"Games theory," murmured the telephone. "You plan your strategy on the basis of the strategy your opponent would plan on the basis of the information you believe him to have.
Games theory is a link to some of Poul Anderson's futuristic sf. See here. Although this is rarely even mentioned in contemporary fiction, some sort of future history lies ahead of Yamamura's period and it could be one of the futures described in another work or series by Anderson.
There is another quote from Machiavelli:
"'One must therefore be a fox to recognize traps, and a lion to frighten wolves,'" recited Kintyre in Machiavelli's Italian. "'Those that wish to be only lions do not understand this.'"
- and I skipped past one about women in an intervening chapter. We have now reached the end of the penultimate chapter of this novel. It remains for the hero to rescue the heroine and apprehend the villain.
1 comment:
Kaor, Paul!
And that line Anderson quoted from Machiavelli in MURDER IN BLACK LETTER reminded me of what Christ said in Matthew 10.16: "Behold, I am sending you forth like sheep in the midst of wolves. Be therefore wise as serpents, and guileless as doves." I can't help but wonder if what Machiavelli said was a kind of reversed echo of that text from Matthew.
Ad astra! Sean
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