Delay

Maybe I can explain some delay in rereading the next Poul Anderson story? Poul and Karen Anderson's character, Gaius Valerius Gratillonius, the last King of Ys, knows no Greek so cannot read Homer but loves Vergil's Aeneid. I also know no Greek but am trying to revive and improve my school Latin so that I can at least read the Aeneid. I spent time today struggling with Latin word order: "The robbers from the man from the forum coming money took."

The attached map shows the epic journey of Aeneas, ancestor of Romulus, from Troy to Italy via Carthage. Vergil presents a mythical account of the origin of the conflict between Rome and Carthage, a conflict that became important in Anderson's Time Patrol series. Ys was a colony of Carthage which was a colony of Tyre which in turn figures prominently both in the Bible and in The Time Patrol.

Anderson retold Norse sagas and both Andersons retold the legend of Ys. Homer and Vergil would also have been suitable subjects but no one can do everything and Anderson in fact did an amazing amount.