Tuesday, 10 December 2019

A Unique Structure And "Body"

Regular blog readers know, ad nauseam, that I am fascinated by the structure of Poul Anderson's History of Technic Civilization which is unique among sf future history series and possibly even among fictional series of any kind.

The pre-Flandry period of the Technic History comprises:

(4x3) + 12 = 24 installments, filling Volumes I-III of The Technic Civilization Saga (see image) -

3 stories in each of 2 collections
3 previously uncollected stories
3 novels
12 installments, including 1 further novel, in The Earth Book Of Stormgate.

The Flandry and post-Flandry periods, comprising 15+4 = 19 installments, fill Saga Volumes IV-VII because they include either 7 or up to 10 novels depending on how we categorize such narratives.

14 of the 43 installments have no continuing characters which gives a future history what I call "body."

1 comment:

Sean M. Brooks said...

Kaor, Paul!

You have argued that if a story has at least 100 pages, it should be considered a novel. And I agree with that, it makes sense. So I consider THE PLAGUE OF MASTERS and WE CLAIM THESE STARS, both over 100 pages in length, to be novels. But not "A Tragedy of Errors."

Ad astra! Sean