"'...everyone but Sol must be disarmed, and the only way to enforce such a peace is for Sol to be the unquestioned ruler.'"
-"The Star Plunderer," p. 356.
Basil Donovan says:
"'We led you and it was to defeat... We've been stripped of our titles. We're just plain citizens of the Empire now like you, and the new rulers are Terran. Why do you still think of us as your leaders?'"
-Poul Anderson, "Sargasso of Lost Starships" IN Anderson, Rise Of The Terran Empire (Riverdale, NY, 2011), pp. 363-436 at I, p. 368-369.
Despite the previous post, these passages display historical consistency and continuity. Argos says that his Empire will conquer. Later, Donovan speaks as one of the conquered. A complex series presents different points of view. Poul Anderson's Technic History succeeds admirably. The Terran Empire is resisted unsuccessfully in "Sargasso of Lost Starships" but successfully in The People Of The Wind and "Outpost of Empire" and is defended brilliantly by Dominic Flandry throughout his career. Flandry's son betrays the Empire but his daughter follows in her father's footsteps, then, after a long gap, we are shown the aftermath of the Empire and two of its successor civilizations.
The Technic History: can't get enough of it.
1 comment:
Kaor, Paul!
I would have replied to Basil Donovan with the suggestion that many Ansans still thought of their defeated aristocrats as their natural leaders from habit, and personal respect and affection in many cases.
I don't think the Empire was exactly defeated in "Outpost of Empire." The outback Freeholders were counting on the Empire to show moral self restraint by not using the EXTREME means that would have crushed them. The problem was the Outbackers not being included in the negotiations led by the Freehold Cities on how and on what terms the planet would be annexed by the Empire. And the Outbackers objected to the very existence of the Cities.
Sean
Post a Comment