Wednesday 1 September 2021

Marco Polo And Extratemporal Encounters In At Least Four Timelines

Some sources:

Poul Anderson, "The Only Game in Town" IN Anderson, Time Patrol (Riverdale, NY, 2010), pp. 129-171.

Neil Gaiman, "Soft Places" IN Gaiman, The Sandman: Fables And Reflections (New York), pp. 124-148.

Doctor Who, during the period of the first Doctor.

Section 2 of "The Only Game in Town" begins:

"Anno Domini One Thousand Two Hundred Eighty:..." (p. 133)

- then tells us what Kublai Khan, Marco Polo and several others, including two Time Patrolmen, were doing in that year.

"Soft Places" begins:

"Anno Domini 1273.
"A sense of mounting panic rises in Marco's chest." (p. 125, panels 1-2.)
 
- then shows us Marco Polo's encounters with people from other times.
 
Marco did not record his meeting with the Doctor because he thought that time travel would not be believed.
 
I have read one other work that concluded with an extratemporal encounter with Marco but remember neither title nor author's name. The text ended:
 
"Mar. Co. Po. Lo. A strange name in a strange tongue."  

1 comment:

Sean M. Brooks said...

Kaor, Paul!

One of the things I remember from Anderson's "The Only Game In Town" was the Indian Patrol agent (John Sandoval?) commenting that while Kublai Khan might have been inspired by Marco Polo's tales, it was the Khan's idea to send an exploratory party eastwards to find out what might be found.

Ad astra! Sean