"(Oh, treetop highways under the golden-red sun of Cynthia! Four-armed drummers who sound the mating call of Gorzun's twin moons! Wild wings above Ythri!)" (p. 183)
-copied from here.
"...Ramanujan, where gilt towers rose out of mists to catch the first sunlight, blinding against blue Mount Gandhi."
-"Hiding Place," pp. 598-599.
The description of Ramanujan reminded me of the earlier descriptions of Cynthia etc. This is what it would really be like to visit some of the planets in Poul Anderson's Technic History. Meanwhile, we should appreciate Earth in the same way.
5 comments:
Kaor, Paul!
I think we see Poul Anderson really hitting his stride in writing evocative descriptions of other planets in "A Message in Secret" and THE PLAGUE OF MASTERS.
Ad astra! Sean
Sean,
I like morning on Hermes and Merseia.
Paul.
Kaor, Paul!
I agree! And that "morning" on Merseia also symbolized the hopes of Merseians like Brechdan Ironrede that the "evening" of the Empire was finally coming. The first Chapter of ENSIGN FLANDRY opened with "Evening on Terra," and we are suppose to soon feel that was OMINOUS for both an old man like Emperor Georgios and Terra herself.
But the point I had in mind was both "A Message In Secret" and THE PLAGUE OF MASTERS were written before MIRKHEIM and ENSIGN FLANDRY. And it was in those two older stories that we really see Anderson beginning to write such excellent descriptions of fictional extraterrestrial planets.
Ad astra! Sean
Sean,
I agree about the descriptions in the earlier stories.
I also had in mind a morning on Merseia in "Day of Burning" and on Hermes in "Mirkheim."
Paul.
Kaor, Paul!
The "morning" we see in "Day of Burning" was also good!
Ad astra! Sean
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