Rupert and his companions distance-view a battlefield.
Men create and destroy:
"Someone's Bible lay in the mud, open but covered with blood and vomit." (p. 192)
As ever in Poul Anderson's works, the wind comments:
"The wind and the wounded sang Miserere." (ibid.)
- which is another indirect Biblical reference.
Men in buff coats with closed-cropped hair sit around a fire:
"'They're Parliament,' Rupert said starkly. 'Our foe then holds the field.'" (p. 193)
I cannot help reflecting that I would have been on the other side. Parliament was not yet democratic but would develop in that direction and meanwhile it represented merchants as against aristocrats. But I prefer Cavalier hair-styles and enjoyment of life.
11 comments:
Kaor, Paul!
I'm just a bit surprised any soldier would carry his Bible into battle! I would have thought it better to leave the Book behind in one's camp, along with the rest of his gear. A large, complete Bible would be a bulky object to carry.
I don't agree that a totally victorious Parliament would INEVITABLY or necessarily become more democratic as time passed. Esp. if there was nothing to check or restrain its power. Legislatures can be as tyrannical as any king, president, commissar, or general secretary!
Anderson, like most conservatives, seems to have favored the traditional Aristotelian "mixed" form of gov't, one combining elements of monarchy, aristocracy, and democracy. With these elements checking each other. I think the political system seen on the planet Dennitza, in the Terran Empire, comes closest to Anderson giving us his view of the best, possibly ACHIEVABLE form of gov't.
Ad astra! Sean
Many merchants sided with Parliament, but Parliament didn't represent them; it was dominated by landowners, like Cromwell.
The English Civil War was a civil war -within- the ruling class, the 9,000 or so families that owned the country.
Other social groups got walk-on roles; one effect of which was to frighten the bejayzus out of the landowning class, so that they recoiled politically into Royalism and religiously into Anglicanism.
When the Civil War started the squirearchy were split, with landowners and nobles on both sides, and many of the elite were Puritans or Presbyterians.
By the time of the Restoration, that was rapidly ceasing to be true. "Dissent" (Protestants more radically so than the Church of England) retreated into the towns, which became islands in green sea of royalism and orthodoxy.
Monmouth's Revolt was more or less the last gasp of that element as an independent political/social force.
In 1688, many merchants backed the Whigs, but the Whig leaders were all aristocrats -- landowners on a much greater scale than the average squire.
Then in the 18th century the upper elements of the landed aristocracy grew ever closer to the merchants, particularly the financiers and bankers of London, eventually more or less merging with them through intermarriage and cultural accommodations.
Kaor, Mr. Stirling!
I agree with this mini essay. Sir Malachi Shelgrave, in A MIDSUMMER TEMPEST, fitted into this paradigm. He was both a landowner and had commercial/industrial interests.
Albeit, the situation seen in Anderson's book would better fit into what we see happening in the later 18th century.
Ad astra! Sean
Sean: Yeah, or even the early 19th. Tho' probably "condensing" the Industrial Revolution like that would have unpredictable consequences.
English class history and politics remain complicated whatever way you look at them.
Kaor, Mr. Stirling and Paul!
Both: I agree.
Ad astra! Sean
OK. Many merchants backed Parliament and, later, upper aristocrats moved towards merchants. This has come up before and I will try to get it right next time.
That does clarify the role of merchants. It did not yet represent them but they obviously hoped to profit and to gain influence by backing it.
It being Parliament.
Fear of revolution is a massive motivator for the powers that be. They respond with reforms or repression but they always respond. I am not of the view that repression is good because it generates resistance. It is not and it does not necessarily.
Kaor, Paul!
Reform and concession is better than a bloody revolution or civil war. When done the way advocated by Edmund Burke.
And "repression" is sometimes necessary, if only to keep the peace and preserve order. It was not wrong for, say, George III and Lord North to put down the Gordon Riots of 1780.
Ad astra! Sean
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