I hope that:
the US gets the President it wants;
the UK gets the BREXIT it wants;
we all get through the pandemic soon;
our future holds a Solar Commonwealth but not a Terran Empire.
Happy New Year. Good night.
Thursday 31 December 2020
The Last Post
Chronological Questions II
Satan's World, "...the Shenna affair..." (p. 175);
shortly after that, the beginning of "Lodestar";
ten years later, the end of "Lodestar";
ten more years later, Mirkheim.
That makes twenty years between Satan's World and Mirkheim. Why then does Eric Tamarin reflect that van Rijn's face is:
"...sharply remembered from documentary shows a decade ago following the Shenna business..." (p. 176)?
The answer is partly that these texts were never meant to be read this closely.
Greatland
Grand Duchess Sandra and her son, Eric, discuss their response to the Baburite invasion.
"'We can organize guerillas.'
"'They'd spend near their whole time surviving.' At the present epoch, Hermes had a single continent, Greatland, so enormous that most of its interior was a desert of blazing summers and bitter winters. 'Worse, they'd invite reprisals on everybody else. And never could they defeat well-equipped troops on the ground, missile-throwing ships in orbit.'" (p. 153)
A conversation can be narrated without identifying a point of view. See the description of the dialogue between van Rijn and Hirharouk in Coya Conyon. I had to check but this conversation between Sandra and Eric is definitely narrated from her pov. Her cigar smoke tastes harsh.
However, of particular interest is the explanatory interpolation, beginning "At the present epoch..." A future historian, recounting the conversation, pauses to explain to his audience the geology of Hermes in that long past epoch.
For the development of Greatland by a later Grand Duke, see the link from "Hermes," also Edwin Cairncross's Ambitions.
Baburite Rule
If Babur and the Solar Commonwealth are about to wage war, then it is advisable that Babur occupy the Maian System in order to forestall a Commonwealth occupation. That makes sense. But why are they about to wage war? We learn that the Baburite occupation of Hermes has a hidden agenda: Benoni Strang's social revolution. That man would have done no harm and much good if he had stayed home and led the Liberation Front.
The Hermetians are promised internal self-government, a promise soon broken. However, while that promise is still ostensibly on the table, Sandra reflects:
"'...I can't imagine any interest the Baburites might take in our local politics.'" (p. 153)
I read somewhere that Spanish Christians had more religious freedom under Muslim rule because the Muslim rulers did not care which of their subjects were "heretics." An Alan Moore superhero loses interest in human politics just as we have no preference between red and black ants.
(Click on the above link from "Babur" for a surprise.)
A Phone, A Cyanops And A Baburite
Sandra's portable phone hangs from her belt. Thus, it is a walkie-talkie, too bulky to fit in a purse or pocket. It saves an animal's life. Sandra's hounds have trapped a scaled, clawed, reptilian cyanops (scroll down) on a cliff top. As she prepares to shoot this native Hermetian animal through one of its eye with a rifle, her phone buzzes and she must return immediately to Starfall. Although we are not told how many eyes the cyanops has, we assume two but film-makers could make some other assumption.
In the Insignia Room back in Starfall, Sandra sits at bay before the three-dimensional image of a conquering Baburite. I did not think of comparing Sandra to the cyanops but she does.
(The Van Rijn Method is another volume but Sandra Tamarin is one of the characters on its cover.)
Phones And Falkayns
"The portable phone at her belt buzzed." (p. 146)
Here is a mobile phone although I said in an earlier post (see the link) that there were none in the Solar Commonwealth period.
Sandra's vice executive phones with a message from "Admiral Michael" who turns out to be a Falkayn and also the second in command of the small Hermetian space navy. Earlier, "Mike Falkayn," obviously the same guy, had been left in charge of the reserves at home when Sandra led the fleet to Mirkheim. (VII, p. 112)
Have we been told yet that Michael is David's older brother? We did know that David was a younger son. Michael's seniority and his death in combat (see Mirkheim Miscellany) will have grave consequences for David. Times of crisis affect both nations and individuals.
A Time Of Crisis
"Sandra Tamarin-Asmundsen...had felt guilty about leaving Starfall at a time of crisis - domestic as well as foreign, with more of the Traver class in an uproar..." (p. 145)
If the lowest social class, allowed no say in public affairs, is in an uproar amounting to a crisis, then all is not well in Hermtian society so meet its leaders and agree some social changes. I remember, during Apartheid, someone saying, "Change will come over time." Yes, it would and did come because a lot of people campaigned for it but he was arguing that they should stop campaigning!
Change is certain. Change for the good is not.
Chronological Questions
(i) Poul Anderson presents no year dates except in the opening story, "The Saturn Game."
(ii) He does inform us about periods of time that elapse between installments or between important events in the Technic History. Thus, we are often told the age of either Falkayn or Flandry in a particular installment. The events of Mirkheim occur ten years after the end of "Lodestar" and a hundred years after the Council of Hiawatha. "Lodestar" occurs shortly after Satan's World but ten years elapse between the beginning and end of "Lodestar."
Rather that arbitrarily ascribe AD/CE year dates to events after "The Saturn Game," I think that it makes more sense to treat, e.g., the discovery of hyperdrive as time zero and to date the Breakup, the Solar Commonwealth, the Grand Survey etc from then.
Wednesday 30 December 2020
Saturn And Cana
A photograph of Saturn in Orion Shall Rise (see Photographs Of Saturn) got me into rereading The Rebel Worlds, then other works in the Technic History. There is yet another image of Saturn in the Saturn Room in the Hotel Universe:
"Overhead lifted the vast half-circles of the rings, tinted more subtly than rainbows in a violet sky where four moons were presently visible. Sparks of light flickered in the streaming arcs and meteors clove the heavens. Where a tiny sun was setting, dimmed by thick air, clouds lay tawny and rosy." (p. 135)
It is in the Saturn Room that van Rijn preaches to Bayard Story about:
"'The very first miracle that Our Lord did...'" (p. 136) (See A Select Vintage And Solar Spices.)
Although I referred to the "...very first miracle...," I did not cite the Biblical reference so here it is: John 2: 1-12.
Something In Us
Maybe I have more in common with David Falkayn than I had thought? He had thought that:
"'...civilization had evolved beyond war.'" (p. 131)
This is certainly possible. France and Germany no longer settle their differences by waging war. Chee Lan points out that the Shenna had not, and the Baburites have not, evolved beyond war but Falkayn keeps asking questions. Why did the Baburites arm even before they knew that there would be a source of wealth like Mirkheim to fight for? In any case, they could have bought all the supermetals that they needed for a fraction of the cost of the navy that have built. His provisional hypothesis:
"'I have this gnawing notion that something in us, in Technic culture, is responsible.'" (ibid.)
And that is the answer. Not only something in their Technic culture but also something in his Hermetian culture. Looking at an apparently external problem is like looking in a mirror. When the Prisoner unmasks Number One, he sees his own face.
In this sense, the Baburites are not like the Patriarchy of Kzin which is merely an external threat - except insofar as it is projected onto the interstellar stage by the imagination of an American sf author.
Baburites, Kzinti, Vegans And Men
Sandra Tamarin:
"'It seems the worst amateurs are in the Commonwealth Admiralty.'
"They've never had to fight a war. Skills, doctrine, the military style of thinking evaporated generations ago.
"Such things must needs be relearned in the time that is upon us." (p. 118)
So the Baburites have the same effect on the Solar Commonwealth as the kzinti have on the UN? (I refer, of course, to Poul Anderson's Technic History and to Larry Niven's Known Space History.)
In James Blish's Cities In Flight, the Colonials must fight the Vegan Tyranny without any help from Earth.
In two other future history series, Jerry Pournelle's CoDominium and CJ Cherryh's Alliance-Union, mankind exports war without needing to find any extra-solar aliens to fight.
I doubt that we will go out into the galaxy and find anything remotely resembling ourselves.
Fiction And Reality
The Fanatic
When Benoni Strang and Emma Reinhert complete their conversation:
"Emma Reinhart shivered a bit. She had glimpsed the fanatic." (p. 30)
We must understand and accept that this particular individual, Strang, has become fanatical on this issue but should not infer that anyone who is concerned about such an issue is fanatical. I remember a cross-purposes conversation with a fellow pupil at school. Because he was a bird-watcher, I remarked that I knew someone else who had become "fanatical" on the subject. He replied, "So, according to you, it is a subject for fanatics?" I was left floundering at the depth of the misunderstanding. First, by "fanatical," I had meant just "very enthusiastic," not anything else. Secondly, surely it is the case that someone can become "fanatical" about any subject, not that certain subjects are particularly appropriate for "fanatics"? I mention this because I think that it is all too possible that all radical social reformers are written off as "fanatics." The kind of energy that is admired in an entrepreneur like van Rijn can also be expressed in other kinds of creativity and social leadership.
Looking Forward, Looking Back
Lady Sandra Tamarin thinks:
"Is our time past? Is the whole wild, happy age of the pioneers? Are we today crossing the threshold of the future?"
David Falkayn thinks:
"This was a grand era in its way. I too will miss it."
- see Hopewell.
Dominic Flandry reflects that:
"He would much rather have lived in the high and spacious days of the trader princes, when no distance and no deed looked too vast for man, than in this twilight of empire."
-see Tide And Twilight.
Daven Laure, a Ranger of the Commonalty, refers to the future version of English, spoken by the earlier characters, as "...ancient Anglic."
Conversation On Ayisha, Moon Of Babur
Let us yet again revisit those Hermetian social issues. Poul Anderson's texts present narratives that resemble real life to the extent that readers can adopt different positions. Thus, I would not back van Rijn if he bribed government officials, did not back Flandry when he led the Intelligence operation during the Imperial conquest of Brae and have big problems with the Time Patrol preserving the Holocaust etc. I will summarize and comment on a conversation between Benoni Strang and Emma Reinhart.
Reinhart: You couldn't vote and the aristocrats owned all the desirable land. That doesn't seem terrible.
My comment: What?!
Reinhart: Nobody prevented you from leaving Hermes and making your own career.
Strang: But those that I left behind are underlings with no say in public affairs. The Kindred resist progress and development and maintain feudal privileges.
My comments: I am for democracy, progress and development and against feudal privileges;
options open to a Traver (Strang's social class):
(i) stay and accept your lot;
(ii) stay and campaign for equal rights;
(iii) leave and make a career elsewhere;
(iv) leave and organize an alien conquest of your home planet!
Many do (i), (ii) or (iii). Strang does (iii) in order to do (iv). Only (iv) is unequivocally wrong. (End of comments.)
Interstellar Flight
As the spaceship Muddlin' Through escapes from the planet Babur, Falkayn asks the computer Muddlehead when they can go hyper:
"It shouldn't be long. They were already high in the gravity well of Mogul and climbing upward fast in Babur's. Soon the metric of space would be too flat to interfere unduly with fine-tuned oscillators; and once they were moving at their top faster-than-light psuedovelocity, practically nothing ever built had legs to match theirs." (VI, p. 108)
This passage is written as if from experience even though we do not know whether it will be possible to build "oscillators" that can generate "psuedovelocity" in flat space.
The Hermetian fleet approaches Mirkheim:
"'Navigation reports we are one light-year from destination.'" (VII, p. 111)
"About three hours till arrival, at their top psuedospeed..." (VII, p. 113)
This information should enable readers with knowledge of astronomical distances to calculate travel times for journeys within the volume of space covered by the Polesotechnic League.
Adzel wants to say a prayer for their enemy, Sheldon Wyler, killed by friendly fire during the first part of the trader team's escape. Falkayn replies, "'Later. First we've got to escape.'" (VI, p. 107)
Practicalities first; spirituality second. Even if prayer does not benefit Wyler, it is necessary for the living that they respect the dead.
Star Trek Parallels
In the first Star Trek film, Admiral Kirk successfully argues that he should be restored to the captaincy of the Enterprise because his experiences during the five year mission qualify him to meet the challenge approaching Earth. In Mirkheim, I, David Falkayn argues that his twenty plus years of trade pioneering equip him to investigate Babur. See also Admiralty, Labyrinthine Corridors II and Wisdom From The Academy.
In the third (?) Star Trek film, Kirk breaks the laws of the Federation to get Spock back. In "Lodestar," Falkayn has broken his oath of fealty to van Rijn for reasons we have discussed.
Spock, mildly telepathic, is with the Federation whereas Aycharaych, universally telepathic, is with the Roidhunate.
Good And Bad On Both Sides?
Sheldon Wyler and his ultimate employers, the Seven In Space, are unscrupulous and Merseian aristocrats become enemies of mankind so you might ask: who is good among the enemies of the League? Well, van Rijn transforms the Baburites into customers and Anderson manages to transform even that arch-schemer, Benoni Strang, into a partially sympathetic character right at the end. Also "enemies of the League" potentially include members of all those societies that the League leaves behind in its accumulation of wealth. Clearly, Wyler means to include such societies in his remarks. Some of these societies band together into Supermetals but others might have joined the Baburites. Potentially - only potentially - David Falkayn became an enemy of the League when he was moved to break his oath of fealty to van Rijn. That action could have resulted in an open conflict between Falkayn and his fellow Master Merchants. Fortunately, van Rijn was flexible enough to accommodate that situation.
Manse Everard broke the laws of the Time Patrol but in circumstances that made the Danellians recognize his worth on their side of the war against temporal chaos. And these reflections have again taken us past midnight. Good night.
Tuesday 29 December 2020
A Cosmos Of Enemies
Sheldon Wyler, a human being, works for the Baburites because he has no loyalty either to the Solar Commonwealth or to the Polesotechnic League. We, the readers, know that Wyler previously worked for Stellar Metals, a member company of the Seven In Space cartel. However, Falkayn and his companions, who might have found this fact significant, do not know it.
Several Merseians, like Blyndwyr of the Vach Ruethen, have enlisted in the new Baburite space navy. Wyler comments:
"'Mostly they belong to the aristocratic party at home and have no love for the League, considering how it shunted their kind aside and dealt instead with the Gethfennu group. You know, not many League people seem to understand what a cosmos of enemies it's made for itself over the years.'" (p. 96)
In the trader team story, "Day of Burning," the Gethfennu, organized crime, were the only international network on Merseia capable of a coordinated response to the imminent threat of radiation from the supernova, Valenderay.
If this were an ERB novel, then the Good Guys would have many enemies, all of whom would be personally despicable and morally reprehensible: cowardly, spiteful, dishonorable etc. (In one of ERB's Land That Time Forgot novels, an IWW member works for the Germans during WWI and hates all Americans.) Poul Anderson shows us good and bad on both sides when the League encounters its "...cosmos of enemies..."
Job
"'Come on, let's move along, for Job's sake,' Falkayn said." (p. 93)
Nowadays, I hope to find references to books of the Bible that have not been mentioned yet but, in fact, we have had quotations from Job. See The Bible On The Blog. But why does Falkayn refer to Job himself in this manner? Presumably none of his team-mates understands the reference? They are in dire straits so maybe he feels that they are about to be served as ill as Job? My inspiration drains away this evening but I hope to return to the fray some time tomoz.
This volume is called Rise Of The Terran Empire. Is the Empire rising? In one sense, yes, because previous social arrangements are failing. The Commonwealth cannot control the League which now cannot control itself.
Assembling Some Of The Chronological Evidence
Eighteen years before Mirkheim, David Falkayn discovered Mirkheim. (Prologue, Y minus 18; I, p. 35; II, p. 60)
Ten years before Mirkheim (and three years after Supermetals started), Nicholas van Rijn and Coya Conyon found their way to Mirkheim. (II, p. 62)
Nine years before Mirkheim, Coya Falkayn joined the trade pioneer crew. (Y minus 9.)
The team disbanded five years later. (I, pp. 34-35; p. 35)
For three year, Adzel was in a Buddhist monastery in the Andes (I, p. 37) and the Falkayns brought up their first child. (I, p. 34; IV, pp. 76, 79)
One year before Mirkheim, Leonardo Rigassi rediscovered Mirkheim. (Y minus 1.)
Then the crew minus Coya went to Babur.
Two Definitive Collections
Time Patrol collects the whole Time Patrol series except for the long novel, The Shield Of Time, to which it is a companion volume.
The front cover blurb of The Earth Book Of Stormgate (New York, 1979) reasonably accurately proclaims that this book:
"Spans, illuminates and completes the magnificent future history of the Polesotechnic League"
The two collections are also complementary, covering past and future history respectively although of alternative timelines.
B. S.
Benoni Strang, who is from Hermes and visits sub-Jovian Babur:
"He was of medium height and slim, graceful of movement, his face rectangular in outline and evenly shaped, his hair and mustache sleek brown, his eyes gray-blue. In his leisure time he wore an elegantly tailored slacksuit."
-Prologue, Y minus 5, p. 29.
Bayard Story:
"He was a rather handsome man, medium-sized, slender, his features regular in a tanned rectangular face, eyes blue-gray, hair and mustache smooth brown with a sprinkling of white. An elastic gait indicated that he used his muscles a good deal, perhaps under intermittently severe conditions. His soft speech held a trace of non-Terrestrial accent, though it was far too eroded by time to be identifiable. An expensive slacksuit in subdued greens fitted him as if grown from his body."
-III, p. 66.
They are the same guy. Comparing their descriptions would let the cat out of the bag but, as we read the novel, we neither compare the descriptions nor notice the initials. See also Clues. That Strang is Story is a big revelation later in the novel. Although they are both described in the text, showing them both in a film would spoil the surprise. See How To Film Mirkheim?
More About The Chronology
Commander Nadi of the Supermetals defense force updates Grand Duchess Sandra of Hermes:
"'...Falkayn's employer, Nicholas van Rijn, deduced that the supermetals must come from a world of Mirkheim's type, and used the same method of search to find it.... Did I distress you?'
"'No. You, you surprised me. Van Rijn? When?'
"'Ten standard years ago. Falkayn and Falkayn's future wife persuaded him to maintain silence. In fact, he very kindly helped our agents keep the issue confused, to delay the eventual rediscovery.'" (p. 62)
So ten years between the end of "Lodestar" and the beginning of Mirkheim. For discussion of the Chronology of Technic Civilization, see here.
A Fanciful Comparison
In Poul Anderson's Mirkheim, the Supermetals Company asks the Grand Duchy of Hermes to establish a protectorate over the industrially valuable planet, Mirkheim, just as the Autarchy of United Babur and the Solar Commonwealth prepare to go to war for it.
In Neil Gaiman's The Sandman: Season Of Mists, Lucifer Morningstar retires as Lord of Hell, expels the demons and the damned, locks every gate, then hands the key to His Darkness Morpheus, Lord of the Dreaming, who soon has every other pantheon pressuring him to give them this desirable piece of spiritual real estate.
I did say that this was a fanciful comparison. I thought of it because Grand Duchess Sandra thinks:
"Isn't that a red hot rivet dropped into my palm!"
-Mirkheim, II, p. 51.
Early Morning News
While exercising, Grand Duchess Sandra watches an early newscast on her phone which she has switched to television reception.
Yesterday, a navy speedster known to have been stationed at the primitive planet, Valya, landed at Williams Field, generating rumors that Babur has issued a new declaration. Three previous Anglic-language pronunciamentos had been radioed to the scientific outpost on Valya by an orbiting Baburite ship. The original claim of the Autarchy of United Babur to Mirkheim had been radioed from Earth orbit. Because Mirkheim is close to Babur and because the supermetals are strategically important, the Autarchy will not tolerate possession of Mirkheim by any power hostile to Babur. The Hermetian throne, neither confirming nor disconfirming the rumors, will make a statement soon.
Addressing a convention of the Justice Party, Prime Minister Lapierre of the Solar Commonwealth said that his government was willing to negotiate but that Babur had not yet arranged to exchange ambassadors. The Commonwealth will not yield to aggression. Babur has amassed great naval strength.
Last night, the Liberation Front held a rally at a resort on the Longstrands where intemperate orators addressed a large and enthusiastic crowd of Travers.
Troubles both external and internal.
Maia And Sandra
Sandra Tamarin will be the viewpoint character in this chapter and the first thing that she will do will be to wake up. However, the chapter does not start with that. Instead, the omniscient narrator takes us on an interesting journey at the speed of light.
From below the eastern horizon, the Hermetian sun, Maia, gilds steeples and towers in Starfall. When the sun rises above Daybreak Bay, its light travels over the Palomino River, along Olympic Avenue to Pilgrim Hill, among trees, gardens and buildings and past Old Keep, New Keep and Signal Station. One beam, passing above an upper balcony of New Keep, goes through the French windows and onto Sandra's bed, waking her in the first sentence of the second paragraph.
Now we are in her point of view and the first thing that we learn is that her husband, Peter Asmundsen, who had proposed to her on p. 7, died more than four years ago. Events move fast towards a future historical climax but, although it is dawn in Starfall, it is midnight in Lancaster.
Monday 28 December 2020
I Remember Hermes
"Both moons of Hermes were aloft, Caduceus rising small but nearly full, the broad sickle of Sandalion sinking westward. High in the dusk, a pair of wings caught light from the newly set sun and shone gold. A tilirra sang amidst the foliage of a millionleaf, which rustled to a low breeze. At the bottom of the canyon it had cut for itself, the Palomino River rang with its haste; but that sound reached the heights as a murmur." (p. 5)
I like the wings gold in the light of the already set sun. A tilirra, a millionleaf and the Palomino River are referred to as if we knew them. Several colonized planets in Poul Anderson's Technic History become concretely realized places. It is as if we had been there. I remember Ys - and also Hermes, Avalon, Dennitza, Merseia etc.
Falkayn's Age V
"The Three-Cornered Wheel"
"A Sun Invisible"
"The Trouble Twisters"
"Day of Burning"
Satan's World
"Lodestar," first narrative section
Mirkheim, Prologue, Y minus 18.
"Lodestar," second narrative section
Mirkheim, Prologue, Y minus 9.
Mirkheim, I-XXI
"Wingless," where David is a grandfather
Complicated, you must admit.
My Response To Van Rijn's Problem
If I were a wage- or salary-earner in the Solar Commonwealth, then I would want my union at least to have a say in how the money in the pension fund was invested. Independent financial advisers would also have to be consulted.
I would want the union to be:
democratically controlled by its members;
not a profit-making organization;
committed to siblinghood;
completely independent of government, which is another employer;
campaigning against SSL lobbying, logrolling, pressure and bribery;
also campaigning against cartelization.
Is van Rijn alarmist when he says that he does not envy the Falkayn's children? Why should they care whether government becomes more involved in running businesses like van Rijn's? I agree that the cartelization is one big problem and would want the unions to oppose it.
Unrighteous News
Van Rijn's Problem
The Garver Bill will give trade unions control of the pension funds of Solar Commonwealth citizens.
Therefore, United Technicians will control the Solar Spice & Liquors pension fund.
The Home Companies will cooperate with this legislation and the Seven In Space will be indifferent.
Therefore, the Polesotechnic League Council will not oppose the Bill.
Despite their rhetoric about siblinghood of workers, unions are profit-making organizations.
Having said that, van Rijn then says that it is not a problem (!) but adds that the close ties between unions and government are a problem.
He does not want government involved in running his business and does not envy the Falkayns' children.
David Falkayn suggests a public relations campaign with pressure on legislators, logrolling etc but van Rijn thinks that this will not work against the Home Companies. (Also, he is seventy one - the same age as me - and tired.)
Hanny Lennart of the Home Companies phones to warn van Rijn against lobbying and bribery.
My Response
Please allow me some time to formulate it.
At First Sight II
"He thought a grove of low trees with long black fronds stood at the edge of sight on his left, and that he could make out the glistening city that he knew was to his right. However, this was as unsure as the greeting he would get. And every shape he discerned was so alien that when he glanced elsewhere he could not remember it. Here he must learn all over again how to use his eyes." (p. 3)
This is Benoni Strang's first visit to the sub-Jovian planet, Babur. He experiences what has previously been described both by CS Lewis and by Poul Anderson. See At First Sight.
A Baburite says:
"'After our experience on Suleiman...we question what we may gain from the Polesotechnic League.'" (p. 4)
Thus, this section of the Prologue is a sequel to the Nicholas van Rijn story, "Esau." Strang confirms this by assuring his hosts that:
"'The Solar Spice & Liquors Company is not the whole League...'" (pp. 4-5)
Genesis, Gabriel And Prophets
"A ship hunted through space until she found the extinct supernova. Captain David Falkayn beheld the circling planetary core and saw that it was good. But its aspect was so forbidding that he christened it Mirkheim." (p.7)
See Genesis 1:31.
Y minus 9.
"'I told Mortensen no calls from anybody less rank than the angel Gabriel." (p. 12)
See Luke 1: 19.
"You, in a clown suit with a red balloon snoot and painted grin, you would still look like some minor Hebrew prophet on a bad day." (p. 14)
Three more Biblical references.
On Hermes
In Prologue, Y minus 24, Sandra Tamarin informs us that she has had a son, Eric, by Nick van Rijn. Thus, this section of the Prologue is a sequel to The Man Who Counts. In Prologue, Y minus 18, David Falkayn discovers Mirkheim. Thus, this section is set between the two narrative sections of "Lodestar."
Sandra's father has business interests that disqualify him from election as Grand Duke of Hermes, therefore she will probably be elected as Grand Duchess. Although this is not mentioned here, readers should remember that Hermes is David Falkayn's home planet.
Peter Asmundsen, who cannot avoid giving preferential promotions to Followers, thinks that his Traver employees have legitimate grievances and that he might threaten to strike if he were in their place. He manages this situation first by traveling to meet Traver leaders in person and secondly by hammering out compensations for Travers like extra vacations. This whole social structure sounds unwieldy and unstable. Why not just abolish this distinction between Followers and Travers? Even if he were minded to do so, Asmundsen lacks the authority to upend society unilaterally. In this passage, Poul Anderson shows us how a man of intelligence and goodwill is able to manage his employees within the framework of an inherently unequal social system. Elsewhere in the novel, he shows us how men lacking goodwill operate.
If Asmundesen had opted to handle the issue from a distance, then he would have been able to use the "'...complete equipment, communication, computation, data retrieval...'" (p. 5) in Sandra's parents' home. Anderson, writing in 1977, listed these functions separately instead of just referring to computers.
Sunday 27 December 2020
Lines Of Descent
two sons of Hans Molitor;
a son and a daughter of Dominic Flandry;
a daughter of Max Abrams;
a son of Dragoika -
- and the very last installment of the Technic History presents remote descendants of rebels exiled by Flandry.
The series is not a history of a single family or "people." Instead, its collective protagonist is the human race interacting with many other intelligence species - beginning on Ythri - and the history ends with those remote descendants who are no longer human.
Falkayns And Flandry
The view of Chicago Integrate from Nicholas van Rijn's penthouse on the roof of the Winged Cross:
"Whenever they visited, the Falkayns never tired of that spectacle."
-Poul Anderson, Mirkheim IN Anderson, Rise Of The Terran Empire (Riverdale, NY, 2011), pp. 1-291 AT Prologue, Y minus 9., p. 11.
Consecutive readers of Poul Anderson's Technic History know that David Falkayn works for van Rijn but do not yet know of any couple called the Falkayns. However, the text continues:
"To David it was comparatively fresh; he had spent most of his life off Earth." (ibid.)
This confirms that one of these "Falkayns" is the one that we already know and also fits with what we know about him.
"But Coya, who had been coming to see her grandfather since before she could walk, likewise found it always new." (ibid.)
This informs us that van Rijn's granddaughter, Coya Conyon, introduced in the concluding story of the previous volume, is now married to David.
After this prologue, future history will accelerate:
in Mirkheim, Chapter I, the Falkayns had stopped space traveling to bring up their daughter, Juanita, and Coya is pregnant again;
in Chapter XVIII, Nicholas Falkayn is born;
in the following story, "Wingless," Nicholas Falkayn, an engineer on the planet Avalon, advises his son and the viewpoint character of the story, Nathaniel/Nat;
the last work to be collected in Rise Of The Terran Empire, which is another complete novel, The People Of The Wind, features a remote descendant, Tabitha Falkayn, who is also Hrill of Highsky Choth on Avalon, but that is the last that we see of the Falkayns.
After that, the narrative slows way back down again with twelve of the remaining nineteen works devoted to a single influential figure, Dominic Flandry. But none of that should be in our minds as we read about the Falkayns' visit to van Rijn on the Winged Cross.
Coya
Coya Conyon:
twenty five years of age;
daughter of Malcolm Conyon and Beatriz Yeo;
granddaughter, through her mother, of Nicholas van Rijn;
an astrophysicist at Luna Astrocenter;
has traveled around most of the Solar System;
has also visited the extra-solar planet, Ythri;
followed the adventures of the Muddlin' Through crew in her teens.
When we read about the Muddlin' Through crew, we knew nothing of Coya Conyon but maybe she could be retconned into screen adaptations? Authors are always free to add to the pasts of their characters. David Falkayn's mother, Athena, appears once briefly in Mirkheim. A few details of his early life had been mentioned on the occasion of his first appearance in "The Three-Cornered Wheel." These could be expanded in any dramatizations.
Tongues Of Angels II
"'What shall I say in the Great Tongue?'
"'Say that you come in the name of God and all angels and in the power of the planets from one who sits today in the seat of the Pendragon and command him to come with you. Say it now.'
"And Dimble, who had been sitting with his face drawn, and rather white, between the white faces of the two women, and his eyes on the table, raised his head, and great syllables of words that sounded like castles, came out of his mouth. Jane felt her heart leap and quiver at them. Everything else in the room seemed to have been intensely quiet; even the bird, and the bear, and the cat, were still, staring at the speaker. The voice did not sound like Dimble's own: it was as if the words spoke themselves through him from some strong place at a distance - or as if they were not words at all but present operations of God, the planets, and the Pendragon. For this was the language spoken before the Fall and beyond the Moon and the meanings were not given to the syllables by chance, or skill, or long tradition, but truly inherent in them as the shape of the great Sun is inherent in the little waterdrop. This was Language herself, as she first sprang at Maleldil's bidding out of the molten quicksilver of the star called Mercury on Earth, but Viritrilbia in Deep Heaven."
-CS Lewis, That Hideous Strength IN Lewis, The Cosmic Trilogy (London, 1990), pp. 349-753 AT CHAPTER 11, p. 587.
That is a very helpful exposition of what is not the case. "...Language herself..." is Platonic, the antithesis of scientific. No meaning is inherent in any syllable in the way that the Sun is reflected in a drop of water. Intelligent beings give meanings to syllables by their communicative skill and preserve meanings in their traditions. There is no "Language herself" on any uninhabited planet. No deity bids it to spring from an inanimate environment.
Poul Anderson wrote some mythologically based fantasies but, in his hard sf, he speculated about how intelligence might really emerge on other planets - by natural selection, not by special creation. Ythrians learn to communicate through sounds and feather movements. Their Old Faith might include a god of language but, if so, then he is just another myth creatively imagined by an already linguistic community.
Tongues Of Angels
For Alan Moore, see:
For SM Stirling referencing Tolkien, see:
For discussion of Poul Anderson's Time Patrol language, Temporal, see:
CS Lewis, a theological sf author, wrote a passage about language that is worth quoting at length in order to disagree with it and instead to champion the views of hard sf writers, like Anderson, who accepted scientific method and evolutionary theory. That will be another post.
Valenderay And Merseia
In Anderson's "Lodestar," Epsilon Aurigae, Sirius B and Valenderay are listed as famous supernovae.
In his The People Of The Wind, the Terran High Admiral's super-dreadnaught flagship is called Valenderay.
Part of the pleasure of reading a future history series is recognition of such background references to events in earlier installments.
More significant than Valenderay is Merseia:
needing League help in "Day of Burning":
discontented Merseians in Mirkheim;
the Merseian Rhoidunate growing in The People Of The Wind;
the Roidhunate a major threat to other civilizations in the Flandry series;
however, some Merseians have settled peacefully on the human colony planet, Dennitza, in the Flandry novel, A Knight Of Ghosts And Shadows.
Languages
Hirharouk speaks fluent Anglic, using a vocalizer to get the sounds right. Van Rijn replies in Planha. How many languages does van Rijn speak? The answer is in Mirkheim and somewhere on the blog.
Anyone who suddenly speaks in a language unknown to some or all of his hearers displays knowledge in a context where knowledge is power or, at least, communication is an essential part of power. No wonder magicians casting spells and priests reciting liturgies were regarded with awe. Van Rijn's command of alien languages is entirely pragmatic but he is able to translate Shakespeare etc to deliver an inspiring speech on Diomedes.
I cannot speak even one other language fluently. Once, when I saw someone wearing the Esperanto badge, I managed -
Me: Cu vi parolas Esperanton?
He: Jes, jes, flue! Kaj vi?
Me: Ne, ne flue!
And, at a handfast, I recited Poul and Karen Anderson's "Tene Mithra, etiam miles, fides nostris votis nos."
There will be more on languages.
Saturday 26 December 2020
Coya Conyon
Now that we are back in Coya Conyon's point of view (pov), I want stay in it as long as possible. I sympathize with Coya when she notices a value difference between her generation from that of her grandfather. During my childhood and teens in the fifties and sixties, our elders made a big deal of something called a "generation gap" although, later, in the late seventies and the eighties, I never experienced such a gap with my daughter - who was brought up completely differently. I once heard the suggestion that the only generation gap in history was between those born before or after the atom bomb. Van Rijn and Coya are born at different stages in the history of the Polesotechnic League. He saw freedom. She sees monopolization.
It is not completely accurate (see previous post) that Coya remains the pov character throughout the rest of the narrative. On pp. 379-280, van Rijn and Hirharouk argue although their confrontation is described from neither of their povs. The omniscient narrator steps in again. The Ythrian captain's large, golden eyes and the Master Merchant's small, black ones give look for look but the reader does not look out through either of these sets of eyes. Then Coya enters her grandfather's stateroom and regards them both. We are back in her pov to which we will probably return some time tomoz.
Fair winds forever.
Ten Years Later II
After the double space between paragraphs, we read:
"This happened shortly after the Satan episode..." (p. 375)
"This..." means the incident that had ended with Falkayn growing tense where he sat. "...the Satan episode..." means the events of the novel, Satan's World. If we have been reading Poul Anderson's Technic History as it was originally published, then ideally we have read:
Mirkheim
The People Of The Wind
nine previous stories in the Earth Book
preferably also "The Star Plunderer" and "Sargasso of Lost Starships"
- between Satan's World and "Lodestar." If, instead, we are reading Baen Books' seven-volume The Technic Civilization Saga, compiled by Hank Davis, then we have read just one Earth Book story, "A Little Knowledge," between Satan's World and "Lodestar." Either way, that "Satan episode," climaxing in "...a ship which had run out of beer..." (ibid.) should be in our past as it is in van Rijn's.
Next, the omniscient narrator summarizes for our benefit the ensuing decade of van Rijn's life. Van Rijn's favorite granddaughter, Coya Conyon, is mentioned. This is chronologically Coya's first appearance and she features in only one other work, Mirkheim, which we may or may not have read yet. Then, in a new paragraph but without any double space to indicate a change of scene, we read:
"I can't say I like most of those money-machine merchant princes, Coya reflected..." (p. 376)
Thus, the omniscient narrator has segued into Coya who remains our viewpoint character until the poignant concluding sentence when van Rijn:
"...moved to pour from a bottle; and Coya saw that he was indeed old." (p. 408)
Ten Years Later
I especially appreciate one particular change of scene and of narrative point of view in Poul Anderson's "Lodestar." The opening section of this story ends with the following single-sentence paragraph:
"And then his glance passed over the Nebula, and as if it had spoken to him across more than a thousand parsecs, he fell silent and grew tense where he sat." (p. 375)
The viewpoint character is David Falkayn. Thus, we have been told what Falkayn was perceiving, thinking and feeling since the beginning of the story. In the second sentence, he heard a blaster shot and smelled ozone. In the second, he felt a near miss. In the third, he was dazzled. Thus, it must have been he who saw the lightning which "...reached..." (p. 370) in the opening sentence.
However, in the concluding sentence of the section, the viewpoint begins to withdraw from Falkayn. We are told that he sees the Crab Nebula, that he thinks something about it - as if it spoke to him - and that what he thinks causes him to grow tense where he sits but we are not told what it is. He is having an Andersonian moment of realization, as I have remarked before.
After this enigmatic sentence, a double space between paragraphs indicates a change of scene. We imagine a screen adaptation in which the camera pulls back from Falkayn, then from the spaceship, Muddlin' Through. If Falkayn is beginning to disclose his thoughts to his team-mates, then we are not hearing them.
Next, the omniscient narrator takes up the story but I am being interrupted here so I will publish this much now. We will transition to ten years later.
Future History Continuity
The Early Technic History In Planet Stories
"Tiger By The Tail," January 1951
"Honorable Enemies," May 1951
"Sargasso of Lost Starships," January 1952
"The Star Plunderer," September 1952
"The Ambassadors of Flesh," Summer 1954
These five stories are, at least, an early Terran Empire series with no conception as yet of any future history series. The earliest Nicholas van Rijn story was published elsewhere in September 1956 and had to be revised to make it consistent with the emergent Technic History.
In the opening chapter of "Sargasso...," we find:
the planet Ansa
tailed green Shalmuans
Terrans
the Imperial Fleet
a quadrupedal Donarrian who is also a loyal slave
Thus, if we are sufficiently familiar with the Technic History, then we appreciate much future historical continuity. Van Rijn likes Ansan soup and Helen Kittredge possibly visits Ansa. See here.
Conflict
avoid it;
resolve it;
conduct it more effectively!
It is necessary to know, not assume, which lesson someone else has learned. Lord Hauksberg assumes that there is a peace party within the Merseian Roidhunate (!) whereas any human Dennitzan who assumes that every Merseian Dennitzan is a Roidhunate sixth columnist would be equally off his trolley. Same species; different conditions.
Five Wars against Men tamed the kzinti until Speaker accepted a human female as an ally. Avalonian Ythrians, sharing a planet with human beings, should be able to advise other Ythrians on basic human psychology while at the same time acknowledging the "different conditions" of Avalon and Empire.
It is possible to be serious about avoiding conflict without conceding anything to a potential aggressor. Reverend Wilfrid, a Zen monk who travels by train, reflected that maybe a drunk football fan whose team has just lost a match has a right not to be confronted with the fact of organized religion if he doesn't want to be! Wilfrid can cover his shaved head with a hat and his monastic garb with an overcoat and thus can do his best not to provoke aggression - but that in no way excuses the aggression if it comes anyway.
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