Because we enjoy Poul Anderson's descriptions of natural scenery, I cannot do better than to quote for comparison Dornford Yates' description of a red dawn:
"It was as we rose out of Tours that the dawn came up. I never saw such a heaven as I saw then. The whole of the sky was fretted with tiny clouds, and every cloud was ablaze with a crimson glow. Above and beyond was the blue; but this was overlaid with a crimson coverlet. And the magic of this brocade came down to touch the earth. Highway, meadows and trees rendered it helplessly. For three or four minutes the whole of the world was red. Then the great alchemist rose and, using his ancient prerogative, turned the firmament into purest gold. But the saying stuck in my mind, Red in the morning, Shepherd's warning. Foul weather was ahead."
-Dornford Yates, Red In The Morning (London, 1946), CHAPTER VII, p. 177.
And that is a pathetic fallacy.
3 comments:
Kaor, Paul!
Very nice, I agree! Yates is yet another of the too many writers I should read.
I also thought of how Anderson (and Stirling as well) quoted an Austrian cavalry song beginning, I think, "Morgenrotte" ("morning red"). But I can't quite which of Anderson's stories has it.
Ad astra! Sean
Kaor, Sean!
A MIDSUMMER TEMPEST has Prince Rupert remembering and singing it:
Morgenrot, Morgenrot,
Leuchtest mir zun fruhen Tod?
Bald wird die Trompete blasen.
Dann muss ich mein Leben lassen,
Ich und mancher Kamerad!
Spellcheck kept trying to correct that to English words. I’ve studied German, so I can translate it:
Morning-red, morning-red,
Dost thou shine to me to the early death?
Soon will the trumpet blow.
Then I must leave my life,
I and many a comrade!
Best Regards,
Nicholas
Kaor, Nicholas!
That's it! Many thanks! And I'm almost sure Anderson quoted this verse elsewhere in in his works, along with mention of how those "Austrian lads" were not being morbid, but cheerful.
Best regards! Sean
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