During And After

(Some general reflections but they will link back to Poul Anderson's works. Please bear with me.)

There are two ways to know of a historical period or process: live it or study it. Sometimes we can do both. My parents lived through World War II and long enough after it to read histories of it. I did the same with the Cold War and, of course, could read analyses at the time.

Sometimes, the distinction between living and studying is not as clear as we think. I spoke to a veteran of the famous "Battle of Cable St" when 100,000 anti-fascist demonstrators prevented 3,000 uniformed Blackshirts protected by 6,000 Metropolitan Police from provocatively marching through a Jewish district of London in 1936. His account:

"What did I see on the day? Other people's backs!
"How did I know that we stopped the fascists from marching? I read it in the newspaper the following day!"

It is possible to be right in the middle of an event and yet not, immediately, know its significance.

A neighbor remarked that he was reading about a public meeting held in London before the War. When an elderly visitor spoke knowledgeably about that same meeting and was asked about his involvement in it, he replied, "I chaired the meeting." Suddenly, written history had become oral history. In fact, I have just been interviewed about events that I was involved in thirty years ago.

All of this has a direct relevance to Poul Anderson's Time Patrol series. A Patrolman can reverse this process. He can first study a period, then live through it. And he is not limited to events in his own lifetime. That is precisely what happens in "The Sorrow of Odin the Goth", which I will probably reread next.