An Extended Present

Poul Anderson's Time Patrol series has a past, a present and a future. The "present," comprising Manse Everard's career in the twentieth century immediately before, then after, joining the Patrol stretches from 1955 to 1990, the period during which the series was published. Thus, Gorbachev is mentioned after he has become prominent in the real world although Everard would have known of him before.

By contrast, Julian May's Jack The Bodiless, first published in 1991, summarizes events in 2009, 2013 and 2016 in a chapter dated 2040. What marvelous things are dates. I hope still to be alive in 2040 when I will be ninety one. Meanwhile, Everard's 1990 was the same as ours (apart from the covert existence of the Patrol) whereas May's 2009 and following are a future that we might now think of as an alternative recent past.

Dare I hope still to be alive in 2057, the date quoted on the opening page of Anderson's History of Technic Civilization?