Friday, 11 September 2020

Apparent Death

Sherlock Holmes and James Bond each apparently die at the end of a volume but return in a later volume. Aycharaych apparently dies at the end of Poul Anderson's A Knight Of Ghosts And Shadows. Two volumes later, it is suggested that he might return but then Anderson stopped writing the Technic History. Anderson does not do returns from apparent death. We think that Flandry and Hanno are each about to die near the end of a novel but they are rescued.

The best fictional return from death that I know is in Stieg Larsson's The Girl Who Played With Fire. Lisbeth is shot in the head with a low-caliber gun, loses consciousness and is buried but, a few pages later, wakes up. I really thought that she was dead for those few pages.

1 comment:

Sean M. Brooks said...

Kaor, Paul!

I remember as well how in THE GAME OF EMPIRE, we he Merseian Protector, Tachwyr the Dark, wondering if Aycharaych HAD died during the Dennitzan bombardment of Chereion. It makes me wonder if, during the time he was writing GAME, Anderson had some thoughts on bringing back Aycharaych.

I greatly value what Anderson wrote during his later years, after 1985 (starting with THE KING OF YS tetralogy). But I can't help wishing he had written one or two more stories, showing Flandry (and Aycharaych?) in later years.

Ad astra! Sean