After "The Big Rain," the UN will send a military force to overthrow the Venusian Republic. In "The Snows of Ganymede," a Planetary Engineer says:
"'The Venusian campaign was a small affair. I ought to know - my great-great-grandfather was a UN marine who fought there and settled down afterward.'" (p. 184)
Thus, four generations and six installments of this future history series separate the Venusians and one Un-man that we see in "The Big Rain" from the Planetary Engineers, Jovians and psychotechnicians that we see in "The Snows of Ganymede."
Poul Anderson wrote:
"Heinlein wrote vivid tales of events happening to individuals, but civilization itself became a protagonist too, ever changing..."
-Poul Anderson, AFTERWORD IN Anderson, The Complete Psychotechnic League (Riverdale, NY, 2017), pp. 229-231 AT p. 229.
Thus, Anderson contrasts the historical scale of Heinlein's Future History with the geological scale of Olaf Stapledon's future and cosmic histories. Anderson himself wrote both, e.g.:
"Sol swung onward through its orbit, once around galactic center in almost two hundred million years, and onward and onward."
-Poul Anderson, Genesis (New York, 2001), PART ONE, IX, p. 96.
5 comments:
Kaor, Paul!
But we see both kinds of perspectives in GENESIS, the historical and the geological and cosmic. And, without the historical/human POV I don't think many readers would have been much interested in the geological/cosmic. At best, GENESIS is going to be an acquired taste for many readers.
Ad astra! Sean
Sean,
Like Brian Aldiss' GALAXIES LIKE GRAINS OF SAND, Anderson's GENESIS synthesizes the Stapledon and Heinlein future history models.
Paul.
Kaor, Paul!
Either "merge" or "combine" might be a better word for what these authors did.
Ad astra! Sean
Sean,
I was taught Hegel by a Hegelian so I think thesis, antithesis, synthesis.
(I was also taught Berkeley by a Berkelian: living fossils.)
Paul.
Kaor, Paul!
Using "synthesis" like this for literature sounds too much like chemistry! (Smiles)
Ad astra! Sean
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