Anderson Celebrates Life

Poul Anderson celebrates humanity throughout history and into speculative futures. His characters inhabit diverse locations, including:

Hiram's Tyre;
the legendary Ys;
the city of Gray on the planet Avalon;
a future era, the "Winter of the World," when technology has been lost.

They can struggle for survival or enjoy great wealth, can meet gods, aliens or superior AI, may be pious like Gratillonius of Ys and van Rijn of the League or cynical like Everard of the Patrol and Flandry of the Empire. What they have in common is that they live and Anderson conveys their sensations and perceptions.

While an escaped mutineer hides, floating in the water of a harbor, he smells salt, smoke, tar and fish, sees docks, warehouses, fishing smacks and steamboats and -

"Inshore, Newkeep raised walls, towers, battlements. The light of a newly risen sun glowed on lichenous brick, flashed off high windows, gave back red and gold from the Imperial standard which flew above...Despite its name, as commonly translated by the Seafolk, Newkeep was over three thousand years old." (1)

It is always worth rereading Anderson's novels to savor descriptive passages. Here, our viewpoint character is on the run, in danger of his life and up to his neck in water but, like van Rijn feasting and conniving, he is alive.

(1) Anderson, Poul, The Winter Of The World, New York, 1976, p. 19.

Who Knows of Avalon?

In "The Problem of Pain"

"...intermediate in size between Earth and Ythri, surface gravity 0.8 terrestrial;
"slightly more irradiation, from a somewhat yellower sun, than Earth gets, which simply makes it a little warmer;
"axial tilt, therefore seasonal variations, a bit less than terrestrial;
"length of year about three quarters of ours, length of day a bit under half;
"one small, close in, bright moon;
"biochemistry similar to ours - we could eat most native things, though we'd require imported crops and livestock to supplement the diet.
"All in all, seemingly well-nigh perfect." (1)

South of the largest continent, a great gulf swarms with life. A strong eastward current is deflected north by an archipelago. Monstrous marine creatures graze on floating islands of densely interwoven "atlantis weed" probably also supporting lesser plants and animals. Higher solar energy input and rapid rotation make storms more violent than would be possible on Earth.

On an island in the gulf:

"A mat of mossy, intensely green plants squeezed out any possibility of forest." (2)

Surgeon trees' thin leaf-fringed bows, sharp enough to cut a wing from a swooping Ythrian, whip insanely in the wind which blows gorgeous blossoms torn from vines. Widespread low, russet-leaved, rankly odorous hell shrubs clutch at feet with raking twigs and emit vapours scarcely harming Ythrians but slowly poisoning human beings. Waterfowl fly through a rose, gold and silver-blue sunrise.

In "Wingless"

Ythrians and human beings settle different territories in the Hesperian Islands before jointly colonising the Coronan continent. Nat Falkayn, seventeen Avalonian (twelve Terran) years of age when visiting the Ythrian extended household of Weathermaker Choth:

"...stood on a balcony of that tall stone tower which housed the core families. Below were a paved courtyard and rambling wooden buildings. Meadows where meat animals grazed sloped downhill in Terrestrial grass and clover, Ythrian starbell and rye, Terrestrial oak and pine, Ythrian braidbark and copperwood, until cultivation gave way to the reddish mat of native susin, the scattered intense green of native chasuble bush and delicate blue of janie. The sun Laura stood big and golden-colored at morning, above a distantly glimpsed mercury line of ocean. Elsewhere wandered a few cottony clouds and the pale, sinking ghost of Morgana. A flock of Avalonian draculas passed across view, their leathery wings awkward beside the plumed splendor of Keshchyi's." (3)

Morgana is the moon, brighter and faster than Luna. Keshchyi is a young Ythrian.

Whirlpools around the dark coraloid reefs at a lagoon entrance hold "...thick brown nets of atlantis weed torn loose from a greater mass far out to sea..." (4)

In "Rescue on Avalon"

The highest Avalonian mountains are called the Andromeda Range by human beings and the Weathermother by Ythrians. (Hloch of the Stormgate Choth wrote The Earthbook of Stormgate on the peak of Mount Anrovil in the Weathermother.) Ironleaf trees draw metal from the soil and concentrate pure particles in shining purple leaves which attract pollinating bugs and also absorb radio waves. A hospital window opens on Avalonian king's-crown, Ythrian windnest and Earthly oak.

The Parliament of Man and the Great Khruath of the Ythrians divided continental territory between the species. Human beings need prairies for crops whereas Ythrian hunters occupy the Weathermother.

In The People of the Wind, Chapter One

The city of Gray on Falkayn Bay is surrounded by human-owned grain-fields, Ythrian-owned pastures for maukh and mayaw, forests of oak, pine, windnest or hammerbranch and treeless areas of native susin where some barysauroids survive. Even in Gray, humans, with ample room on Avalon, build low. Highrises are for ornithoids (Ythrians).

"Laura, a G5 star, has only 72 per cent the luminosity of Sol and less ultraviolet light in proportion; but Avalon, orbiting at a mean distance of 0.81 astronomical unit in a period of 0.724 Terran, gets 10 percent more total irradiation than man evolved under." (5)

Christopher Holm, thirty years Avalonian old, has joined Stormgate Choth as Arinninan. The Stormgate compound:

"...stood on a plateau of Mount Fairview. At the middle lifted the old stone tower which housed the senior members of the family and their children. Lower wooden structures, on whose sod roofs bloomed amberdragon and starbells, were for the unwed and retainers and their kin. Further down a slope lay sheds, barns, and mews. The whole could not be seen at once from the ground, because Ythrian trees grew among the buildings: braidbark, copperwood, gaunt lightningrod, jewelleaf which sheened beneath the moon and by day would shimmer iridescent. The flowerbeds held natives, more highly evolved than anything from offplanet - sweet small janie, pungent livewell, graceful trefoil and Buddha's cup, a harp vine which the breeze brought ever so faintly to singing. Otherwise the night was quiet and, at this, altitude, cold." (6)

Avalonian constellations include Wheel, Swords, Zirraukh, Ship and Maukh.

Chapter Two

"Avalon rotates in 11 hours, 22 minutes, 12 seconds, on an axis tilted 21 degrees from the normal to the orbital plane. Thus Gray, at about 43 degrees N., knows short nights always; in summer the darkness seems scarcely a blink." (7)

Human fluid balance and kinesthesia have had to readjust to a gravity field only 80 percent Terran. Ythrians shifting their breeding cycle to Avalonian conditions had low fertility in early generations.

Humans who join choths "go bird." Ythrians who leave choths to become atomic individuals within the global community become "Walkers." Mistwood Choth, like the home world Ythri, has successfully adapted Terran technology.

Chapter Three

Equatorial diameter: 11,308 kilometers. Highest Andromedan peak: 4500 meters. Corona, the north polar continent extending past the Tropic of Swords: eight million square kilometers, comparable to Australia. In the Southern hemisphere, Equatoria, New Africa and New Gaiila are small continents or large islands.

2000 kilometres west of Gray, the Oronesian archipelago crosses the Tropic of Spears, separating the Middle Ocean to the West from the Hesperian Sea in the northern hemisphere and the South Ocean beyond the equator. Oronesia supports a distinct ecology. Eccentrics flee there to settle islands and found choths of only a single household. However, the more numerous Highsky Choth occupies much of the archipelago and controls the fisheries around latitude 30 degrees North. Tabitha Falkayn, Hrill of Highsky, is a third generation human member of her choth and was brought up by Ythrians. Western Corona and northern Oronesia must defend the Hesperian Sea against Terrans.

Upper slopes have susin and a few shrubs. Lower, cultivated ground has red Ythrian clustergrain to feed shuas and Terrestrial fruit trees to feed Highsky humans. A herder and his uhoth control flapping shuas while an Ythrian sailor scouts for piscoids and native pteropleuron lumber around.

Chapter Four is about Terrans preparing to attack Avalon from Esperance.

Chapter Five

The main Ythrian language is Planha, the equivalent of Terran Anglic. Khruaths, gatherings open to all free adults in a given territory, have judicial and limited legislative authority. Wyvans, the presiding officers, explain the law and try suits but cannot compel. If non-compliance is deemed sufficiently serious, then the Wyvans cry Oherran, calling on everyone in the territory to attack the offenders. Rejection of the call would be a deathpride matter, with suicide the Wyvans' only option.

Addendum, Sun 23 Nov 2015: I was too brief about the Khruaths -

an ancient Khruath was a periodic gathering open to all free adults in a territory;
later, regional Khruaths elected delegates to Year-Khruaths covering larger territories;
Year-Khruaths send delegates to the High Khruath of the planet, meeting every six years or on extraordinary occasions;
Wyvans are chosen at each level;
however, any free adult can attend a Khruath at any level.

Chapter Six

The only other Avalonian city is Centauri at the mouth of the Sagittarius in the Gulf of Centaurs. In the Phoenix House, Tabitha/Hrill orders a catflower cocktail. She and Chris/Arinnian eat piscoid-and-tomato chowder, beef-and-shua pie, salad of clustergrain leaf and pears and drink coffee spiced with witchroot and a bottle of vintage dago. The Nest, a tavern for ornithoids, is the tallest building in Centauri with a gravshaft to its rooftop for humans who have not brought flying gear. It is unwalled, protected from rain by a vitryl canopy. Insectoids circle fluoroglobes and a service robot serves New African beer.

Most of Highsky keeps to the Old Faith, using drugs in sacred revels. Other planets in the Lauran System are Elysium, Camelot, Phaeacia and Utgard.

Chapters Seven and Eight describe a battle in space.

Chapter Nine

Morgana is smaller than Luna but, being close, raises twice the tides. The Avalonian vertebrate design is hexapodal. Winged creatures have four legs. The dense mat of low-growing vegetation prevents native forests and helps to explain why animals remain reptiloid, unable to compete with mammals or birds. Trees are low and thick or slim and supple to survive high winds caused by rapid rotation. Imported domestic animals had to be revamped genetically because local food lacks some vitamins.

In Chapter Ten, the Terran Admiral parleys with Avalonian leaders and a fallen Avalonian, the First Marchwarden, is laid to rest.

Chapter Eleven

High Wyvan Liaw of the Tarns addresses the Great Khruath of Avalon from outside David Falkayn's house on First Island in the Hesperian Sea. On a North Coronan prairie, a flapping youth leads a herd of quadrupedal burden-bearing zirraukhs. South-East from Oronesia are the Brendan's, Fiery and Shielding Islands. Atlantis weed patches are entire ecologies grazed by peaceful but huge kraken. David Falkayn's granddaughter named Avalon. Equatorian centaurs use tools of stone and bone.

Chapters Twelve and Thirteen are mainly about the consequences of the war in space.

Chapter Thirteen

In winter, snow falls in North Corona and in the mountains but not in Gray where "...the susin stayed green on its hills the year around." (8)

Chapter Fourteen

Zirraukhs are warm-blooded quadrupeds smaller than horses and unlike them but used for the same purpose.

Chapter Fifteen

An Ythrian swoops on a pteropleuron that had been hunting piscoids near the surface of the sea.

Chapter Sixteen

Grief causes premature ovulation in a bereaved Ythrian female. A male seeks her out. This is not against choth law and the female's human chothmate, Arinnian, has no cause to challenge so he insults the Ythrian male until the latter challenges him.

Chapter Seventeen

On the Scorpelunan plateau in Equatoria, hexapods graze under their parasol membranes. Packs of dog-sized hexapodal lycosauroids and throngs of twenty centimeter long cockroach-like kakkelaks attack Terran invaders who are being slowly poisoned by hell shrubs. Furious tropical storms caused by high irradiation and fast spin delay evacuation.

Chapter Eighteen

Smaragdine susin, chasuble bush and Buddha's cup grow on a hill above Falkayn Bay. 

Chapter Nineteen

Trefoil and sword-of-sorrow grow in the grass. Harp vines ring. Jewelleafs twinkle. Morgana is less bright because scarred by Terran bombardment.

Why Am I Doing This?

I have summarized an alternative reading. We read an Anderson novel to follow the story. We appreciate that there are rich background details but do not usually pause to savor the details. I have noted as many details as I can of the planet Avalon.

(1) Poul Anderson, "The Problem of Pain" IN Anderson, The Earth Book of Stormgate, New York, 1978, pp. 26-48, AT p. 33.
(2) ibid., p. 40.
(3) Poul Anderson, "Wingless" IN The Earth Book of Stormgate, pp. 411-420, AT pp. 413-414.
(4) ibid., p. 417.
(5) Poul Anderson, The People of the Wind, London, 1977, p. 7.
(6) ibid., p. 10.
(7) ibid., p. 18.
(8) ibid., p. 127.

Fair Winds Forever

Poul Anderson was able to invent new characters for specific purposes, then invest them with substance. An omnibus collection contains twelve works (eleven stories and one novel) set before, during and after the period of the Polesotechnic League. Another novel, The People of the Wind, is set after this period. From this further novel, Anderson generated a title and interstitial passages for the collection. The People of the Wind is set on the planet Avalon where some humans and Ythrians are organised as the Stormgate Choth so the collection became The Earth Book of Stormgate. The rationale for the title is that the works in the collection present human perspectives on events preceding the founding of the Stormgate Choth on Avalon.

Five of the works feature Ythrians. Of these, four focus explicitly on human-Ythrian relations, three are set on Avalon, two are set after the joint colonisation of Avalon and one is about Falkayn, the founder of the Avalonian colony, and his employer, van Rijn. Of the seven non-Ythrian works, one is about Falkayn, one about his future travelling companion, one about a planet previously visited by Falkayn and three about van Rijn. The one remaining story mentions van Rijn. Thus, all twelve works are connected to each other but not all in ways that link them directly to Avalon. Anderson makes this further connection in the specially written Earth Book introductions to the works.

In "Esau," Emil Dalmady reports to van Rijn. The Earth Book introduction informs us that Dalmady's children joined the Avalonian colony where one of them wrote "Esau." The introductions to two other stories inform us that she also wrote them. Earth Book introductions mention three Stormgate members from The People of the Wind: Lythran, Blawsa and Christopher Holm/Arinnian. They also introduce new characters: the historian Rennhi, who wrote The Sky Book of Stormgate about Ythrian perspectives but who died before she could start the companion volume, the Earth Book, and her son Hloch who wrote the Earth Book. Arinnian wrote one Earth Book story and collaborated with Hloch on two others which were based on Rennhi's decipherment of records left by van Rijn and Falkayn on Falkayn's home planet, Hermes.

Hloch's other sources are:

Far Adventure by Maeve Downey, the autobiography of a planetologist;

a private correspondence recorded on Terra and kept in the archives of the University of Fleurville on the planet Esperance;

the reminiscences of James Ching, a spaceman who settled on Catawrayannis;

Tales of the Great Frontier by A. A. Craig;

stories by Judith Dalmady in the Avalonian periodical Morgana;

a historical novel about van Rijn originally published on either Terra or Hermes;

a tale brought to Ythri by the xenologist Fluoch of Mistwood and translated into Anglic by Arinnian;

the private journal of the spaceship captain Hiraharouk of Wryfields Choth on Ythri.

Hloch writes of Rennhi that her Sky Book, which we do not read, describes the history of the choth, the Ythrian ancestors, the Avalonian founders and their descendants to her own day.

"...of how past and present and future have forever been intermingled and, in living minds, ever begetting each other - of this does her work pursue the truth, and will as long as thought flies over our world." (1)

Thus, Anderson adds significantly to the works gathered in the Earth Book. Hloch signs off with:

"Now The Earth Book of Stormgate is ended. From my tower I see the great white sweep of the snows upon Mount Anrovil. I feel the air blow in and caress my feathers. Yonder sky is calling. I will go.
"Fair winds forever." (2)

(1) Poul Anderson, The Earth Book of Stormgate, New York, 1978, p. 2.
(2) op. cit., p. 434.

Ansa and Avalon

In a "future history," stories are set in successive periods so that the events of earlier stories inform the background of later stories. By this criterion, one small part of Poul Anderson's Technic History, just four stories and one novel, is a miniature future history: 

the planet Avalon is colonized in the late twenty fifth century;

the Terran Empire is founded near the end of the twenty sixth century;

the Empire annexes the colonized planet Ansa in the twenty eighth century

but fails to annex Avalon in the twenty ninth century.

Hence, a Hegelian triad:

thesis - colonial freedom;
antithesis - imperial annexation;
synthesis - settling of border disputes, later followed by continued trade and cultural influence.

Dates are given not in the stories but in a Chronology compiled by Sandra Miesel after consultation with Poul Anderson. At the very least, we should understand that several centuries elapse between the twentieth century and the Polesotechnic League and a comparable period between the League and the Empire, then several millennia before the Commonalty. Some dates seem arbitrary. Thus, Dominic Flandry is said to be born in 3000 so that he is a nineteen year old Ensign in Ensign Flandry, said to be set in 3019. Nine volumes of the History cover only forty five years, till Flandry meets his illegitimate daughter, but events important to the Empire, like civil war and usurpation, occur in this period. Works set during the post-Imperial "Long Night" have round number dates: 3600, 3900, 4000 and 7100. The Long Night, three stories and one novel, is a second miniature history.

Returning to the first mini-history, "Sargasso of Lost Starships," about Ansa, originally published in Planet Stories in 1952 but not included in an Anderson collection until 2009, is definitely part of the History because it refers to Manuel Argos who founded the Empire that same year in Planet Stories. It also includes alien races known to Flandry. One of the Terran ships attacking Avalon in the later novel is called Ansa. No future history has ever comprised its author's total sf output. However, a future history may contain stories of variable quality from different periods of its author's career. The fantastic and implausible space opera of "Sargasso of Lost Starships" contrasts sharply with the scientific and political realism of the Avalonian stories. All that matters for the Technic History is that the Empire forcibly annexed Ansa. Whether Terrans and Ansans then encountered psychically powerful humanoids in a "Black Nebula" is another matter. Baen Editor Hank Davis added a fictitious introduction suggesting that this part of the story is early Imperialist propaganda, thus a fiction within the fiction. (1) From its title, I had expected "Sargasso of Lost Starships" to be hard sf about abandoned spaceships orbiting together, not a fantasy with alien characters resembling ancient kings and queens.

Anderson had already presented "The Star Plunderer," about Manuel Argos, not as a straightforward, presumably accurate, narrative but as an excavated text that may be either "...a genuine record..." or "...historical fiction..." (2) The stories included in The Earthbook of Stormgate are retroactively presented as narratives published on Avalon that may or may not be true accounts of the events described. This recognition of the stories' textuality would have enabled Anderson to write, for example, a longer account of Manuel's career without any obligation to remain consistent with Admiral Reeve's account in "The Star Plunderer." The History gains authenticity from the fact that readers may regard some of its parts as inauthentic.

(1) Davis, Hank, Introduction IN Anderson, Poul, The Rise of the Terran Empire, Riverdale, NY, 2009, pp. 263-264.

(2) ibid, p. 235.

The Earth Book of Stormgate

"Wings of Victory" and "The Problem of Pain" describe early human-Ythrian contact. "Wingless," "Rescue on Avalon" and The People of the Wind are set on the joint human-Ythrian colony planet, Avalon. The Earth Book of Stormgate is a collection beginning with "Wings of Victory" and "The Problem of Pain" and ending with "Wingless" and "Rescue on Avalon." Between these end points, the collection contains seven stories and one novel set during the Polesotechnic League period of Anderson's History of Technic Civilisation. The People of the Wind is set in the early Imperial period.

  In The Earth Book, an Avalonian Ythrian, Hloch of the Stormgate Choth, fictitiously writes a general introduction, introductions to particular works and a general conclusion. He writes in the aftermath of the Terran War on Avalon as described in The People of the Wind. Hloch's contributions enhance the fictitious history which is already rich in the individual stories. For example, the hero of "Esau," Emil Dalmady, comes from the colony planet Altai later visited by Dominic Flandry during the later Imperial period. Dalmady reports to Nicholas van Rijn, a Master Merchant of the Polesotechnic League. He meets an alien race, the Baburites, who will later invade Hermes (home planet of David Falkayn, protege of van Rijn and Founder of the Avalonian colony) and Mirkheim (an important planet discovered by Falkayn). Hloch adds that Dalmady's children moved to Avalon where works written by his daughter were included in The Earth Book. These include the story about her father entitled "Esau" and another about Falkayn's grandson on Avalon.

Hloch also tells us that, when the League was breaking up, van Rijn and Falkayn moved records from Earth to Hermes. Later acquired and deciphered by Hloch's mother, these records revealed previously unknown information about Falkayn on the planet Merseia (Flandry's later enemy) and about van Rijn's belated arrival at Mirkheim. Hloch and Arinnian, the latter a character from The People of the Wind, work this information into narrative form which we read as stories in The Earth Book. By telling us how the stories originated, Hloch adds to the history behind the stories.

The first Ythrian story is pre-League. Avalonian stories are post-. Thus, The Earth Book spans the League period. But there are other works set in the same period:

a three story van Rijn collection;
a three story Falkayn collection;
two novels featuring both characters.

There is also one story, "The Saturn Game," set long before "Wings of Victory" and there are two stories of the early Empire set before The People of the Wind. I suggest that all these works from "The Saturn Game" up to and including The People of the Wind can be seen as an expanded Earth Book. Imagine that Hloch's successor as an Avalonian historian finds these works and includes them in chronological order in a later edition of The Earth Book although without adding introductions as Hloch had done. Hloch's commentaries would remain although with "The Saturn Game" now preceding even his general introduction. The work would comprise several volumes but with a changed reading order. For example, the first two Falkayn stories belong in an early introductory section or volume, not in the later Trader Team section.

The proposed expanded Earth Book would differ in two ways from the first three volumes of the current Baen editions of the Technic History. First, where there are introductions or afterwords by the human author Anderson, I suggest that these should be preserved and published but in an Appendix at the end of the series so that they do not interrupt the flow of the Avalonian narration. Secondly, I disagree with the way the volumes are divided up. For example, I argue that the van Rijn/Falkayn novel, Mirkheim, should conclude a Trader Team volume, not introduce a Rise of the Terran Empire volume. A better title for The Rise of the Terran Empire, minus Mirkheim, would be Avalon and Empire. The Empire is not founded until "The Star Plunderer" which comes after "Rescue on Avalon." (Anderson's future history is richer and better written than Asimov's series containing Foundation and Empire.) I think it makes sense to read the van Rijn works en bloc, then the Trader Team series, starring Falkayn, en bloc.

However, Baen and their editor, Hank Davis, are doing something I could not do: letting everyone read Anderson's series from beginning to end for the very first time.

Anderson, Poul. The Earth Book of Stormgate, New York, 1978.