The Lady Of The Winds

I have just read the fourth Cappen Varra story, "The Lady of the Winds," not having known that there was a fourth. It begins with a vivid description of blue sky above snowy peaks and proceeds to the Pagan world-view in which personal beings are behind such natural phenomena. Maybe the Lady of the Winds is related to the Queen of Air and Darkness?

I had to google two words: sortilege and velleity. The latter was familiar because I had encountered it once before here in Lucifer: Devil In The Gateway by Mike Carey. However, the word seems to have slightly different meanings in Wikipedia, Anderson and Carey.

Although "The Lady of the Winds" contains one brief fight scene, it mainly describes how Cappen writes a song. We know that he is inspired by a book that has been stolen from another universe but the surprise ending is that that other universe is ours.

I notice as I write that Neil Gaiman, from whom Carey inherited Lucifer Morningstar, and other big name authors were also represented in the same F&SF Anniversary Issue as "The Lady of the Winds." See attached image.

Cappen Varra: Conclusion

The Vulgar Unicorn, in which Cappen drinks, makes it onto a cover.

Three more unfamiliar words on one page: "...morions..."; "...feres..."; "...helve." (Poul Anderson, Fantasy, New York, 1981, p. 135)

Do Cappen and Jamie have it too easy in "The Gate of the Flying Knives"? Cappen has been warned of dark forces and grave dangers. Despite this, he and Jamie, without encountering any resistance:

approach the temple of the chief local deity some of whose devotees have kidnapped the Imperial representative's wife and her amanuensis as part of their resistance to the imposition of the Imperial cult;
break into the temple;
creep up to its roof;
pass through the gate into a parallel universe.

Here they meet the token resistance of three guards whom they quickly kill. Then they:

enter a house where they encounter only a deacon who faints when threatened;
retrieve the kidnapped women from the house;
start back, with the women, to the gate.

The second interruption to this triumphal progress comes when the chief villain emerges from the house and whistles for one of the flying monsters called "sikkintairs." Jamie kills the villain with a single cast of his spear and the sikkintair after, admittedly, a not inconsiderable battle.

The third and last obstacle occurs when they reach the gate. More sikkintairs approach from further away and would pursue through the gate. Should the four make their stand here to protect their city from the sikkintairs? At this stage, Cappen's mental acuity helps. He discerns or intuits how to close, indeed even how to annihilate, the gate after they have returned through it. It is a large, vertically suspended scroll, into which people disappear or from which they emerge, so cut down the scroll, fold it, then twist it into a Mobius strip. Now that it has only one side, it cannot have two sides, one in each universe, so it is no longer a gate. Then they pass back down through and out of the temple without any further resistance. So has this all been a bit too easy?

Jamie the Red was reminding me of someone but, of course, there is Erik the Red in history and Taury the Red in Anderson's "Flight to Forever."

Although Cappen Varra stars in only two (later: three?) stories, we recognize him as an episodic hero whose series could have been extended to a hundred installments. In each episode, he would win the prize and the lady but would then slip quietly away only to turn up "[a]gain penniless, houseless, and ladyless..." but making "...a brave sight just the same..." (p. 102) at the beginning of the next story.

However, Poul Anderson never wrote to a single formula.

Jamie The Red

Maybe everyone else out there already knew this but I certainly did not. When, in "The Gate of the Flying Knives" (Poul Anderson, Fantasy, New York, 1981), Anderson's character, Cappen Varra, receives help from his friend, Jamie the Red, that friend is a Thieves' World character in his own right and is even the title character of a novel by two other authors (see attachment).

Googling for images to illustrate posts reveals connections that I was unaware of. Because Anderson's "Fairy Gold," in The Unicorn Trade, referred to Cappen Varra, I set out to reread the two Varra stories in Fantasy, then realized that the second of these stories had originally been published in Thieves' World - and the interconnections proliferated from there. Googling "sikkintair" disclosed a reference to a "Jamie" so I checked to see whether this might be the same Jamie. And so on.

The more we delve into Poul Anderson's works, the more there is to be found in them. I have said this before but I continually rediscover it.

At present, I want to continue rereading Anderson's own works, not anyone else's, but I am also aware of his overlaps with Isaac's Universe, Asimov's Robot stories, Thieves' World, the Man-Kzin War period of Larry Niven's Known Space future history, the War World period of Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle's CoDominium future history, the planets called Cleopatra and Murasaki and I think a couple of other sf series that he has contributed to?

In fact, I have just found online the text of a Berserker story by Anderson.

Cappen Varra

The second of Poul Anderson's Cappen Varra short stories, "The Gate of the Flying Knives," which I am reading in Anderson's collection, Fantasy (New York, 1981), was originally published in the anthology, Thieves' World (see first image), and is set in a city called Sanctuary. Since googling reveals the existence of a Thieves' World novel called Sanctuary (see second image), I deduce that the two Cappen Varra stories and their sequel, "Fairy Gold," are set in this shared universe of the "Thieves' World." Cappen remarks that "'...Shalpa, patron of thieves...has the most devotees of any.'" (p. 114) (If Shalpa is indeed the patron of thieves, then he is a Thieves' World counterpart of Hermes and St Dismas.)

Having read "Fairy Gold" first, not originally knowing the order of the stories, I was pleased, when I started to read the opening story, "The Valor of Cappen Varra," to recognize place names like "Norren" (p. 124). As in several much longer series, Anderson quickly establishes the sense of a familiar, consistent background for the activities of diverse characters like, in this case, Arvel Tarabine and Cappen Varra.

Cappen is a humorous villainous hero:

"Cappen said nothing. If she wanted to think that he had come especially to rescue her, he would not be so ungallant as to tell her otherwise." (p. 95)

"...of course, if she wanted to think he was being magnanimous, it could be useful later -" (p. 98)

I have commented more than once both on Anderson's rich vocabulary and on his "list descriptions" of busy, bustling street scenes. Here, vocabulary-wise, we have:

"'...a theomachy...'" (p. 124);
"'...her coadjutrix...'" (p. 125);
"'...your inamorata...'" (p. 125).

These are all easily googled.

I think that "'...a sikkintair...'" (p. 126) is a denizen of Thieves' World as hobbits and Balrogs are of Middle Earth and as Marshwiggles are of Narnia.

Here are some descriptive lists:

(i) "Merchants, artisans, porters, servants, slaves, wives, nomads, courtesans, entertainers, beggars, thieves, gamblers, magicians, acolytes, soldiers, and who knew what else..." (pp. 102-103);

(ii) - and, continuing the same sentence, "...mingled, chattered, chaffered, quarreled, plotted, sang, played games, drank, ate, and who knew what else." (p. 103);

(iii) - next sentence, "Horsemen, cameldrivers, wagoners pushed through..." (p. 103).

The description continues, though with less lists. Music, vendors, neighbors and devotees each get a sentence or a clause to themselves. But then the street scene closes with a list of smells:

(iv) "...of flesh, sweat, roast meat and nuts, aromatic drinks, leather, wool, dung, smoke, oils, cheap perfume." (p. 103)

We are told that, "Ordinarily, Cappen Varra enjoyed this shabby-colorful spectacle..." (p. 103), although today he is preoccupied.

As ever, Poul Anderson celebrates human activity and life.

On The Track Of Cappen Varra

Fantasy (New York, 1981), a collection by Poul Anderson, comprises:

two stories and one satirical piece under the heading, "Historical";
three stories and one article under the heading, "A-Historical";
four stories, one article and one satirical piece under the heading, "It Could Happen To You";
an Afterword that seems to be part of the third section and that, when we turn to it, turns out to be by Anderson expert, Sandra Miesel.

This is far too mixed up. The various items would have to go into different volumes of any Complete Works.

In "Historical":

"House Rule" is an Old Phoenix inn between the worlds story that belongs in an alternative timelines/parallel universes collection;
"The Tale of Hauk" is a historical fantasy that belongs in a collection of stories set in various past periods;
"Of Pigs And Men," the satirical piece, belongs in a non-fiction, or at least non-narrative, collection.

In "A-Historical":
the article should be in a non-fiction collection;
the stories should indeed be in a Fantasy collection;
of these, the two Cappen Varra stories should be placed before "Fairy Gold" which is not here but which does refer to Cappen Varra.

In "It could Happen To You":
the article and the satirical piece should be in a non-fiction collection;
of the stories, "Interloper" and, I think, "The Visitor" (I have yet to reread it), are sf, not fantasy;
"The Visitor" is in any case repeated in the later collection, All One Universe;
"Pact" and "Superstition" are, I provisionally think, fantasy.

The Afterword is about Anderson's fantasies.

I am trying to track down Cappen Varra stories but felt obliged to analyze Fantasy before reading "The Valor of Cappen Varra."