Here is a short descriptive passage that need not have been in this space opera but immeasurably enhances it:
"The engines began to thrum. Under way, outward bound to the ice mountains of Gorzun, no more to see blue skies and green grass, no clean salt smell of ocean and roar of wind in tall trees. Now we were slaves and had nothing to do but wait." (p. 336)
There are ice mountains on Earth, of course, although it is implied that they are a bigger feature of Gorzun - but they cannot cover the entire surface because there has to be an ecology to support the large, four-armed Gorzuni.
We notice three senses in the quoted paragraph:
seen blue and green;
smell of salt;
sound of wind.
(The Terrestrial tricolor (scroll down) should be blue, white and green.)
The ship goes into secondary drive and leaves the Solar System. Thus, it is retroactively decreed that this "secondary drive" is identical with the multiple quantum jumps "hyperdrive" of the Technic History.
8 comments:
Kaor, Paul!
Problem is, we don't know what the official flag of the Solar Commonwealth looked like. We never see any descriptions of it. Also, I have suggested before your proposed Terrestrial tricolor looks too much like the Romanian flag.
But we do have some idea of what the flag of the Terran Empire looked like. We see this in Chapter 1 of ENSIGN FLANDRY, at the Coral Palace: "The sky illumination had now formed a gigantic banner overhead, the Sunburst alive in a field of royal blue as if atmospheric winds bugled salute." I argue this strongly indicates the Imperial flag was a stylized Sunburst in a royal blue field. And we see repeated mentions in the Flandry stories of a stylized Sunburst being an Imperial symbol.
Sean
Sean,
I think that the Imperial flag is sun and spaceship?
Paul.
Kaor, Paul!
I don't think that was the case. The revised version of "Margin of Profit" has this, near the story's beginning: "His gaze went to the League emblem on the wall behind her, a golden sunburst afire with jewels, surrounding an ancient rocketship,..." Also, the emblem of Asimov's Galactic Empire was the Spaceship and Sun.
I still argue for the flag of the Terran Empire being a sunburst on a royal blue field.
Sean
Kaor, Paul!
I have been wondering what a flag featuring a stylized sunburst in a royal blue field would look like. Or do you think that is too simple a design to be the flag of the Terran Empire? I know you favor a blue, white, and green tricolor.
Sean
Sean,
Sunburst in blue sounds good for an Empire. Tricolor suits a republic.
Paul.
Kaor, Paul!
Not necessarily! The Netherlands is a monarchy and has a tricolor flag. Tsarist Russia was a monarchy and also had a tricolor flag, which post-Soviet Russia adopted as its banner.
Sean
Kaor, Paul!
I thought of something and checked to see if I was righ: and, yes, other monarchies like Belgium and Luxembourg have tricolor flags. Belgium has a flag of three vertical bars in black, yellow, and red. Luxembourg's tricolor in three horizontal stripes of red, white, and sky blue (despite complaints it looks too much like the Dutch flag).
Sean
Sean,
OK. I was just thinking of the French one.
Paul.
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