East Of Windhome

Poul Anderson, The Day Of Their Return IN Anderson, Captain Flandry: Defender Of The Terran Empire (Riverdale, NY, 2010), pp. 74-238, 2.

The chapter begins:

"East of Windhome..." (p. 76)

- which, we might remember, was the name of Hugh McCormac's residence in Chapter VI of The Rebel Worlds.

The viewpoint character, Ivar Frederiksen, hears "...the Windfloss flowing." (ibid.) We might remember that Kathryn McCormac's maiden name was Frederiksen and that Hugh McCormac, when returning to Windhome, heard the Wildfoss River brawling in cataracts.

Ivar and his comrades ambush "Imperials." (p. 77) Later, Ivar confirms that these Imperials are "Terrans." (p. 81) Before doing that, he has entered Windhome, "...the ancestral seat of the Firstman of Ilion." (p. 79) That was Hugh McCormac's title. Sergeant Astaff, wearing Ilian uniform in defiance of Imperial decree, addresses Ivar as "'Firstli' Ivar!'" (p. 80) - then reminds him that he is, "'...next Firstman of Ilion....'" (p. 82)

Astaff also tells us:

"'I know Empire. Traveled through it more than once with Admiral McCormac.' As he spoke the name, he saluted. The average Imperial agent who saw would have arrested him on the spot." (p. 82)

Astaff begins our introduction to Aenean Anglic, with no definite article: "Empire," not "the Empire." More importantly, with Flandry, we met the Pretender McCormac; now, with Ivar, we meet a man who served under, and still salutes, the exiled Admiral McCormac.

Finally, moving the narrative forward, Astaff introduces us to Aenean religion. Ivar, as next Firstman, is:

"'Maybe last hope we got, this side of Elders returnin'.'" (ibid.)

Little does the reader yet suspect what this is going to mean although the opening chapter has given us a hint:

"-Six million years have blown by in the night, said Caruith. I remember..." (p. 76)

The issues of The Rebel Worlds are still with us and more will be added although, somewhat disjointingly, all the characters have changed.

An Unexpected Sequel

If Poul Anderson's major future history series, the History of Technic Civilization, is read in chronological order of fictitious events, for example in Baen Books' seven-volume The Technic Civilization Saga, then the third Young Flandry novel, The Rebel Worlds, is succeeded by two non-Flandry installments, "Outpost of Empire" and The Day Of Their Return. However, and completely unexpectedly, the second of these installments imperceptibly metamorphoses into a direct sequel to The Rebel Worlds despite not sharing any characters with it. Snelund is dead, the McCormacs have fled and Flandry has returned to Terra so what new characters have become active in Sector Alpha Crucis and how do their actions continue the conflicts initiated by their predecessors?

In the large format edition of The Technic Civilization Saga, Volume IV, Captain Flandry: Defender Of The Terran Empire:

p. 73, which could have been an internal title page for The Day Of Their Return, is blank;

p. 74 bears a dedication To Marion Zimmer Bradley, my lady of Darkover (that is another future history series by a woman writer that I have not read);

p. 75 bears a quotation from Job;

pp. 75-76 bear Chapter 1 which does not tell us where it is set and is packed with Biblical language (see On The Third Day... and Jesus And Caruith);

Chapter 2, beginning on p. 76, kicks off the action... 

Another Didonian Unit

The Rebel Worlds, XII.

See Didonian Units.

Whereas Cave Discoverer, Master of Songs and Many Thoughts differ only in their krippo, Cave Discoverer and Woe differ only in their ruka. Although this ruka, a captured enemy unit, must make oneness in order to drink blood and survive, heesh has to be forced into oneness because of heesh's ideological differences from the Thunderstoners. Some of the Thunderstone vocabulary was lost when Cave Discoverer's ruka died but some was retained and more regained when another ruka temporarily replaced the krippo although the new ruka's culture regards such two-species linkages as perverted. Flandry's linguistic skills enable him to lead the variously combined units through speech exercises. He has called a mind into being. Strange.

Didonian Democracy II

(Here is part of what is left of the Antonine Wall.) 

 

The Rebel Worlds, XIII.

More on Didonian decision-making processes:

"...Flandry declared it was needful to push harder forward than hitherto. The remaining Didonians (?) formed several successive entities, as was the custom when important decisions were to be reached, and agreed." (p. 109)

That bracketed question mark reminds readers that:

"The Thunderstoners could assemble one full person at a time. Of the possible combinations, they chose Guardian of North Gate..." (p. 105)

That entity:

"...did not understand [Kathryn's] pidgin, for only heesh's noga had been in Cave Discoverer." (ibid.)

However:

"'They put Lightning Struck The House together for [Flandry] after [Kathryn] left.'"

"All heesh's units had at various times combined with those that had been in Cave Discoverer: among other reasons, for heesh to gain some command of pidgin." (p. 107)

 

Guardian of North Gate, Lightning Struck The House and others cannot meet and converse so they are assembled one at a time and their units remember what they thought. The last entity to be assembled, Lightning Struck The House, informs Flandry of their agreement with him.

The Wind Lulled

The Rebel Worlds, XII.

When Dominic Flandry tells Kathryn McCormac:

"'I want to be your man myself, in every way that a man is able.'" (p. 108)

- what happens? Does she respond immediately? No. Are there background sounds? Most certainly:

"The wind lulled, the river boomed." (ibid.)

Regular Anderson readers should know what to expect by now. The wind lulls as Kathryn realizes what Flandry has said. The river booms as he awaits her response. The wind in particular has become almost a part of the grammar like a full stop or an exclamation mark.

Some Details In Two Empires

The famous Hadrian's Wall is just one county north from where I am now in Lancaster. This Wall is the starting point of Poul and Karen Anderson's The King Of Ys, set during the decline of the Roman Empire. A recent TV program highlighted the lesser known  Antonine Wall, further north, which has not survived. 

Finally, there is an Antonine Seabed on the planet Aeneas in Sector Alpha Crucis of the Terran Empire in Poul Anderson's main future history series. The name of this dead seabed is unexplained although it is consistent with other local nomenclature: the star Virgil, the planet Aeneas, the city Nova Roma etc.

Both images show Hadrian's Wall. An interstellar empire must at least be free of walls.

Intermediate Narratives

Poul Anderson wrote the Young Flandry Trilogy as an extended prequel to his Captain Flandry series. However, two intermediate works also continue plot threads from the Trilogy.

In Ensign Flandry, John Ridenour is on Starkad at the same time as Flandry. In "Outpost of Empire," Ridenour is on Freehold.

In A Circus Of Hells, Aycharaych, a continuing character in the Captain Flandry series, is mentioned for the first time. The Day Of Their Return shows Aycharaych active on Aeneas before he first met Flandry in "Honorable Enemies."

At the end of The Rebel Worlds, Aaron Snelund, Governor of Sector Alpha Crucis, is dead and Hugh McCormac, Firstman of Ilion on Aeneas, has gone into exile with his wife and sons. The Day Of Their Return shows the aftereffects on Aeneas of Snelund's Governorship and of the defeated McCormac Rebellion.

The concluding installment of the Technic History, "Starfog," introduces remote descendants of some of the Aenean exiles.

Flandry And Kathryn

The Rebel Worlds, XII.

Flandry offers to join the rebellion if he and Kathryn can be together even just for the rest of the trek to Port Frederiksen. However, Kathryn, remaining monogamous, replies:

"'I understand what you're thinkin' Dominic. If Snelund, why not you? But don't you see the difference? Startin' with the fact that I do like you so much?'" (p. 108)

Flandry should not be thinking, "If Snelund, why not me?" and should say that he is not. Kathryn did not consent to Snelund, which made what he did rape. Flandry does not propose anything but consensual sex between two adults morally and legally capable of consent. His reply is:

"'I see you're loyal to an arbitrary ideal that originated under conditions that don't hold good any more.'" (p. 109)

What arbitrary ideal? Monogamy? That was not exactly arbitrary because it was strongly based in property relationships. I agree that it originated under conditions that are continually changing but Kathryn can still opt to abide by it, which she does. That settles the rest of Flandry's career:

"Very well, if I have no reason to forswear His Majesty Josip III, let me carry on with the plan I'm developing for the discomfiture of his unruly subjects." (ibid.)

Values

The Rebel Worlds, VII.

Kathryn McCormac to Dominic Flandry after being raped by Aaron Snelund:

"'To you, what happened to me was...unfortunate, nasty, yes, but not a befoulin' I'll never quite cleanse me of, not a thing makes me wonder if I should really want to see Hugh ever again....'" (p. 60)

How can anything done by Snelund to Kathryn befoul her in a moral as opposed to a mere physical sense? Returned to her husband or other relatives, Kathryn needs support, not cleansing. But I know that some societies have had other attitudes.

As Aliens See Us

I have found a lot of quotes about seeing ourselves as others see us. See here.

Sf writers can comment on humanity by imagining how we would appear to other intelligent species. However, I seem to have addressed this issue sufficiently in previous posts. See here and also What Happened Long Ago.

The Didonians are sufficiently alien to present a unique perspective:

"(Blurred, two legs, faceless...no, had they beaks?)"

-The Rebel Worlds, p. 5.

"...the strangers, who had but single bodies and yet could talk..."

-op. cit., p. 6.

"...pity that race, who are not beasts but can think, and thus know that they will never know oneness." (p. 141)

Havelock Hopes, Bonner Thinks

Novelists rarely capture the chaos of many real-life conversations: interruptions, self-interruptions, repetitions, cross-purposes, simultaneous monologues, incoherence. I could quote several examples but they would become tedious. In The Ragged-Trousered Philanthropists, Robert Tressell devoted a paragraph to describing the verbal noise generated by a group of building workers during their lunch break - but usually one of his characters clearly analyzed economic interactions, refuting his work mates' prejudices.

Novelists can at least acknowledge that sometimes someone starts to speak but is unable to complete a sentence.

"'Very good, sir,' Havelock said. 'I hope -'

"Assault burst forth."

-The Rebel Worlds, XII, p. 103.

What did Havelock hope?

"'I think -' Gifford Bonner said.

"And with those words, it ended."

-James Blish, The Triumph Of Time IN Blish, Cities In Flight (London, 1981), pp. 466-596 AT CHAPTER EIGHT, p. 595.

A philosopher begins to say what he thinks, then the universe ends!

Life will still be going on even when it is ending.

Times Of Hope

(Shakespeare Sonnet 60.)

History is full of times of hope like during a revolution or immediately after a successful revolution.

"'Why should anybody put everything at stake for the revolution, if he doesn't hope you'll bring him a better day?'"

-The Rebel Worlds, X, p. 89.

 

"'The glorious revolution was necessary,' Patel declared. 'Emperor Hans restored order and purged corruption.'"

-Poul Anderson, The Game Of Empire IN Anderson, Flandry's Legacy (Riverdale, NY, 212), pp. 189-453 AT CHAPTER TWO, p. 220.

 

"'...I could be a Yankee soldier of fortune, in part starry-eyed over the liberation, in part hoping somehow to cash in on it -...'"

-Poul Anderson, "Ivory, and Apes, and Peacocks" IN Anderson, Time Patrol (Riverdale, NY, 2010), pp. 229-331 AT p. 275.

 

It is always a pleasure to quote from the Technic History and the Time Patrol in the same post. I include the sonnet because it describes the effects of "Time" yet ends optimistically with "...times, in hope..."

The Rogue Planet, Satan, Recedes From Beta Crucis

The Rebel Worlds, X.

As the rogue recedes on its hyperbolic orbit:

raw mountains

gashed valleys

naked stone plains

chill, stagnant seas

night

rare lamps

blue fluorescence

dreary wind-skirl

rushing sterile waters

inanimate, unaware, toiling machines

a dragon's hoard of synthesized isotopes

sufficient reason to garrison and colonize Sector Alpha Crucis

where High Admiral Hugh McCormac waits while battle is joined

Didonian Units

The Rebel Worlds, IX.

Didonian Units

nogas: like rhinoceroses, stupid on their own;

 

rukas: like apes, with the largest forebrains;

 

krippos: birds.

 

Three entities, Master of Songs, Cave Discoverer and Many Thoughts, share a noga and a ruka, differing only in their krippo. Thus, killing that one krippo will end three entities.

The common noga and ruka bestow vigor and boldness. Cave Discoverer explores and adventures geographically whereas Many Thoughts journeys spiritually. Entities have descriptions, not names. A region with a large, loud waterfall is called Thunderstone. Places come closer to being named.

 

Information about Dido is highly condensed and difficult to retain.

We Would Like To Read The Following Works II

See We Would Like To Read The Following Works.

The Sky Book Of Stormgate.

The sources for the Earth Book. (See also here.)

The  Memoirs Of Rear Admiral John Henry Reeves, Imperial Solar Navy.

The records of the  Galactic Archaeological Society.

The Time Patrol records of time gone awry.

The Autobiography of Guild Captain Felip Argens.

The sequel to The Broken Sword.

More about the Old Phoenix.

Forever Beyond Our Reach

The Rebel Worlds, IX. (Alternative title: Commander Flandry.)

"It was all one enormous room. Privacy was surely an idea which Didonians were literally incapable of entertaining. But what ideas did they have that were forever beyond human reach?" (p. 85)

See also Privacy.

A Flatlander cannot visualize a solid.

We cannot visualize colors corresponding to parts of the electromagnetic spectrum that are invisible to us.

Maybe minds cannot understand how they are generated by brains?

Didonians experience a different relationship between consciousness and intelligence. Units watch or perform routine tasks until they detect a situation that requires them to combine into intelligent entities. Do the entities remember the animal experiences of single units?

Didonian Education And Maturation

The Rebel Worlds, IX.

Adult units form temporary entities in different combinations with immature units. Thus, the immature units absorb memories from all the entities in which those adult units have participated. The young also partner among themselves, then usually each of them replaces a unit that has died out of established entities. Thus, for an established entity, it is as if a third of heesh's memories have changed. Heesh has forgotten some old information but learned an equivalent amount of new information. Imagine if you forgot having read Poul  Anderson but acquired memories of having read some other author. Then you could reread Anderson. Any given personality does not cease abruptly but fades gradually into a different personality. Didonians must have a completely different understanding of the ontological status of a personality because they directly experience that gradual fading.

Didonian Democracy

The Rebel Worlds, IX.

How do Didonians make collective decisions? They cannot confer, then vote, simultaneously because many entities share two or more units so that they can never meet each other although they can share memories by swapping units. 

The communion has mixed feelings about guiding Flandry's crew across the mountains so:

"'They'll create one called Many Thoughts and let heesh ponder the question.'" (p. 84)

So will Many Thoughts, who does not exist until created but who then comprises three units bearing memories and aptitudes from many other entities, think and decide for the whole communion? Might that be their equivalent of an election/consensus/vote?

Didonians And Souls

How would the Platonic-Cartesian concept of "soul" apply to Poul Anderson's tripartite Didonians? Is a new immortal soul created every time a new entity is formed? When it is no longer possible to form a particular entity, does that entity's soul then enter a hereafter or, in the Platonic scenario, prepare to reincarnate? If, as I was taught at school, only an organism linked to an individual, immaterial and indestructible soul is capable of reason, then the answer to these questions would have to be yes. But the Didonians are unlikely to deduce such a metaphysical conclusion from their inherently overlapping and demonstrably transient way of experiencing life.

CS Lewis argued that materialism cannot explain reason. I reply in section (7) here.

In Robert Heinlein's Starman Jones, a monkey-like alien animal has a limited linguistic capacity. When, with this fictional creature in mind, I suggested to a teacher who was a member of a religious order that, if animals were slightly more intelligent, then we would be able to converse with them, he replied by drawing an absolute doctrinal distinction between species with and without souls. I began to realize that my education and my private reading were giving me contradictory world-views. Another example was the familiar question: which story is true - Adam And Eve or dinosaurs and cavemen?

Battle Above Dido

The Rebel Worlds, VII.

Flandry's ship, Asieneuve, orbits Dido. A Darthan vessel, needled-nosed and rakish-finned and accelerating from a higher altitude, fires energy beams and missiles. When Flandry strikes the combat button, his ship automatically responds with blaster cannon and counter-missiles. Screens deflect ions but not heat, X-rays or torpedoes. Negagrav slows torpedoes and interceptors hopefully stop them. Shrapnel flies as Darthan armor is penetrated and the badly damaged ship recedes on a cometary orbit.

Beams penetrate Asieneuve. Three explosions are close enough to blast through the hull, shattering machines and killing men, including the exec officer, Rovian. Artificial gravity and air are lost but everyone aboard is spacesuited. The ship falls toward Dido. A chapter ends and we turn the page...

Significant Names

The Rebel Worlds, VII.

While approaching the Virgilian planet, Dido, the Aenean, Kathryn McCormac, tells Flandry:

"'The base, Port Frederiksen' - a brief white smile - 'one of my ancestors founded it - 's on the western end of Barca, as we've named the biggest continent.'" (p. 65)

Names

Virgil wrote the Aeneid, the Latin epic about Aeneas, survivor of Troy and ancestor of Romulus and Remus, founders of Rome.

Dido, Queen of Troy, was romantically involved with Aeneas and his abandonment of her to pursue his destiny is supposed to explain the historical Punic Wars between Rome and Carthage. (The Time Patrol intervened in the Second Punic War but in a different timeline.)

Hannibal Barca, Carthaginian general during the Second Punic War, famously led his army with elephants across the Alps.

Frederiksen: this is the first time that we are told Kathryn's maiden name. Her brother will become Firstman of Ilion on Aeneas after Kathryn's husband, Hugh McCormac, defeated by Flandry, goes into exile with Kathryn and many of his followers.

Ilion is an archaic name of Troy, hence Homer's Iliad. Virgil based his Aeneid on Homer's Iliad and Oddysey, to both of which the Aeneid is a sequel.

Manuel Argos, Founder of the Terran Empire, was a remote historical successor of Romulus.

Treason II

The Rebel Worlds.

See Treason and its combox.

How complicit is Emperor Josip in Governor Snelund's atrocities?

"'Everybody knows what Josip is: too weak and stupid for his viciousness to be highly effective.'" (II, p. 19)

On the other hand, Kathryn McCormac tells Flandry:

"'Snelund claimed the two've them plotted it before he left, and've kept in touch since.'" (V, p. 47)

But maybe Snelund boastfully exaggerates the extent of the Emperor's complicity? On the other hand, Flandry deduces:

"'I can see part of the machinery...

"'...word gets passed from the throne to various powerful, handpicked men. The facts about Snelund's governorship are to be suppressed as much as possible, the investigation of them delayed as long as possible and hampered by every available trick when finally it does roll. Yes. I'd begun to suspect it on my own hook.'" (p. 48)

 

But, because "'...a scandal of these dimensions can't be concealed forever...,'" (ibid.) Snelund also told Kathryn that he would provoke rebellion which could then be suppressed:

"'...in such a way that no firm evidence of anything remains.'" (ibid.)

Although all the evil is done by the governor and his mercenaries,  Snelund needs the Emperor to cover it up for him until he has extracted enough wealth and can provoke rebellion. 

Repackaging

OK. I think that this is how to repackage Poul Anderson's History of Technic Civilization in approximately its original reading order with minimum necessary emendations.

Four Boxed Sets

Box One

Volumes I-IV: The Polesotechnic League Tetralogy

Box Two

Vol V: The Saturn Game And Other Stories

Vol VI: The People Of The Wind

Vol VII: The Earth Book Of Stormgate

 

Box Three

Vols VIII-X: The Young Flandry Trilogy 

Vol XI: "Outpost of Empire" + The Day Of Their Return

Vol XII: a first Flandry collection

 

Box Four 

Vol XIII: a second Flandry collection

Vols XIV-XVI: the last three novels featuring Flandry

Vol XVII: the post-Flandry collection

Contents of the first Flandry collection

"Tiger By The Tail"

"Honorable Enemies"

"The Game of Glory"

"Hunters of the Sky Cave"

Contents of the second Flandry collection

"A Message in Secret"

"A Plague of Masters"

"The Warriors from Nowhere" should either conclude the second collection or become a prologue in A Knight Of Ghosts And Shadows.

 

In Box Three:

the Young Flandry Trilogy introduces Flandry and mentions Aycharaych;

The Day Of Their Return introduces Aycharaych;

the first collection shows Flandry encountering Aycharaych and later capturing him only to see the Merseians get him back in a prisoner exchange.

In Box Four, the first novel climaxes with the ultimate Flandry-Aycharaych confrontation but the third hints that the latter might return.

The phrase, "a sprawling epic," is truly applicable.

Disastrous Decisions And Deployments

The Rebel Worlds, VI.

The Imperial armada will reach the Virgilian System three days hence only to learn that McCormac has led his fleet to Beta Crucis to secure Satan. McCormac will leave a light vessel to guard Port Frederiksen on Dido and Darthan mercenary scout ships to patrol the system and attack any arriving Josipist craft. With the benefit of hindsight, we know that these deployments are heavy with future significance. Attacked by a Darthan, Flandry's first command, Asieneuve, will crash land on Dido. However, after slogging across the Didonian surface, Flandry will capture that light vessel in Port Frederiksen, thus acquiring the enemy codes and defeating the McCormac Rebellion. Poul Anderson makes it sound so easy. But the larger problems of Aaron Snelund and Emperor Josip must still be addressed. Josip is part of the solution to his own problem. He "'...won't outlast [his mother] by much, the way he treats his organism. And he won't have children - not him!'" (II, p. 19)

However, the succession crisis will cause another civil war but that is a later installment.

Treason

The Rebel Worlds, V-VI.

Governor Snelund plans to extract enough wealth from Sector Alpha Crucis to enable him to return Home to:

"'...bribe, buy elections, propagandize, arrange events, maybe purchase certain assassinations...till he has a Policy Board majority on his side.'" (V, p. 48)

He will commit atrocities, provoke civil war, then crush the rebels, wreaking enough destruction to destroy the evidence of the atrocities. Returned Home, he will become the power behind the Throne. He has planned this campaign in advance with Emperor Josip which means that the Emperor himself is guilty of treason against the Empire.

Hugh McCormac's oldest son, Colin, voices some doubt:

"'But - makin' you Emperor -'" (VI, p. 53)

It had not occurred to me on previous readings but, if Hugh McCormac does become Emperor Hugh I, then his oldest son will succeed as Colin I. But they have reckoned without Dominic Flandry, loyal subject of Josip - up to a point.

Labyrinthine Corridors II

See Labyrinthine Corridors, Corridors Of Power and Down The Shaft.

When a machine inside an antigrav flying cab has communicated with a machine inside the Intelligence headquarters tower, the cab deposits Flandry on the fiftieth-level parking flange where his card transfers credit through the meter before the door unlocks. A marine outside the entrance verifies his ID and appointment before admitting him to the building.

He walks through several crowded halls in preference to standing on a moving strip. Since the crowd is multi-species, we remember similar scenes in Star Trek and The People Of The Wind. See Admiralty.  On this level, there are civilian visitors. However, when a negagrav field in a lift shaft has taken Flandry to the ninety-seventh level, where he halts by grasping a handhold, everyone he passes in the corridor outranks him. Kheraskov's suite needs only a scanner and a talkbox linked to a low-grade computer because:

"Everybody unimportant got filtered out at an earlier stage." (p. 16)

Labyrinthine Corridors

Occasionally a back cover blurb captures the essence of a novel.

"On Terra herself, those who occupy the labyrinthine corridors of power busy themselves with trivialities and internal politics, as outside the final darkness gathers."

-back cover blurb on Poul Anderson, Young Flandry (Riverdale, NY, 2010).

As a matter of fact, Flandry is summoned by Vice Admiral Sir Ilya Kheraskov who busies himself with the fate of the Empire.

Those "labyrinthine corridors" reminded me of the tunnels and chambers which, we are told, go deep beneath the foundations of the towers of Admiralty Center. However, Kheraskov's office is on the ninety-seventh level of one such tower. Flandry, carried up by a negagrav field, walks along a corridor whose silence is deepened by the occasional soft voice or whirring machine. 

Interruption. Maybe more on this later.

Aeneans

Hugh and Kathryn McCormac, characters in Poul Anderson's The Rebel Worlds, are from the planet Aeneas. Chapter VI of The Rebel Worlds is set on Aeneas as is all of The Day Of Their Return. Anderson keeps minute details, such as Aenean phrases and speech patterns, consistent.

Kathryn McCormac to Dominic Flandry:

"'We had connections, we could eventu'ly raise a zoosny on Terra, even if Snelund was a pet of the Emperor's.'"

-The Rebel Worlds, V, p. 47.

Sergeant Astaff to Ivar Frederiksen, Kathryn's nephew:

"'When zoosny's died down, I'll slip your folks word you're alive and loose.'"

-Poul Anderson, The Day Of Their Return IN Anderson, Captain Flandry: Defender Of The Terran Empire (Riverdale, NY, 2010), pp. 74-238 AT 2, p. 81.

"A tadmouse piped into the mordant wind."

-The Rebel Worlds, VI, p. 54.

("...mordant..." is another instance of the wind commenting on the action.)

"A trill sounded. [Tatiana] walked to a perch whereon, tiny and fluffy, a native tadmouse sat."

-Captain Flandry, 7, p. 122.

(Tatiana is Ivar's fiancee.)

Details in The Rebel Worlds developed further in its sequel include tinerans, the Antonine Seabed, the Wildfoss River and Windhome:

"...the ancestral seat of the Firstman of Ilion."

-The Day Of Their Return, 2, p. 79.

Stars

The Rebel Worlds, V.

When the ships of the sector fleet depart, Flandry reflects that:

"The stars ignored them, were not touched by the wars and pains of life, were immortal - No, not that either. They have their own Long Night waiting for them." (p. 42)

The stars are mortal but where did the energy that started the universe come from? 

In one of John Sanders' novels, the hero ascended an Alp, there gained a perspective transcending international conflicts, then returned to resume his part in one such conflict while I, one of the readers, was still in the Alpine perspective. The stars do not "ignore" anything because they are not conscious in the first place but people can adopt a stellar or cosmic perspective according to which life does not matter because it is transient.

The forces and processes that generate, sustain and will outlast intelligence are almost entirely unconscious:

energy

entropy

temporary, local negative entropy, i.e., life

natural selection

consciousness

intelligence

 

Animals that preexisted and coexist with human beings are conscious but everything else is unconscious and we are a transient expression of that.

We Would Like To Read The Following Works

A complete history of the city-state of Ys from founding to flooding.

A complete history of Technic Civilization presented as a single-volume text book like HG Wells' The Shape Of Things To Come or Olaf Stapledon's Last And First Men. Although subsequent civilizations were also technologically based, I think that the phrase, "Technic civilization," applies only the the period between the establishment of the Solar Commonwealth and the Fall of the Terran Empire. However, there is considerably less information about later periods so it could probably all fit in one volume.

A complete history of the UN and of the Solar and Stellar Unions in Poul Anderson's earlier future history series.

A history of the timeline guarded by the Time Patrol in two parts:

(i) an account of how the Patrol operated and intervened in prehistory, then in history until the end of the twentieth century;

(ii) a narrative linking together what is known about the periods between the end of the twentieth century and the Danellian Era.

The Scum Of The Empire

The Rebel Worlds, V.

Kathryn McCormac reveals Snelund's plans for civil war to Flandry:

"'Afterward he'll disband [his mercenaries], 'long with his overlord corps. He recruited from the scum of everywhere else in the Empire, and they'll scatter back through it and vanish automatic'ly. He'll blame the revolt on subversion, and claim to be the heroic leader who saved this frontier.'" (p. 49)

See also:

"The Scourings Of Space" 

Donarrians And Ymirites 

 

I suppose that a multi-species interstellar civilization will have a lot of scum and scourings!

The Sector Fleet

The Rebel Worlds, V.

Some ships have been reassigned "...to help confront Merseia..." (p. 41);

many have joined the rebel, McCormac;

some must guard the key planets of the sector;

Admiral Pickens, moving toward the Vigilian System to confront McCormac, has only a quarter as many ships;

Asieneuve, commanded by Flandry, leaves the fleet to embark on her confidential special mission.

The action begins. The plot thickens.

Kraich

The Rebel Worlds, IV.

I said here that governor Aaron Snelund's apparent concern was a dramatic performance. Sure enough, when Snelund, smiting his chair arm, declaims:

"'No negotiation with a traitor!'" (p. 35)

- Flandry reflects, "How dramatic..." (ibid.)

After Flandry's interview with Snelund, the company of two xenos is very welcome. In a rooming house in Catawrayannis, Flandry's executive officer, Rovian of Ferra:

"...shared his kennel with a betentacled hulk from an unpronounceable planet. The hulk reeked of exuded hydrogen sulfide but was personally decent enough; among other sterling qualities, it did not know the Eriau language. It rippled on its bunk when Flandry entered, mushed an Anglic greeting, and returned to contemplation of whatever it contemplated.

"Rovian stretched all six limbs and yawned alarmingly. 'At last!' he said. 'I thought I would rot.'" (p. 38)

 

We are told that the rooming house's clientele are "...mostly nonhumans: unchoosy ones." (ibid.)

 

Mostly: it follows that a few very unchoosy human beings do share lodgings with beings like the hulk and the Ferran. Flandry, who has just come from the governor's palace with its live-fur carpet, moving sculptures, incense and music must sit on the floor because there are no chairs and must smoke a cigarette to cover the stench. However, this company is more acceptable than Snelund's. Rovian converses exactly like a man albeit while addressing Flandry in the principle Merseian language.

Because they are speaking Eriau, when the alert Ferran pounces on something that Flandry says, the latter responds, "'Kraich.'" (p. 39) OK, what does it mean?

"Faintly from outside came traffic rumble and an occasional raucous cry." (ibid.)

Plausible background details are always with us. There is a whole city out there.

Appearance

The Rebel Worlds, IV.

"[Snelund's] geniality was replaced by an appearance of concern. His tone sharpened. 'Have you fresh news of the Merseian situation? We're as worried about that as anyone in the Empire, despite our current difficulties.'" (p. 34)

We notice the "appearance." Aaron Snelund is what James Blish used to call a "moral imbecile," incapable of treating other people as anything but means to his own ends. He has caused and is still furthering those "current difficulties" for his own aggrandizement so his apparent concern can only be an elaborate dramatic performance.

I was impressed when a Zen monk addressed our meditation group during a foot-and-mouth crisis. Referring to the farmers who supplied the monastery but who needed to avoid physical contact, she started to say, "We must not appear to be...," but then interrupted and corrected herself: "We must not be insensitive to their situation." (Her emphasis.)

People talk about appearing. The Dharma is about being.

Catawrayannis On Llynathawr

The Rebel Worlds, IV.

Dominic Flandry comes to Catawrayannis, the city on Llynathawar, one of the eleven extra-solar planets visited by Flandry in his introductory trilogy.

See also:

A Ninth Planet

Planets Seen From Orbit

On Llynathawr

Important Planets 

Sector Alpha Crucis Of The Terran Empire 

I have not remembered much of this information so I imagine that even regular blog readers have also forgotten most of it.

Rereading a novel like The Rebel Worlds has become a combination of finding new information to post about and searching the blog for what has been posted already.

Tolkien presents endless details of a single world; Anderson many details of endless worlds.

Terran Space Navy Vessels

The Rebel Worlds, III.

Meteor

Comet

Continent

Planet

Star

Nova

Supernova 

See:

Asieneuve

Terran Naval Craft

 

In the combox to "Terran Naval Craft," Sean lists, starting with the largest:

 

superdreadnaughts

Nova class dreadnaughts

Star class pocket battleships

cruisers

light cruisers

destroyers

subdestroyers

Meteors

scoutships

supply ships

repair ships (?)

 

Glory to the Emperor!

 

Addendum, 30 Nov 2020: Flandry hijacks a Conqueror-class subdestroyer. (XIII, p. 114) 

A Clan Town Of Att

See two book reviews:

The People Of The Wind

The Rebel Worlds

 

The Rebel Worlds, III.

A Shalmuan community:

 

sprawling down a slope;

white drum-shaped houses;

several thousand occupants;

colorful roof gardens;

ways paved with tough moss;

common fruit trees;

cultivation and pastures below;

woods opposite;

"...silvery psuedograss..." (p. 26);

rotting bodies lashed to a hundred crosses;

"...charnel odor." (p. 25);

black clouds of carrion birds and insects.

 

The crosses are the work of Imperials or their mercenaries, not of Shalmuans. Flandry investigates. One of his bodyguards vomits.

Names Of Planets

The Rebel Worlds, III.

A planet can be named by its inhabitants or by its discoverers who may or may not be human. In the Terran Empire:

Shalmu was named by the Shalmuans;

 

Llyanthawr was named by its Cynthian discoverers, then bought by the Empire;

the star, Virgil, and its planets, Aeaneas and Dido, were named by their human discoverers;

 

Ifri?

"The habitable planet of the third sun was Shalmu.

"So it was called in one of the languages spoken by its most technologically advanced civilization." (p. 23)

Precisely. There is not just one name. There are different planetary civilizations, each with more than one language.

The Commonwealth and the Empire continue the tradition of naming stars and planets after Terrestrial mythological figures. There are other examples in the Technic History.

In CS Lewis's Out Of The Silent Planet, Weston and Devine kidnap Ransom and take him to "Malacandra," which Weston says is a planet's true name, learned from its inhabitants, but do even a planet's inhabitants have one true name for it? Conditions in the Solar System turn out to be not scientific or Darwinian but theological with a Platonic language originating on Mercury.

In Doctor Who, when the Doctor was told that he was to be transported to a planet identified only by a number, he replied that he was old-fashioned enough to prefer names and was then told that this planet was named "Skaro." He and we recognize the home planet of Daleks and Thals. But the answer should have been something like: "The planet - in the principle language of its dominant species through most of its history - was named 'Skaro.'"

After these interesting excursions to the Ransom Trilogy and to Doctor Who, we will return to the Flandry period of the Technic History.

The Southern Cross

The Rebel Worlds, II.

Orion Shall Rise ends with a ship questing for the Southern Cross whereas Dominic Flandry's adventure in The Rebel Worlds begins with Vice Admiral Kheraskov briefing Flandry about Sector Alpha Crucis of the Terran Empire and showing him a projection of:

"..twinned Alpha and bachelor Beta of the Southern Cross." (p. 20)

For the significance of this constellation in Poul Anderson's works, see here. (Scroll down.) See also "The Astronomy Of The Technic Civilization Saga" by Johan Ortiz here.

These are real places and Anderson invites his readers to imagine an Empire that operates on that scale. Kherakov, described as:

"...the master of perhaps a million agents through the Empire and beyond." (p. 17)

- does not expect Flandry to "'...contribute more than a quantum to our effort.'" (p. 18)

However, Flandry, an Andersonian hero who has already come to the attention of upper echelons because of the Starkad affair, will single-handedly resolve the conflict in Sector Alpha Crucis. (This parallels Falkayn's earliest exploits bringing him to van Rijn's attention.)

Multi-Species Civilization

The Rebel Worlds, I.

In his orbiting prison, Hugh McCormac recalls a conversation with a quadrupedal Wodenite, then is rescued by a team that includes a centauroid Donarrian whose:

"...simian countenance was a single vast grin." (p. 11)

Earlier in the Technic History, a Donarrian was loyal to a human being in "Sargasso of Lost Starships."

Can bodies be so different yet minds so similar that a Donarrian grins like a man while rescuing his wrongfully imprisoned (human) Admiral? I don't know but there is only one way to find out. The truth must be out there. There has got to be organic life at least on some of the many recently detected extra-solar planets. We will have to look for Wodenites and Donarrians.

The Ages That Follow

Several characters introduced during Orion Shall Rise die before the end. In the second last paragraph, Iern toasts:

Terai

Wairoa

Vanna Uangovna

Mikli

Jovain

 

- a mixed bunch. There are others that Iern was unaware of. 

Iern's wife, Faylis, would have died in Skyholm if she had not left it before it flew off to attack Orion. Iern and Ronica might have died, but didn't, when they rammed Skyholm. Thus, the novel could have ended with nearly all of its major characters dead. Instead, it ends with hope. Plik survives to prophesy that Iern's and Ronica's "'...spirits will walk crowned through the whole cycle to come - and, it may well be, the ages that follow.'" (CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN, p. 468)

If we link Orion Shall Rise to There Will Be Time, then those ages will also involve time travelers and Star Masters.

Something In Leviticus

Poul Anderson, The Rebel Worlds (London, 1973), I.

Hugh McCormac thinks that Aldebaran and Arcturus resemble fires warming the camps of men whereas Deneb and Polaris, far beyond the Empire and even beyond its enemies, are, by contrast, "...a cold sight." (p. 7)

He then reflects that Kathyrn would:

"...say there must be something in Leviticus against mixing so many metaphors." (ibid.)

Before we let it slip past us, we should notice that here is yet another reference to the Bible. We already know from much earlier in the Technic History that there are Christians on the McCormacs' home planet, Aeneas.

Planets Seen From Orbit

See:

Descriptions, Including The Milky Way

 

In Space

  

Return From Space

 

From his cell in the prison satellite, Hugh McCormac alternately sees:

 

the night side of the planet, Llynathawr, with a red and gold sunrise and lights flickering in the city of Catawrayannis;

 

the planet as a scimitar close to its sun;

 

the full planet as a brilliant shield with oceans, clouds and continents.

 

Llynathawr looks like distant Terra and unlike McCormac's rusty and tawny home planet of Aeneas.

 

The Rebel Worlds, I. 

Dominic Flandry's Tragic Era II

See Dominic Flandry's Tragic Era.

To recapitulate, Poul Anderson's History of Technic Civilization, when not repackaged in chronological order of fictional events as the seven-volume The Technic Civilization Saga, comprises:

the Polesotechnic League Tetralogy;

three short stories that could be collected at this point;

two companion volumes focused on the planet, Avalon;

the nine-volume Flandry period;

one collection of four post-Flandry stories.

The Rebel Worlds, which I will shortly reread, is the third volume of the Flandry period and also of the introductory Young Flandry Trilogy, the latter corresponding to Saga, Volume IV.

Meanwhile, I am also reading for the first time CJ Cherryh's Downbelow Station where, in Book Four of Five, a space battle commences.

A Final Moment Of Realization

Orion Shall Rise, CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX.

"It cracked through his head...

"Ronica caught at his arm...

"'Darling Iern, what's wrong? Are you okay?'

"'I - yes -' He struggled for self-command. 'Yes, I just had a, a rather frightful idea.'" (p. 458) 

Obviously, a major moment of realization. While Skyholm laser-attacks Orion, Iern realizes that he is able to fly Orion Two down through the atmosphere and ram Skyholm - which he does. Although he does not expect to survive, he manages to bounce the spaceship off dense atmospheric layers around the world, then to climb back into space from where he and Ronica broadcast a message of peace and unity to all mankind.

The concluding sentences of the novel are awesome:

 

"Wind quickened. A whale surfaced. The ship bore onward, in quest of the Southern Cross."

-CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN, p. 468.

The wind quickens with a new age for mankind. The whale demonstrates that Gaea is safe. The ship quests the Southern Cross: Iern, Ronica and mankind will return to space.

Dominic Flandry's Tragic Era

For the previous post, I reread just two sentences in The Rebel Worlds. This was enough to make me want to reread the entire novel and to re-immerse my mind in the Flandry period of the Terran Empire. This novel is the culmination of the Young Flandry Trilogy which delineates the background of the pulp hero who had first appeared in "Tiger By The Tail." It introduces Aeneas, the setting of The Day Of Their Return, and even mentions the tinerans.

The Rebel Worlds shows us Chives's home planet, Shalmu, features Hugh McCormac's doomed attempt to reform the Empire, describes the metropolis in its own right of Admiralty Center in the Rocky Mountains, reveals Flandry's imagining of the coming Long Night and informs us of his tragic relationship with Kathryn McCormac and the fulfillment of the curse put on him by the heroine of the previous novel. Flandry exiles McCormac and his followers. Their remote descendants will be discovered millennia later in the concluding installment of the Technic History when human civilizations have spread through several spiral arms of the galaxy, Anglic has become a dead language, Vixenite colonials have colonized New Vixen and the planet Serieve has also been colonized on the galactic rim.

Rereading The Rebel Worlds could lead to rereading other Flandry stories and also that concluding installment, "Starfog."