Saturday 8 December 2018

Elder Races

I have found the, or at least a, reference to Avalon in Diamond Mask and will quote the passage when I have time for a more leisurely post.

Meanwhile, consider seven Elder Races:

in Poul Anderson's Technic History, the Ancients are dead or gone and human beings run Technic civilization and will spread through several spiral arms;

in Anderson's The Avatar, the Others are alive but remote and human beings will become like the Others;

in Anderson's "Flight to Forever," the last of the Vro-Hi, half a million years old, plans the philosophy of the Second Galactic Empire;

in Anderson's Tau Zero, human beings will become the elder race of the next universe;

in Julian May's Galactic Milieu, the Lylmik are dying but humanity will take their place;

the Lensman and Green Lantern series both have a proactive elder race - and did Mentor of Arisia once reveal that his real form was a naked brain like May's Jack the Bodiless? I can't remember.

3 comments:

Sean M. Brooks said...

Kaor, Paul!

We also see a non-human elder race in Anderson's story "The Martyr." And the ancient Ai Chun of WORLD WITHOUT STARS is certainly at least an ELDER race.

Sean

paulshackley2017@gmail.com said...

Sean,
Anderson gives us more of everything.
Paul.

Sean M. Brooks said...

Kaor, Paul!

I agree! And since I've finished reading Stirling's THE SKY BLUE WOLVES, I finally feel free to start rereading soon the HARVEST OF STARS books.

Sean