(ii) "The Acolytes"
(iii) "The Green Thumb"
(iv) "Entity"
(v) "Symmetry"
(vi) "The Chapter Ends"
Do these stories fit in Poul Anderson's Psychotechnic History?
For (i)-(iii), see A Galactic Civilization.
For (iv)-(v), see "Entity" III and its links.
(vi) "The Chapter Ends"
This story, set millennia later, makes no reference to the Psychotechnic History - except that it does include psychotechnicians. If anything, its reference to an earlier First Empire based in Sol City contradicts the earlier History which did not have interstellar imperialism.
It has been asked whether Sandra Miesel added this story to the Chronology. I don't know although I assume that she would not have done. Given that it does include psychotechnicians, I think that the story makes sense as happening a long time after the Third Dark Ages. Its title also fits as the end of a series.
5 comments:
Kaor, Paul!
But "The Chapter Ends" was first pub. in 1951, BEFORE most of the undoubted Pyschotechnic stories had even been written. So early, that one one or two words in "Chapter" and found in later, undoubted Pschotechnic stories, is not conclusive. Even "Technic," you've mentioned can be found in one these items. And that does not mean the story the word was in belongs to a different timeline.
I still argue for considering "The Chapter Ends" as a one off, stand alone story by Anderson.
Ad astra! Sean
Sean,
The main, if not only, question is whether Anderson included this story in his chart.
Paul.
Kaor, Paul!
That would settle the matter, if you found "The Chapter Ends" on HIS chart, not Miesel's. Or some evidence to that effect in the Poul and Karen Anderson papers held by that university in California.
Ad astra! SEan
Sean,
But I question whether Miesel would add to the chart and indeed assume that she didn't.
Paul.
Kaor, Paul!
My thought was that Anderson did NOT include the "The Chapter Ends" in that chart he published around 1954. What I think happened was that in the 1980's, when Miesel was editing those collections of Anderson's stories, she decided to include "Chapter" as part of the Psychotechnic series on the grounds that it did have some faintly tenuous tie to that timeline.
I think Anderson pub. that partial Psychotechnic chart in the October 1954 issue of STARTLING. We really need to find that issue and check out what was listed on it.
Ad astra! Sean
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