A certain amount of physical closeness, falling well short of inter-species intercourse, plus conflicts for dominance between Locklear and Kit might have been interesting or amusing if both characters had been human but are, to my taste, somewhat distasteful given that she is a kzin. But how would members of two intelligent species cooperate given that not only their bodies but also their motivations are very different?
A man, a teela, a puppeteer and a kzin explore the Ringworld. The kzin is the product of many generations defeated by men and his ancestors included Kdaptists. Thus, cooperation is possible. Speaker accepts Teela Brown as a comrade even though she is female.
Ythrians employing human beings explore Gray/Avalon but find that their responses to death are antithetical. Later, both species live on Avalon. Some Ythrians become Walkers, living as atomic individuals in a global community, whereas many human beings join choths but some spend a lot of time getting the balance wrong, like Christopher Holm/Arinnian. Tabitha Falkayn/Hrill, brought up by Ythrians, gets it right.
Merseians can be and are integrated into a human economy and legislature on Dennitza despite the racial supremacism of the Roidhunate - like the difference between Germans and Nazis. Poul Anderson created Dominic Flandry and the Merseians as a space opera hero and his enemies but then wrote more serious fiction about them.
1 comment:
Kaor, Paul!
My impression is that First Marchwarden Ferune disapproved of "Walkers" in THE PEOPLE OF THE WIND. But we never see any of those Walkers, so we can't decide how just his disapproval was.
I would have thought a flying race like the Ythrians would have made the apparent individualism of Walkers more workable for Ythrians than for humans.
I would rather say Anderson expanded on or filled out the possibilities to be seen in peoples like Merseians or persons like Dominic Flandry.
Ad astra! Sean
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