-Poul Anderson, The Shield of Time (New York, 1991), PART ONE, 1987 A. D., p. 4.
"I'd like to go back and find out what became of my trek-mates, Hipponicus, those two women and the baby....No. I've only so much lifespan left me, whatever the length of it turns out to be, and it'll hold heartbreak enough. Maybe they survived okay."
-ibid., PART TWO, 1902 A. D., p. 120.
Everard's trek-mates were among the metaphorical eddies or bubbles referred to in the previous post.
"...I had been warned at the beginning that a Time Patrol agent's life becomes a series of farewells. I had yet to learn what that really meant."
-Poul Anderson, "The Sorrow of Odin the Goth" IN Anderson, Time Patrol (Riverdale, NY, 2010), pp. 333-465 AT 1980, p. 351.
In one way, it is easy. An agent can just leave an acquaintance centuries in the past and never go back. On the other hand, how easy is that?
2 comments:
I was an Air Force brat, and you got used to moving regularly... and this was before the Internet made it easy to keep in touch with people.
Kaor, Paul!
While I see Stirling's points, Everard was thinking of people who had nothing like the Internet, or even regular, reliable snail mail.
Easier for Everard to let go of memories of people in the past he had known only casually, harder with those he had known well.
Ad astra! Sean
Post a Comment