Monday 29 April 2024

Other League-Empire Links

The trader team's experience on Merseia lays the basis for the Merseian xenophobia of the Imperial period. 

The second Young Flandry novel involves the rediscovery and reclamation of a robotic mining operation abandoned at the end of the League period.

Flandry refers twice to van Rijn and once to a planet called "Vanrijn." That third reference harks back to the first story in Trader To The Stars although we did not then know that the home planet of the newly contacted bipartite race would be named after van Rijn.

Several other intelligent species are common to both periods, none having become extinct in between. (Surprise: the Chereionites, not introduced until the Flandry period, turn out to have been extinct all along except for their single survivor, Aycharaych.)

The planets, Hermes and Diomedes, play roles in both periods. Other planets are present as background references, e.g., van Rijn's operative, Emil Dalmady, comes from Altai where Flandry, later, foils the Merseians; van Rijn's space yacht captain and Flandry's acquaintance, Chunderban Desai, both come from Ramanujan.

Meanwhile, rereading The Byworlder, it has become a travelogue: the sea journey; the subsea station; San Pedro Bay; a train journey inland; Watts Tower; Afroville. This happens sometimes in futuristic sf.

Back in China, Wang Li has the misfortune to be married to a fanatical harridan. The daily life of the future.

4 comments:

Sean M. Brooks said...

Kaor, Paul!

And, IIRC, we see mention in A KNIGHT OF GHOSTS AND SHADOWS of Flandry meeting Tachwyr the Dark on Talwin dressed in the most flamboyant Ramanujan style of that time, including a gaudy turban. But Flandry had a reason for wearing that turban!

Ad astra! Sean

Sean M. Brooks said...

Kaor, Paul!

I forgot to mention I think Wayland and that League base on Irumclaw were both abandoned around 2600 as the Time of Troubles became really destructive and chaotic.

Ad astra! Sean

S.M. Stirling said...

Altai became much more "archaic" in the interval between the League and Flandry. Which makes sense; if they're pursuing a nomadic lifestyle, then the attitudes that go with it would make sense and would be reconstructed from old stories, literature, etc.

Sean M. Brooks said...

Kaor, Mr. Stirling!

I agree, and we see Oleg Khan making very similar points to Flandry in "A Message in Secret."

I did think it odd, given the part Russian background of the colonists on Altai, nothing like Russian Orthodox Christianity among the religions of that planet.

Ad astra! Sean