Only twenty pages.
Reads like a summary of a long future history series.
Although the story is about interstellar exploration, four and a half of its nine narrative passages recount the consequences on Earth.
Poul Anderson shows that he can present a utopian future. Increased peace on Earth is attributed to knowledge of manifold reality but the vast growth in wealth must also be a factor.
This story belongs in the same category of futuristic speculations as Anderson's novel, Genesis, and his tetralogy, Harvest of Stars. Faster than light space travel and humanoid extra-terrestrials do not exist. We feel that these three later works present more credible futures.
4 comments:
Poul could b e very -compact- when he wanted.
Kaor, Mr. Stirling!
I agree, albeit there were times I regretted his talent for compact writing. I would have loved it if, for example, THE PLAGUE OF MASTERS had been 225 pages, instead of 125.
Beginning in 1980, with his three volume THE LAST VIKING, Anderson started writing longer stories. A really long one being the four volume THE KING OF YS, co-authored with Karen Anderson. And so on with many other works written during Anderson's last 12 years.
Ad astra! Sean
Remember that when Poul started his career, the average published SF novel was in the 60-70,000 word range.
You couldn't write long SF novels, as a general rule. There were exceptions, but they were (to coin a phrase) exceptional.
Kaor, Mr. Stirling!
That is true, plus Anderson contributed some exceptions to that general rule. One of his earliest pub. books, THE BROKEN SWORD, is well over 125 or 130 pages. Granted, that was fantasy, not SF.
I am glad you are not forced to cramp your stories into a mere 130 pages!
Ad astra! Sean
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