Fictional Biographies In Future Histories

Poul Anderson's Dominic Flandry hears of the lost island on Starkad whereas James Blish's Crispin de Ford hears of the Lost City in space. See the previous post. In true bloggish style, this comparison inspired further reflections on future histories.

The framework of a future history series enables its author to locate a fictional biography inside any period of his created historical sequence. Robert Heinlein could have done this with his Space Patrol hero, John Ezra Dahlquist, who is referenced in one Scribner juvenile novel and stars in one Future History short story. The title character of The Man Who Sold The Moon appears in one long story describing the height of his career and a shorter story, written earlier but set later, describing his death on the Moon. Heinlein's Future History, featuring Harriman, Dahlquist, Rhysling and others, served as a model for other future history series. Heinlein's Lazarus Long, appearing in only one novel (I do not acknowledge later additions), turns out to have lived through the entire History so it would have been good if he had cameoed earlier under one of his aliases.

Nicholas van Rijn, already elderly, introduced the Polesotechnic League period of Anderson's Technic History, then that period came to include the entire career of van Rijn's protege, David Falkayn, from Falkayn's apprenticeship with another Master Merchant of the League to his eventual seniority in van Rijn's Solar Spice & Liquors Company. Falkayn becomes acting CEO of SSL and we know that, later again, he will found a colony outside human space where he will have grandchildren and later descendants. The Technic History also included a Captain Flandry series, then acquired both a Young Flandry Trilogy and two Admiral Flandry novels.

Blish's Cities In Flight was complete as a trilogy, comprising:

They Shall Have Stars, prequel;

Earthman, Come Home, the collected Okie series and the end of the Okie period;

The Triumph Of Time, sequel.

 

However:

Earthman, Come Home refers to a previous city manager of New York, de Ford;

 

Blish was asked for a juvenile interstellar sf novel;

 

he wrote A Life For The Stars in which de Ford is shanghaied by Scranton but acquired by New York and promoted to city manager.

 

In another future historical sequence, Blish wrote:

 

"Common Time" in which Garrard test flies Haertel's FTL overdrive, then confers with Haertel;

 

other works in which the Haertel overdrive or its successors are used;

 

Welcome To Mars about the teenage Adolph Haertel.

 

Thus, in four future histories, we read about:

 

Harriman's achievements, death and how he is remembered;

Dahlquist's heroic death and how he is remembered;

Rhysling's songs and death in changing times;

a short cross-section of Lazarus Long's endless existence;

van Rijn's later career;

the lives of Falkayn, Flandry, de Ford and Haertel.

 

And I did not realize that I was setting out to summarize all of that.