and his granddaughter disagree about the Polesotechnic League;

in "The Sensitive Man," characters argue about the role of the Psychotechnic Institute. See here.

(I think that the Institute had the chance of doing some good but should have been honest about its limitations.)

Anderson And Gaiman Quote Marlowe

"Once upon a time there was a king who set himself above the foreign merchants. What he did is of no account now; it was long ago and on another planet, and besides, the wench is dead."

-Poul Anderson, "The Master Key" IN Anderson, David Falkayn: Star Trader (Riverdale, NY, 2010), pp. 273-327 AT p. 275.

 

Matthew the Raven: I think I like being a dream better than I liked being a man.

-Neil Gaiman, The Sandman: The Doll's House (New York, 1995), PART SIX, p. 201, panel 8.

 

Matthew: I did some rotten things near the end. You know how it is.

Let's just say I'm glad all that stuff is in the past. And in another life...

Gilbert: "But that was in another country, and besides, the wench is dead." I see.

-Gaiman, op. cit., panel 9.

 

FRIAR BARNARDINE. Thou hast committed—

     BARABAS. Fornication:  but that was in another country;
     And besides, the wench is dead.

-copied from here.

Names

One way to convey to readers that a story is set in an exotic society or period is to give some of its characters appropriately exotic names. In Poul Anderson's "The Sky People," "Loklann sunna Holber" and "Robra sunna Stam" are personal names followed by patronymics, "...son of..." By contrast, two other societies have retained surnames:

the Meycan calde, Don Miwel Caraban, has a daughter called Donita Tresa Caraban;

the visiting Maurai ship's captain is Ruori Rangi Lohannaso.

Centuries later, in "Progress":

both another ship's captain, Ranu Kaelo Makintairu, and his cyberneticist, Alisabeta Kanukauai, are related by blood to the Lohannaso Shippers' Association;

Mericans retain patronymics as evidenced by Lorn sunna Browen of Corado University;

a Beneghali scientist-administrator is called Indravarman Dhananda.

Multiple cultures flourish in the centuries after the War of Judgment.

Future Histories, And Future Historical Periods, Without Space Travel

Before the scientific and industrial revolutions, it was not realized either that there could be technological changes or that these would cause social changes. Accounts of the future Buddha projected the life of the historical Buddha into the future. "The Prophecies of Merlin" in Geoffrey of Monmouth's The History Of The Kings Of Britain assume a continued history of the Kings of Britain. Poul Anderson's The Shield Of Time shows historical cycles continuing in the absence of a scientific revolution.

HG Wells did not include space travel in The Shape Of Things To Come but did add it to Things To Come, the film. An escape velocity rocket fuel is about to be produced at the end of the fourth story in Robert Heinlein's Future History. The opening story of Anderson's Psychotechnic History covers only the recovery from World War III. Space travel is absent from Anderson's short Maurai future history although it occurs in the connected volumes, There Will Be Time and Orion Shall Rise. SM Stirling's Emberverse series is an alternative future history where a low tech society has no possibility of space travel.

Evening Reading

Despite the focus on Poul Anderson, I read other authors later in the evening, sometimes finding unexpected points of comparison with Anderson. Reading CJ Cherryh's Downbelow Station is proceeding slowly but that is just me not getting fully into this very different future history series yet. 

I mention this before returning to Stieg Larsson and/or Neil Gaiman. Back to Anderson tomoz. In retirement, the serious business of the day is a choice between different pleasurable activities. I write not a report in an office but the next post on the blog.

Continents And Climates

"Progress," pp. 90-91.

On an island in the Indian Ocean, the characters drink on a verandah while:

darkness is deep and blue;

sea glimmers;

land is black;

stars are brilliant;

candlelight is yellow;

bats dart;

a lizard scuttles;

wild pigs grunt;

a peacock screams;

insects chirp;

coolness is jasmine-scented -

- and the Merican wishes to God he were back in Corado where his clan has a lodge among the pines and deer on the north rim of the Grand Canyon.

Historical Discontinuity And Continuity

In Poul Anderson's Maurai History, what we would call "World War III" is named by its survivors and their successors the "War of Judgment." This tells us, the readers of the Maurai History, first that the War has brought to an end any historical knowledge or sense of continuity with the past and secondly that subsequent generations have a partly moralistic and partly realistic understanding of the War. That conflict was a consequence of the civilization that it destroyed. In that sense it was a Judgment. Mythologically, the gods judge us. Morally, we judge ourselves. Either way, we are judged.

Now here is some historical continuity. This afternoon, we revisited Levens Hall where the Head Gardener lives in a large house in the grounds of the Hall. The present Head Gardener is only the tenth in over three hundred years. The first had worked for the King of France. Imagine a series of ten historical novels... If you have to be sf about it, then you can also imagine some time travel but it is not necessary.

Historical Transition

"Progress."

The transition from "The Sky People" to "Progress" is a wrench because "Progress" begins in the midst of the action with different characters although there is early evidence of historical continuity when the words "N'Zealann," "Maurai" and "Lohannaso" soon appear in the text. (pp. 74-75)

The phrase:

"For centuries after the War of Judgment..." (p. 84)

- suggests a longer timescale than that implied in There Will be Time where it seems that rebellion against Maurai dominance begins when the Eyrie moves to Phase Two in the twenty-second century.

In "The Sky People," Ruori Lohannaso first reflects that Maurai political psychologists should be able to "divide-and-rule" (p. 34) the Sky People and later explicitly suggests that Meycan missionary and cultural influence will civilize them over "'...a century or two.'" (p. 67) In "Progress," we read:

"Relations between the Sea People and the clans of southwest Merica remained fairly close, however little direct trade went on. After all, missions from Awaii had originally turned those aerial pirates to more peaceable ways." (p. 88)

When Ranu says that the Maurai Federation sends psychodynamic teams to redirect the energies of barbarians, a Merican responds:

"'Just like you did with my ancestors, eh?'" (p. 92)

So it seems that Ruori's "...century or two..." have elapsed and this explains the absence of character continuity. It is at this point that the Maurai stories become a future history series, however brief.

AI In SF II

 

Rereading AI In SF, I thought that the last sentence quoted at the end of the post:

"So was insight, a direct contact with the paramathematical frame of reality."

- looked as if it needed a concluding question mark. However, checking confirmed the absence of a question mark at this point in the text of the story by Greg Bear & SM Stirling.

On the other hand, the following paragraph suggests that the sentence had been a question:

"They couldn't know, Halloran realized. Kzinti physics was excellent but their biological sciences primitive by human standards."

-for reference, see the above link.

 

We need a synthesis of all the sciences and philosophy to approach a comprehensive understanding of reality.

A Computer And A Shadow

Poul Anderson, "Progress" IN Anderson, Maurai And Kith (New York, 1982), pp. 73-137.

"'That's why humans are aboard, you know. Theoretically, our computer could be built to do everything. But in practice, something always happens that requires a brain that can think.'

"'A computer could be built to do that, too,' said Dhananda." (p. 84)

This issue has come up too often before and I do not propose to summarize the arguments again! See here.

The text continues:

"'But could it be built to give a damn?' Ranu muttered in his own language. As he started down a ladder, one of the soldiers came between him and the sun, so that he felt the shadow of a pike across his back." (ibid.)

Ranu mutters in his own language about giving a damn. Dhananda is accompanied by soldiers and Ranu feels the shadow of a weapon on his back. All of this conveys the potential ideological and physical conflict between the two men.

Two Poul Andersons

Poul Anderson, Orion Shall Rise (London, 1988).

"Those who remember other tales from the world of the Maurai will perhaps notice what appear to be inconsistencies with them in this book. However, consistency is not an either-or matter. New data and insights often cause us to revise our ideas about the past and even the present. Surely the future is not exempt." (AUTHOR'S NOTE on an unnnumbered page somewhere between the title page and the PROLOGUE, beginning on p. 1)

Logically, consistency is either-or and not a matter of appearance but there can be differences of interpretation and understanding. The Poul Anderson who addresses us in the signed "Author's Note" at the beginning of Orion Shall Rise is simply the author standing outside the text whereas the Poul Anderson who addresses us in the Foreword to There Will Be Time is embedded in the text, coexisting with his informant, Robert Anderson, and thus also, although he does not meet him, with the time traveler, Jack Havig. This second Poul Anderson informs us that the Maurai stories and There Will Be Time are fictions within the fiction. Writing them, he changed some details and speculated about others. We can therefore regard Orion Shall Rise as a more accurate account although we must still accept that "Maurai" is a name invented by the fictional Poul Anderson.

Lohannaso And The Milky Way

In Poul Anderson's Technic History, certain families are associated with certain planets:

Falkayn, Tamarin and Runeberg with Hermes;

 

Falkayn and Holm with Avalon;

 

Kittredge with Vixen;

 

McCormac and Frederiksen with Aeneas.

 

I mean by this that each of these surnames occurs more than once in the Technic History.

 

Similarly, there is a surname that recurs several times in connection with Anderson's Maurai Federation:

 

"...Captain Ruori Rangi Lohannaso..."

-"The Sky People," p. 14.

 

"The Lohannaso Shippers' Association..."

-Poul Anderson, "Progress" IN Anderson, Maurai And Kith (New York, 1982), pp. 73-137 AT p. 75.

 

"Captain Rewi Lohannaso..."

-There will Be Time, XI, p. 117.

 

"Terai Lohannaso..."

-Poul Anderson, Orion Shall Rise (London, 1988), CHAPTER TWO, p. 24.

As far as I can see without yet having reread every word of the third Maurai story, it does not give us a Lohannaso but does present another old friend:

"The night was as clear as I've ever seen, fantastic with stars, more stars than there was crystal blackness in between them, and the Milky Way a torrent."

-Poul Anderson, "Windmill" IN Maurai And Kith, pp. 139-168 AT p. 144.

Sea And Sky Combat

For some earlier discussion of the Maurai History, see:

From Historical Fiction To Science Fiction

Maurai In There Will Be Time

 

I have previously summarized several accounts of combat from Poul Anderson's works. The sea and sky battle in "The Sky People" is one of the best and I might return to it to write a summary. Basically, a single Maurai sea ship destroys one Sky People airship and captures another. Then the sea ship and the captured airship attack and destroy three more airships.

In this first Maurai story as also in the first Kith story, "Ghetto," a political necessity gets in the way of a personal relationship. In "The Sky People," because the flying pirates have a scientific culture, the Maurai will seek long-term trade and peace with them, not the endless war that some Meycans would have preferred. In "Ghetto," the central characters breaks off his engagement rather than change sides in a class conflict. 

Rouri's Moment Of Realization

"The Sky People."

We knew it had to happen. The Sky People have attacked and begun to sack the city. The Maurai explorers who had been guests in the city have fought to their boat, taking with them a bunch of noble Meycan women. The commander of the accompanying Meycan men urges the Maurai captain, Ruori, to carry the women to safety elsewhere while he and his men return to the battle. Ruori, not wanting to flee, would prefer to pull the enemy aircraft from the sky.

"Ruori stopped dead." (p. 38)

Of course he does. He has just thought of something. He stops his men from casting off, runs to the main Meycan woman and says that he has an idea but we must read on to learn what it is. Regular Anderson readers could see this moment of realization coming a long way back.

Squalor In Space?

Although the Lunarians in  Poul Anderson's Harvest Of Stars Tetralogy, genetically engineered to live and procreate in Lunar gravity, pass their entire existences inside enclosed artificial environments - Lunar cities, spaceships and space stations -, they possess enough energy and enterprise to make such environments colorful and spacious, the antithesis of mere metal caves and corridors.

However, CJ Cherryh's Downbelow Station suggests that human conflicts and wars on an interstellar scale might overload such environments with hordes of desperate refugees arriving in over-crowded, under-supplied spaceships.

The mere ability to travel between the stars is an ultimate symbol of freedom in American sf but what might it be like in practice, confined inside artificially maintained environments far removed from any hospitable planetary surface?

Serious Points And Post-Nuclear Recoveries

Poul Anderson's "Lodestar" begins with violent action but makes a serious point about economic injustice. Anderson's "The Sky People" features violent action but makes a serious point about the difference between scientific and non-scientific cultures. Anderson should not be written off as merely writing about violent action.

In Anderson's Psychotechnic History, rapid recovery from World War III is helped by the new science of psychotechnics. In his Maurai History, beginning with "The Sky People," slower recovery from the War of Judgment is helped by new technologies and paramathematical psychology.

See:

A Science Of Society?

Maurai Civilization

 

Maybe the fact that the Islanders who developed the new technologies had less metal to cannibalize than the mainlanders who were slower to recover also helps to meet an earlier objection? See here. 

Ruori And Metal

"The Sky People."

The cover illustration is accurate in almost every detail except that Ruori should be wearing a shimmering shirt. (p. 20) Earlier he had referred to his people wearing sarongs, sandals and clan tattoos. (p. 15)

He says:

"'For centuries men have been forced to tear up the antique artifacts, if they were to have any metal at all." (p. 22)

Maybe this statement goes some way toward answering an earlier objection? See the combox here.