(i) Ys (under which King?);
(ii) in the Time Patrol timeline (which period?);
(iii) in Technic Civilization (which period? which planet?);
(iv) some other Andersonian universe (which one?).
The three that I have mentioned have certain common central features:
a strong historical basis;
a central character striving to hold everything together;
tragedy.
Grallon is tragic because he is the last King of Ys;
Flandry is tragic because he defends an Empire that will fall;
Everard is tragic because he guards a timeline that includes much suffering.
The Technic History is long enough to include central characters before Flandry. Ys informs us briefly about the founder and other early Kings. In an ideal universe, that entire history would be told.
6 comments:
Hi, Paul!
I hope your edition of THE KING OF YS includes the notes written by Poul and Karen Anderson at the end of each volume. I first read THE KING OF YS in four separate paberback books which lacked these informative notes. Then I replaced the softcover versions with the hardback SFBC edition, which included the notes.
As for which of the three "worlds" created by Poul Anderson you listed most likely to be preferred by me for living in, I think I would pick the Technic History, at the beginning of what I believe was the long reign of Emperor Georgios. Planets? Either Terra herself or Dennitza.
Or another fictional timeline? I like the world we see in THE HIGH CRUSADE and "Quest." And I hope other readers will offer their own suggestions!
And, yes, I agree that one of the qualities marking Gratillonius, Manse Everard, and Dominic Flandry is tragedy, the fear or realization that all they strove for and accomplished was either doomed to failure or came at a very high cost.
Sean
Sean,
I do have an edition with the auctorial notes.
The illustration looks like the cover of a single volume edition?
I would like to live on Avalon after the Terran War.
Paul.
Hi, Paul!
Yes, the illustration you chose was for the one volume complete edition of THE KING OF YS, altho I don't recall if it also included the notes.
Again, yes, the double human/Ythrian colony on Avalon would also be a very interesting world on which to live.
Sean
Ys doesn't strike me as all that great, even if it's an improvement on many places in the fourth century. You could be poor; or you could be rich, and still not have the standard of living of a rather poor 20th century American, at least in some ways. You could be an aristocrat of royal blood, and worry about yourself or your daughter becoming the wife of a series of kings, each killing his predecessor. After good king Hoel, Colconnor; after good king Grallon, the end.
We aren't given a full history of the Time Patrol timeline, but there seems to be war, tragedy, and retrogression as well as progress. Perhaps far uptime, in the Era of Oneness -- but we don't really know what that's like.
The great days of the Polesotechnic League might be a pretty good time to live. You could live pretty comfortably on Terra or various colonies, or seek adventure and a chance of getting rich at distant trading posts. But then, there would be worms at the heart of the rose.
Best Regards,
Nicholas Rosen
Hi, Nicholas!
What you are saying is that ALL human societies, without exception, are flawed and imperfect. With, perhaps, the exception of the mysterious, post human Danellians in the Time Patrol series. But, we know too little about them to speculate (altho I have my suspicions that even the Danellians are flawed).
Yes, the early Polesotechnic League, down till when Nicholas van Rijn was about fifty years old, would probably be a good time for us to have lived in. I suggested the earlier reign of Emperor Georgios, during the Terran Empire.
Sean
Any society in which the germ theory of disease and the corresponding exercise of sanitation is not understood, is something I might want to read about, but not live in.
Just the existence of anti-vaxxers in our current society is bad enough.
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