The Slow Build-Up

Anyone who reads Poul Anderson's History of Technic Civilization for the first time in Baen Books' seven-volume The Technic Civilization Saga, compiled by Hank Davis, can have no idea of what is ahead of them. The build-up to a major future history series is imperceptible. Volume I, The Van Rijn Method, collects eleven installments, including one novel. However, the first six of these installments contain no single continuing character. Over the course of the remaining five installments in this volume, David Falkayn reappears once and Nicholas van Rijn three times so that eventually historical continuity is complemented by an amount of character continuity although not focusing on any single individual.

Planets and organizations are mentioned without any hint of their later importance. On this blog, I need not list their names yet again. Seven of the eleven installments in this volume had been among the twelve that had been previously collected as The Earth Book Of Stormgate and therefore bring with them into the Saga their Earth Book introductions. In particular, the introduction to the third story, "The Problem of Pain," presents significant background information about the founding of the Solar Commonwealth. Hloch, the Avalonian Ythrian editor of the Earth Book, makes his contribution to the wider Technic History. His Earth Book stretches across only the first two and a half volumes of the Saga.

The Polesotechnic League And A Criminal Organization

Because the Polesotechnic League is not an Intelligence service but a mercantile mutual support organization, it did not feature in the previous post, Intelligence Services And Criminal Organizations. Nevertheless, on Merseia, the League has occasion to do business with organized crime, the Gethfennu, because the latter is the only international network capable of a coordinated response to the planet-wide threat of radiation from the supernova, Valenderay. This plus the fact the Gethfennu is not an alien influence inserted into Merseian society but rather is the ancient baronial tradition in a distorted form bears out the suggestion that organized crime is an integral part of organized society. So, whether on Earth or on Merseia, how far does its influence extend?  

Intelligence Services And Criminal Organizations

Might Intelligence services sometimes employ or otherwise cooperate with criminal organizations? The two kinds of outfits act in secret and have a common interest in maintaining the status quo, the former because such maintenance is their raison d'etre, the latter because their preferred modus operandi is to operate within and to prey upon an orderly economy.

Dominic Flandry helps to enrich gang boss Leon Ammon on the frontier planet of Irumclaw because a wealthier Ammon will be better equipped to lobby Imperial officials to continue defending that part of the frontier. Flandry is canny enough to work part-time for Ammon as a private operation but might his Service get the same idea, to defend the Empire by enriching local gang bosses?

James Bond cooperates with a major smuggler of cigarettes, gold, diamonds, people etc against an even less scrupulous smuggler of heroin, opium etc. The CIA and MI6 buy intelligence from SPECTRE and the French Deuxieme Bureau pays them to assassinate a defector. Bond works with the Union Corse, the French equivalent of the Unione Siciliano or Mafia, against SPECTRE and even marries the daughter of the Capu of the Union Corse.

It will be evident that I am continuing to reread Ian Fleming and also to find points of comparison with Poul Anderson.

Poul Anderson And Ian Fleming

Similarities

a series about a secret agent

exotic locations

colorful descriptive passages

attention to detail

the need for a dictionary and an encyclopedia

Contrasts

The David Falkayn and Dominic Flandry series are biographical. We follow Falkayn from apprentice to acting CEO and Flandry from Ensign to Fleet Admiral. By contrast, Bond is always active in whichever year Fleming is writing the new novel. Information about Bond's s earlier life and career is fragmentary and contradictory. This literary eternal present was ended by Fleming's ill health and death, not by Bond aging. In fact, Bond's early biography was revised to knock a decade off his age. Originally, he had been active before and during the war whereas, later, he joined the Navy and Intelligence only during the war and then only by lying about his age.

In the later episodes of a biographical series, readers should be able to share the central character's nostalgia for events in earlier episodes. Despite the contrast noted in the previous paragraph, I think that Fleming wrote this kind of fictional nostalgia better than Anderson.

 

In Royale-les-Eaux, Bond remembers:

 

"...the great battle across the baize he had had with Le Chiffre so many years ago. He had come a long way since then..."

-Ian Fleming, On Her Majesty's Secret Service (London, 1965), 2, p. 21.

 

- and, in Jamaica:

 

"...his survival against the mad Dr. No..."

-Ian Fleming, The Man With The Golden Gun (New York, 1965), 4, p. 41.

Having created such memorable characters, Fleming deploys their names to good effect in later episodes.

Comparing Heroines

In Ian Fleming's Dr No, Honeychile Rider is an orphan, lives alone in the cellars of a ruined great house in Jamaica, befriends animals that come in from the fields, becomes involved in James Bond's investigation of Dr No and later, as Honeychile Wilder, has two children by a Philadelphia doctor.

In Poul Anderson's The Game Of Empire, Diana Crowfeather is an orphan, sleeps alone in a ruinous temple on Imhotep, is a friend of Tigeries, becomes involved in Targovi's investigation of the Magnusson rebellion and later, we think, joins Intelligence with Targovi, possibly still using Axor's quest as a cover.

Just one of those quick breakfast posts. Maybe more later.

Two Culminations

I know that I keep saying this in different words but I still think that seven volumes culminating in The Earth Book Of Stormgate followed by ten volumes culminating in the post-Flandry collection make for one very impressive future history series, way ahead of any of its competitors, also that each of these culminations is highly appropriate.

In the Earth Book, the editor, Hloch, having recounted the history of the Polesotechnic League as far as van Rijn's arrival at Mirkheim, has reminded his readers of the eventual Babur War and then concluded with two Avalonian tales both told from youthful hover-points even though the first was written in her high old age by Judith Dalmady/Lundgren who was then drawing on the fresh memories of the protagonist, David Falkayn's grandson. Youth and age and beginnings and endings interact throughout the History. Hloch comments that The Earth Book Of Stormgate is ended, wishes his readers fair winds forever and flies above Mount Anrovil in the Weathermother. He has completed the story of the beginning of the colonization of Avalon. 

In the concluding installment of the Technic History:

human civilizations have spread through several spiral arms of the galaxy;

a planetary population descended from the Aenean rebels who were expelled by Dominic Flandry rejoins interstellar civilization even though meanwhile its members have ceased to be human;

a new source of immense wealth, the "Cloud Universe" globular cluster, is about to be opened up to human prospectors and miners.

After seventeen volumes, a new beginning...

The Evolution Of A Future History

Poul Anderson's first future history series, the Psychotechnic History, follows its model, Robert Heinlein's Future History, in several respects, one such respect being the almost total absence of continuing characters. In both series, two or three characters appear for a second time. That is all. In fact, the stories in Heinlein's The Green Hills Of Earth are not chronologically linear but contemporaneous, e.g., "Gentlemen, Be Seated" describes a lunar accident mentioned briefly at the end of "Space Jockey."

By contrast, Anderson's major future history series, the Technic History, might seem to be just two character-based series strung together. Its opening four volumes are set entirely within the lifetimes of van Rijn, Falkayn and their colleagues and therefore do not count as a future history. Nine entire volumes are set entirely within the lifetime of Dominic Flandry and therefore do not count as a future history. But that leaves only four other volumes! (For this purpose, I count "The Saturn Game," "The Star Plunderer" and "Sargasso of Lost Starships" as an extra volume to be read between the Polesotechnic League Tetralogy and The People Of The Wind. Including "Outpost of Empire" in the same volume as The Day Of Their Return makes the Technic History complete in seventeen volumes.)

However:

the nine-volume Flandry period is a sequel to the Polesotechnic League volumes;

the novel, The People Of The Wind, is set after van Rijn but before Flandry;

the remaining three volumes are collections and each of them comprises a future history in its own right.

Thus, what began as two series about individual characters became one massive future history series.

"The Milky Way Soared Overhead."

"The Milky Way soared overhead."

We have often read similar phrases. See The Milky Way Thread. However, this sentence was written not by Poul Anderson but by Ian Fleming:

-Ian Fleming, Dr No (London, 1989), VII, p. 63.

James Bond sees "...a dense bright carpet..." of stars and counts over a hundred in "...a finger's length..." (ibid.)

This passage highlights a difference between genres:

the sf cliche of FTL, faster than light interstellar travel;

more generally, any speculative fiction about future space travel technologies, preferably avoiding cliches;

most fiction and literature, simply reflecting the perennial human experience of stars as lights in the sky.

As we always say, Poul Anderson wrote all three. We have also noted that, in his detective novels, realms like the night sky and the ocean depths are described with the sensibilities of an sf writer.

James Bond will find that Dr. No is sabotaging American rockets but not that he is secretly developing an FTL drive. That can happen in sf but not in spy fiction!

Exotic Locations

Dominic Flandry's exotic locations are Starkad, Merseia, Irumclaw, Talwin, Admiralty Center, Shalmu, Llynathawr, Dido, Scotha, Alfzar, Brae, Nyanza, Altai, Unan Besar, Vixen, Varrak, Vor, the Coral Palace, Diomedes, Dennitza, Chereion, Archopolis, Ramnu, the High Sierra and Imhotep whereas James Bond's are Royale-les-Eaux, Harlem, Jamaica, Saratoga, Las Vegas, Istanbul, Paris, Crab Key, Miami, Fort Knox, Italy, Nassau, Toronto, New York State, the Swiss Alps, Japan, Berlin, the Seychelles and a few that I have missed.

Many people enjoy fictional narratives set in real places but not those set in imaginary extraterrestrial locations. Why and why not? Entirely different kinds of writing skills are involved. I can neither visit New York, then write a convincing account of it, nor imagine somewhere new and write a plausible account of it so I fully appreciate works by authors able to do either or both. Poul Anderson, of course, does both, e.g., see his accounts of Amsterdam in "Star of the Sea."

I suggest that anyone who has never read any fantasy or sf samples some Poul Anderson.

A Single-Volume Future History

The Earth Book Of Stormgate is not only a pivotal volume in Poul Anderson's Technic Civilization future history series but also and in its own right a single-volume future history, covering many centuries:

Hloch's introduction refers to the Terran War on Avalon, thus to the events of the previous volume, The People Of The Wind;

"Wings of Victory" describes first contact with Ythri;

"The Problem of Pain" describes Ythrian-human exploration of Avalon;

"How To Be Ethnic In One Easy Lesson" describes Adzel's student days on Earth;

"Margin of Profit" is the first van Rijn story;

"Esau" - van Rijn and the planet Babur, a prequel to Mirkhem;

"The Season of Forgiveness" - Christmas on Ivanhoe, a sequel to the first David Falkayn story;

The Man Who Counts - van Rijn on Diomedes, a planet later visited by Dominic Flandry;

"A Little Knowledge" - problems in the Polesotechnic League;

"Day of Burning" - the trader team of Falkayn, Adzel and Chee Lan on Merseia, thus a prequel to the Flandry series;

"Lodestar" - more problems in the League, also van Rijn and the trader team at Mirkheim, thus another prequel to Mirkheim;

"Wingless" - Falkayn's grandson on Avalon during the colonization of the Hesperian Islands;

"Rescue on Avalon" - an ancestor of Daniel and Christopher Holm on Avalon during the colonization of the Coronan continent;

Hloch's introductions to individual stories impart other information, e.g., about the origin of the Solar Commonwealth.

The Earth Book, although mainly about the Polesotechnic League, begins and ends with human-Ythrian interactions, from the discovery of Ythri to the full colonization of Avalon.

Solos

Fictional secret agents like Dominic Flandry and James Bond often seem to work solo although it helps to have backup, e.g., Chives. When isolated on Scotha, Flandry has no alternative but to work alone. However, on occupied Vixen, he joins forces with the local resistance movement. Later when he parleys with the pretender, Magnusson, he has gone as part of a delegation and meanwhile is also in cahoots with another team of Terran agents who have been sent to Merseia and who are unfortunately arrested. In The Day Of Their Return, intelligence gathered by Flandry is shared with a High Commissioner, Chunderban Desai.

In Diamonds Are Forever, Bond is inserted into a case that had been initiated by Scotland Yard Special Branch and, in mid-Atlantic, he receives a signal that not only discloses the identity of the mysterious mastermind, ABC, but also alerts 007 as to what action he should take next. In this novel at least, Bond is clearly part of a team.

That is all for today, folks. I really am trying to blog a bit less.

A Peak Of Future History

The Earth Book Of Stormgate is a peak of future historical writing. Hloch's introductions and afterword make this volume both more and other than just another collection. In the first place, if the book had not included these specially written passages, then it would have had to be titled differently and probably less evocatively. It not only completes but also almost doubles the length of the Polesotechnic League series. Having read six stories and two novels in four previous volumes, we now read a further seven stories and one novel of this series in the Earth Book. Familiar characters return even though we have already read their farewells at the end of Mirkheim. The Earth Book complements The People Of The Wind and almost completes the story of the Ythrians. The only remaining appearance of an Ythrian, imparting some further information about the planet Avalon, is in the Terran Empire novel, The Day Of Their Return. Finally, because it is fictitiously written and published during the period of the early Terran Empire, the Earth Book paves the way for the nine-volume Dominic Flandry series and its single-volume sequel. Thus, this single volume is pivotal to the entire Technic History. If there is any better future historical writing anywhere, then I would like to know about it.

Kinds Of Introductions

Three levels or layers of writing:

a fictional text;

an introduction to the fictional text;

a fictional introduction to the fictional text.

 

The fictional introduction has an intermediate status. Like the introduction, it is an introduction. Like the fictional text, it is a work of fiction.

 

Christopher Holm, a character in the novel, The People Of The Wind, is mentioned in the author's introduction to the novel, The Night Face, and in three of the fictional introductions in the omnibus collection, The Earth Book Of Stormgate. Thus, a character in only one work is nevertheless mentioned, but in different ways, in two others.

 

The Earth Book introductions add an immense amount to the future historical narrative:

 

Holm turns out to be the author of one story and the co-author of two others;

 

Emil Dalmady's daughter lived on Avalon where she wrote short stories that were published in the periodical, Morgana, and three of these were collected in the Earth Book;

 

A.A. Craig, author of Tales Of The Great Frontier, visited Avalon and wrote two of the stories collected in the Earth Book, including the first van Rijn story;

James Ching's first person account of his dealings with Adzel was part of a life long journal and he settled in Catawrayannis.

Dominic Flandry And John Carter

John Carter, former Captain in the Army of the Confederate States, is captured by the Thark horde of green Martians. Carter, the best swordsman of two worlds, is able, in the low Martian gravity, to leap above and behead a twelve-foot Thark. By killing green Martians, he gains their names and females and other belongings. Thus, he becomes Dotar Sojat, a chieftain of Thark, even while remaining their captive. (Later, among the humanoid red Martians, Carter will become a Prince of Helium, then Jeddak of Jeddaks, Warlord of Barsoom, i.e., Emperor of Emperors, Warlord of Mars.)

Dominic Flandry is captured, at different times, by Merseians, Scothani and Ardazhiro. Among the Merseians, he works to make himself useful to his main captor,Ydwyr, until he can escape. His stay among the Ardazhiro is brief. Among the Scothani, he wins money and belongings by gambling and makes himself so useful to so many powerful individuals that he is able to pull down their kingdom around their heads.

"Forgive Me..."

"Tiger By The Tail."

Dominic Flandry to Penda, the Frithian King of Scotha:

"'Forgive me if, in my ignorance, I seem insolent." (p. 258)

Flandry could have worked for van Rijn! Very far from ignorant, he has learned the language and much more en route to Scotha, even noticing that southerners, recently conquered by the Frithians, rightly feel that they are culturally superior to them, like Greeks to Romans. Pretended ignorance is Flandry's defense for saying exactly what he thinks. His self-abasing politeness reminds us of: "'I am a stranger and ignorant...Forgive me...'" (See here.)

In the Frithian court, Flandry not only sees representatives of non-Scothan species but also discerns that they are not respected. He can make suggestions that they agree with. And he even catches the eye of Penda's Queen Gunli. Flandry's campaign of sabotage is already under way.

Arrival On Scotha

"Tiger By The Tail."

On pp. 241-255,  Dominic Flandry is taken as a prisoner to the planet, Scotha. On p. 255, they arrive. See Scotha and The Scothani Empire.

Sf writers do different things with fictional planets. Early in an adventure story about planetary exploration, the author might graphically describe the viewpoint character's sensory experiences immediately after arrival on the surface of Mars, Ythri or wherever it is. See At First Sight. However, in this story, Anderson is primarily interested in Scotha not as a newly discovered planet but as a setting for Flandry's Machiavellian manipulations of his gullible enemies. See:

Flandry On Scotha  

Flandry On Scotha: General Nartheof 

Flandry On Scotha: Sviffash Of Sithafar 

Flandry On Scotha: Queen Gunli

Flandry On Scotha: Prince Torric

Flandry On Scotha: Earl Morgaar 

Flandry On Scotha: Duke Asdagaar And Prince Cerdic

 

CS Lewis and Brian Aldiss criticized sf that merely exported Terrestrial issues into space. See Aldiss, Amis, Anderson, Asimov, Lewis. However, in the first place, Anderson exported exceptionally well and, in the second place, he did a lot more than merely export! Genesis transcends.

Gambling

"Tiger By The Tail."

We began to reread this story a week ago and, albeit with some digressions, we are still recapitulating its opening account of Flandry's journey as a prisoner to Scotha. During this journey, he:

discovers that the Scothans gamble;

learns their games;

teaches them some of his;

easily cheats his unsuspecting captors;

wins clothes and money.

 

Sean Brooks summarized the role of poker in Poul Anderson's Flandry series here. Thus, gambling is common to the careers of Dominic Flandry and James Bond although it is even more important in the latter - central in Casino Royale and pivotal in Moonraker, Diamonds Are Forever, Goldfinger and On Her Majesty's Secret Service. Fleming also covers both horse racing and golf. Those of us who do not play poker or other card games are unable to understand or appreciate the dramatic details of these games as recounted by the authors or even, as Sean pointed out, to understand a poker reference used as a metaphor.

 

There is chess, although not any particular chess moves, in Anderson's A Circus Of Hells and Fleming's From Russia, With Love. Does Anderson's "The Immortal Game" give moves? I can look it up although not this morning.

See Sean's Andersonian Chess.

Later:  After a stroll by Morecambe Bay, the next post is taking shape but is taking longer than it used to.

Self-Submergence

I understand that the social base of Nazism was the petite bourgeoisie, small businessmen, shop keepers, self-employed etc, feeling equally threatened both by big capital and by organized labor - even though the Nazi regime was anything but a "Third Force" equally opposed to those two pre-existing social forces! You might think that members of such a class would value their individuality but another response was to submerge themselves in a mass movement:

Hitler said, "Mass demonstrations must burn into the little man's soul the conviction that, though a little worm, he is part of a great dragon."

-copied from here.

In "Tiger By The Tail," some Scothans also feel:

"...that darker longing for submergence of self which humankind had also known, too often, too well." (p. 254)

Scothans have been forcibly unified and are denied self-advancement by "...the aristocratic, anti-commercial order at home..." (ibid.) One way to cope with this is to identify themselves with the outward aggressive urge of the Frithian kingdom. At University, a Fascist-influenced student told me that we need to recognize "the mystical." This interested me until I learned that, by "mystical," he meant not self-transcendence but "marching together..."

Nazis also scapegoated a racial minority and Dominic Flandry introduces this policy as part of his sabotage of Schotania. See Flandry On Scotha: Earl Morgaar.

Comparative Future Historical Studies II

I have tried but tastes differ. It would have been good to get involved with and to appreciate C.J. Cherryh's voluminous future history series while also comparing it with Heinlein, Anderson, Niven etc. I read Downbelow Station a while back and have just finished The Pride Of Chanur.  

What I liked in the latter:

multi-species space stations with sections for oxygen-breathers and methane-breathers;

sudden contact between intelligent species using FTL in two widely separated spatial volumes;

a human being seen as alien by the viewpoint character.

As in Larry Niven's later works, Cherryh's written style made it difficult for me to grasp what was happening both in terms of space travel technicalities and when it came to the nuances of inter- and intra-species conflicts. Although I understood that the characters were undergoing harrowing experiences, I neither empathized with them nor felt any inclination to reread for a better understanding. I have two further Chanur novels in a single omnibus volume and might, for the sake of completeness, read them a chapter at a time but not with any urgency.

I thought that the characters should have spoken in terms of their own time units rather than using phrases like, e.g., half an hour. The story began with the advent of the human fugitive but he then became peripheral until his comrades arrived in a sort of deus ex machina near the end. Or so I thought.

An important question: can one intelligent being own another? New laws will have to be passed when extraterrestrials are encountered.

The Two Texts Of "Tiger By The Tail"

In the original version:

"Under Penda's leadership, a dozen similar, smaller barbarian states had already formed a coalition with the avowed purpose of invading the Empire, capturing Terra, destroying the Imperial military forces and making themselves masters. Few of them thought beyond the plunder to be had, though apparently some of them, like Cerdic, dreamed of maintaining and extending the Imperial domain under their own rule."

-Poul Anderson, "Tiger By The Tail" IN Anderson, Agent Of The Terran Empire (London, 1977), pp. 7-36 AT II, p. 18.

 

In the revised version, the Scothani Empire:

 

"...had made client states of several chosen societies, helping them start their own industrial revolutions and their own enforced unifications of their species. Under Penda, the coalition had grown sufficiently confident to plan war on the Empire."

-"Tiger By The Tail," p. 254.

 

Thus similar states have become client states and the aim of ruling the Terran Empire has been dropped in favor of merely appropriating some already colonized and civilized planets.

 

Original version:

 

"They had shrewd leaders, who would wait till one of the Empire's recurring political crises had reduced its fighting strength..."

-Agent Of The Terran Empire, p. 19.

 

Revised version:

 

"They would wait for the next of the Empire's recurrent internal crises - and Flandry had been on Llynathawr because a new one of those seemed to be brewing."

-ibid.

 

The completed Technic History not only recounts several of those crises but also presents a theoretical explanation for them.

 

In the original version, Flandry reflects that "...two or three rival imperia... (p. 19) would probably help Scotha whereas, in the revised version, it is explicit that the Mersians are in the background.  

Frithian Kings II

See Frithian Kings.

If the Scothani Empire had not been incorporated into the Terran Empire, would it have been able to reform itself gradually by political negotiation and compromise?

Would the King have accepted that the nobles should vote on taxation?

Would the nobles have accepted that the commons should elect a lower house of the parliament?

Would the nobles later have accepted the extension of the electoral principle to the upper house?

Would Scothan females have gained equality?

Would slaves and subject peoples have been granted their freedom without having to fight for it?

Would all this have been achieved without any need to resist and overcome violent reaction?

Preferably but I doubt it.

A Wisp Of The Milky Way

"The battle in space was, to the naked eye, hardly visible - brief flashes of radiation among the swarming stars, occasionally the dark form of a ship slipping by and occulting a wisp of the Milky Way. But Admiral Walton smiled with cold satisfaction at the totality of reports given him by the semantic integrator."

-Poul Anderson, "Tiger By The Tail" IN Anderson, Agent Of The Terran Empire (London, 1977), V, p. 31.

 

Two points of interest:

 

yet another set of objects seen against the Milky Way; 

the data-processing machine called an "integrator" recalls Anderson's use of that term in his Psychotechnic History. See here. (Scroll down.)

I had to find that paragraph in the original version of this story because it is entirely rewritten in the revised version:

 

"The unaided eye could never really see a battle in space. Nothing but flashes between the stars betokened rays, warheads, incandescent vapor clouds, astronomically nearby. Further off, across distances measured in planetary orbits, the deaths of ships were invisible.

"Instruments sensed more fully, and computers integrated their data to give a running history of the combat. Admiral Thomas Walton, Imerial Terran Navy, laid down the latest printout and smiled in stark satisfaction."

-"Tiger By The Tail," p. 271.

 

Terminology has been updated. The "semantic integrator" has become computers integrating data.   

Frithian Kings

"Tiger By The Tail."

The Frithian kings have unified Scotha and now rule a hundred planetary systems. Within his interstellar realm, a Frithian king is stronger than the Terran Emperor is in his because the latter, although theoretically omnipotent, cannot possibly govern such a large domain in any detail. Thus, the Frithian king is a big fish in a (comparatively) small pool whereas the Emperor is a big fish in an ocean. I could expound here on my experience of big fish in small pools but that would take us away from our current Andersonian context and maybe belongs on another blog.

The king must heed the "...sort of parliament..." (p. 253) of the great nobles which in turn must respect the rights of commoners although, below them, there are slaves and subject peoples. Maybe, after a revolution or two, Scotha will be able to approach some kind of democracy? But first the interstellar ambitions both of the warrior aristocrats and of lesser folk currently unable to better their lot at home must be curbed and fate allots that latter task to Dominic Flandry.

Inter-Species Morality

We have been naturally selected to help other human beings either because they bear the same genes or because they might help us in return and we experience this motivation not as calculating self-interest but as moral obligation but should we feel such obligation towards non-human rational beings? I think that the answer is obviously yes but have had to argue with someone who thought that we should be prepared to exterminate other intelligent species if that was considered necessary to make space for humanity.

The Merseians of the Roidhunate think that the God favors the Race and Cerdic of Scotha thinks that he bears no obligations to any aliens because:

"'They are not of the Blood.'"

-"Tiger By The Tail," p. 252.

So they would agree with the guy that I had to argue with. In CS Lewis's Ransom Trilogy, Professor Weston thinks that mankind is entitled, indeed obliged, to displace other races. The same issue potentially arises in any multi-species sf, e.g., by Larry Niven or CJ Cherryh.

Naivety

"Tiger By the Tail."

I remember being surprised to learn that the Army requires an internal police force to detect criminal activities within its own ranks. There are even plainclothes officers who have uniforms but rarely wear them. Surely members of a disciplined, uniformed, armed service uphold the values that they are sworn to defend? No. It is naive in the extreme to believe that everything in society is as it is claimed to be.

Prince Cerdic:

"'Oh, we have our evil persons, but they are few and the custom of private challenges keeps them few.'" (p. 252)

A custom of private challenges, as opposed to the rule of law, is barbaric! And Cedric's claim is a non sequitur. Is it only the evil that are challenged and only they that are killed in duels? (Cerdic's claim might become circular, i.e., he might claim that death in a duel is proof of evil intent.)

His rosy account of Scothan society continues:

evil persons are few;

their evil is straightforward - just lawlessness or rapacity! - by contrast with Terran deceit;

most Scothani abide by their code;

no true male breaks an oath, deserts a comrade, betrays his lord or lies on his word of honor;

females are kept under control and know their place;

youths respect the gods and the king, fight and speak truth.

 

That phrase, "no true male," is the "No true Scotsman" argument:

 

"All Scotsmen wear kilts."

"But Jim McGregor's a Scotsman and he doesn't wear a kilt!"

"Then Jim McGregor is not a true Scotsman!"

 

What sounded like an empirical generalization turns out to have been an idiosyncratic definition.

 

Flandry will explain that their denial of general dishonesty leaves the Scothani open to it. Each individual follows Flandry's devious advice without reflecting that others might meanwhile do likewise. End of Schothani Empire.

Reflections On Death III

"Tiger By The Tail."

Prince Cerdic:

"'Death is a little thing, Flandry; it comes to everyone at his hour; but honor lives forever.

"'That is why we will win.'

"Battleships help, thought the human." (p. 252)

 

"Kine die..."

 

Planet Stories, January 1951, contained two Poul Anderson stories, one published under a pen name.

 

This has been a quick breakfast post.

Reflections On Death II

 

See Reflections On Death.

Another enigmatic remark by Aycharaych:

"'The totality of existence will always elude us: and in that mystery lies the very meaning. How I pity immortal God!'"

-Poul Anderson, "Hunters of the Sky Cave" IN Sir Dominic Flandry: The Last Knight Of Terra (Riverdale, NY, 2012), pp. 149-301 AT XVII, p. 295.

I have discussed this passage before. See here. Aycharaych seems to be saying that it is better to be mortal than to be immortal.

Flandry reflects that he is holding his own against the Old Man near the beginning of A Stone In Heaven and reviews his life when he thinks that his death is imminent near the end. To personify something feared by giving it a humorous nickname is perhaps to return to the earliest forms of animism and polytheism.

I began to post about fictional reflections on death because I had just read an uncharacteristic passage in a James Bond novel. I had a biography of Ian Fleming which I cannot currently locate. I gathered from it that some passages in the Bond novels are autobiographical. In this passage, Bond is in a plane in a storm:

"There's nothing to do about it. You start to die the moment you are born. The whole of life is cutting through the pack with death. So take it easy. Light a cigarette and be grateful you are still alive as you suck the smoke deep into your lungs. Your stars have already let you come quite a long way since you left your mother's womb and whimpered at the cold air of the world. Perhaps they'll even let you get to Jamaica tonight."

-Ian Fleming, Live And Let Die (London, 2004), 16, p. 160.

Two observations:

it does not sound like James Bond, particularly not the Bond who wrote "You only live twice..." and for whom his secretary wrote the epitaph - 

 

"'I shall not waste my days in trying to prolong them. I shall use my time.'"

-Ian Fleming, You Only Live Twice (London, 1966), 21, p. 180;

 

but it definitely is a reflection on death and worthy of comparison with Flandry and Aycharaych.

Comparative Future Historical Studies

I have just received a copy of The Chanur Saga by CJ Cherryh, a 694-page omnibus edition of three Chanur novels. Some of you might remember that I have been invited/challenged/whatever to read The Pride Of Chanur in its entirety, then to post first impressions, then later to post more considered impressions. We will see how that goes. The Pride Of Chanur is 228 pages in length. Either it is going to grab me, as promised, or it is not.

We have enjoyed comparing and paralleling Poul Anderson's future histories with those of several other sf writers so will we be able to add Cherryh to that list? I will be reading the first Chanur novel in the next few days but will not post about it until finished. If it really grabs me, then it might take time away from blogging...

Reflections On Death

Fiction reflects life which includes death so some writers of fiction reflect on death:

 

"'That is the human mentality again,' said Aycharaych. 'Your instincts are such that you never accept dying. You, personally, down underneath everything, do you not feel death is just a little bit vulgar, not quite a gentleman?'

"'Maybe. What would you call it?'

"'A completion.'"

-Poul Anderson, "Hunters of the Sky Cave" IN Anderson, Sir Dominic Flandry: The Last Knight Of Terra (Riverdale, NY, 2012), pp. 149-301 AT II, p. 164.

 

So Chereionites have instincts that do accept death? Well, we will learn in A Knight Of Ghosts And Shadows that they are extinct, except for Aycharaych. Later in "Hunters...," he will set out to complete Flandry's life. 

In A Knight..., Aycharaych suggests that the consciousness of a mere few decades of life makes human beings always in haste. So Chereionites live longer than just a few decades? That makes sense and might make it easier for them to accept death.

Aycharaych continues:

"'It may be the root of your greatness as a race... Could a St. Matthew Passion have welled from an immortal Bach? Could a Rembrandt who knew naught of sorrow and had no need for steadfastness in it have brought those things alive by a few daubs of paint? Could a Tu Fu free of loss have been the poet of dead leaves flying amidst snow, cranes departing, or an old parrot shabby in its cage. What depth does the foreknowledge of doom give to your loves?'"

-Poul Anderson, A Knight Of Ghosts And Shadows IN Sir Dominic Flandry: The Last Knight Of Terra, pp. 339-606 AT IX, p. 460.

A futuristic sf novel does not need references to Bach, Rembrandt or Tu Fu but is nevertheless enriched by them, especially when expressed in Poul Anderson's prose. Dead Leaves have become a blog theme. There will be more "Reflections on Death."

Re-Appreciation

A day of extra-blogular activities, which today has been, can leave some mental space for re-appreciating the structure of Poul Anderson's Technic History. This post will probably not say anything that has not already been said several times before on this blog. It is important to remember that a good future history series is appreciated on two distinct levels. First, each installment, whether a short story or a novel, has to be fully comprehensible and enjoyable as a discrete fictional narrative. Secondly, however, if we do read the entire series, then we additionally appreciate its many internal cross-references and their emergent bigger picture.

In the Technic History, the pre-League, Grand Survey short story, "Wings of Victory," introduces the planet Ythri and mentions the planets, Hermes, Woden and Cynthia.

The Polesotechnic League period of the History comprises:

five stories and one novel about Nicholas van Rijn;

one story about the Wodenite Adzel, referring to both Ythri and Cynthia;

two stories about the Hermetian David Falkayn;

two stories about van Rijn's first trader team comprising Falkayn, Adzel and the Cynthian Chee Lan;

two novels and one story about van Rijn and the trader team;

two other stories, one referring to van Rijn as a public figure.

The first sequel to the League series features David Falkayn's grandson, Nat Falkayn, who is also van Rijn's great-great-grandson, on the human-Ythrian colony planet of Avalon. The planet was explored by Ythrians and human beings in an earlier story and its colonization was led by David Falkayn. A later sequel shows a remoter descendant, Tabitha Falkayn, helping to defend Avalon against the Terran Empire which, later again, will be served by Dominic Flandry whose many achievements will include:

inflicting several defeats on the Merseians who had originally been helped by David Falkayn;

expelling Imperial rebels whose remote descendants will recontact human interstellar civilization in the concluding installment of the Technic History;

thwarting a planned Imperial usurpation by a Duke of Hermes.

I know that I have recounted all this before but I can't get enough of it and it is impossible to incorporate all of Anderson's future historical cross-reference into a brief summary like this one.

Phases Of Civilization

The Solar Commonwealth is the first phase of Technic Civilization. The Terran Empire is its Indian summer, according to Dominic Flandry. Everything after the Long Night is "post-Technic," I think, although not, of course, post-technological.

Nicholas van Rijn presents a critique of the declining Commonwealth at the end of Mirkheim. We read critiques of the Empire by Lord Hauksberg, Ydwyr the Seeker, Cerdic of Scotha, Chunderban Desai and Dominic Flandry, all discussed in various earlier blog posts. Three men and two aliens present an essentially consistent narrative of rise and decline from diverse perspectives. Cerdic's denunciation is simplistic, possibly disingenuous and partly truthful.

A convincing history and its interpretation emerge across the course of no less than forty three stories and novels.

In Cerdic's Cabin

"Tiger By The Tail."

Prince Cerdic's spaceship cabin:

tusks, shields and swords on a bulkhead;

animal skins on the deck;

a grotesque idol (we would like a description);

both infotrieve and computer terminal;

"bookrolls" with a reader;

holoscreen;

books with Anglic titles;

an Imperial-manufactured lounger.

 

Regarding that idol, Cerdic refers to:

 

"'The gods who forged our destiny...'" (p. 245)

 

Flandry is required to learn the principal Scothan language, Frithian, which is exactly what he wants to do, just as, later in his career, when captured by the Ardazhiro, he learns Urdahu.

Cerdic's contemptuous dismissal of the Terran Empire:

self-seeking politicians;

self-indulgent masses;

corruption;

intrigue;

morality and duty gone rotten;

art declined into craft;

science declined into dogma;

strength sapped by pervasive despair.

 

Both Brechdan and Cerdic acknowledge that humanity was great once. However, Brechdan adds that human beings might be great again whereas Cerdic, far less perceptively, consigns human greatness to "...long ago." (p. 251)

 

I am surprised at Cerdic's complaint that science has become dogma. Can an interstellar civilization be maintained without genuine science? Do the Scothans practice scientific method? Does Cerdic himself know the difference between theory and dogma? Or is he just mouthing someone else's critique?

Time And Worry

"Tiger By The Tail."

"...Scothania was no ordinary barbarian nation. Could the Long Night really be drawing nigh - in Flandry's sacrosanct lifetime?

"He shoved the thought aside. Time was lacking for worry. Let him also dismiss fret about the job from which he had been snatched. It would go to the staff, who could doubtless handle it, albeit not with the Flandry sytle. He had suddenly acquired a new task, whereof the first part was plain, old-fashioned survival." (pp. 249-250)

Time was lacking for worry! I agree that he should not fret about an interrupted job that will go to others but can anyone just decide not to worry about something important? Yes, if immediate survival becomes an even more urgent concern. It is good that Flandry sees survival as merely the first part of his new task. If survival became his only concern, then things would indeed be bad.

Individual mentalities differ. When I told a guy that, for me, meditation can involve agonized guilt for past actions, he commented, rightly, that that does not sound good but then his solution was just not to think about it! Good for him if he can decide just not to think about anything unpleasant but one kind of meditation involves just sitting with whatever comes up and at least some of us simply have no control over what "comes up."

 

Flandry's predicament is not so far from ours. He has his approaching "Long Night." We perceive comparable threats to a continued comfortable life-style. If I thought that one of those threats was about to be realized, then I would not be able to decide not to worry! All fiction is about life, even including futuristic sf and space opera.

Risks And Mistakes

Take no risks when you are on the run but can you avoid every risk? On Unan Besar, the intelligence chief, Warouw, knows that Flandry had had at least brief contact with a certain courtesan who has since departed to an unknown destination. Checking that courtesan's antitoxin record, Warouw learns that she has recently received antitoxin (necessary for everyone on the planet) in Gunung Utara where the dispenser remembers that she was accompanied by a tall man... Flandry has been careless.

When Bond and Solitaire have traveled far enough away from Harlem - so Solitaire thinks -, she removes her veil and is almost immediately recognized by a member of Mr. Big's network. She has been careless.

We try to imagine how these narratives would have unfolded if the characters had not made these mistakes.

Scothans

No rational being has chosen to be the way he is. This can be illustrated by considering the characteristics of different fictional intelligent species. Ythrians, winged carnivores, needing to hunt or herd, cannot avoid being territorial. Merseians have instincts that make them enjoy combat so they must discipline themselves not to see combat as an end in itself.

The Scothans who have captured Flandry are:

seeking adventure, wealth and fame;

well disciplined;

courteous to each other;

kindly toward their prisoner;

brave;

honest;

loyal;

capable of sentiment;

appreciative of beauty;

easily enraged;

uncompassionate;

of limited interests;

unhygienic by Flandry's standards. 

So how would you counsel a Scothan? Would it be possible to widen their interests or to show them the values of restraint and compassion? Might some of this be simply impossible given their genetic inheritance? (In practice, it might be impossible with some human beings.)

The Size Of The Terran Empire Again

"Tiger By The Tail."

The Scothan Empire is in unknown space outside the Terran Empire. The Scothan Prince Cerdic leads a dozen spaceships that loot several planets, including a couple that are under Terran suzerainty although only tenuously connected, and Cerdic leaves no witnesses, thus avoiding open conflict with the Terrans until he has sufficiently prepared for it.

His agents on the Imperial planet, Llynathawr, are of different races, probably including some human beings and also Scothans pretending to be from another part of the Terran Empire - like Aycharaych who had claimed to be from the non-existent planet of Jean-Baptiste in Sector Aldebaran. The size of the Terran Empire makes it easy to infiltrate it.

A Touch Of ERB

I trust that blog readers understand occasional TLAs (Three Letter Abbreviations), e.g.:

FTL = Faster Than Light;

STL = Slower Than Light;

ERB = Edgar Rice Burroughs.

 

When the Schothan Prince Cerdic leaves Flandry's cell:

 

"His guards followed, except for the sentry. The latter whipped forth his dirk and held it straight up, an obvious gesture of salute."

-"Tiger By The Tail," p. 247.

 

Despite their high tech, including guns and rifles firing radium projectiles, ERB's Martians mainly fight with swords. Maybe ammunition is scarce on a dying planet? The Martians salute by raising their swords and shouting "Kaor," meaning both "Hail" and "Aye."

Poul Anderson could have written a better John Carter of Mars book than ERB and would also have been able to rationalize ERB's many scientific absurdities. Carter could have put in an appearance, alongside the Lensman and others, in the Old Phoenix.

The Future And An Unseen Shore

"He sat down by the window and gazed up at the clear sky, into the future."

-Ian Fleming, Live And Let Die (London, 2004), 9, p. 86.

 

"She gazed past the river and the forest beyond, northeasterly toward an unseen shore."

-Poul Anderson, "Star of the Sea" IN Anderson, Time Patrol (Riverdale, NY, 2010), pp. 467-640 AT 11, p. 570.

 

OK. I found a similarity between these two sentences. Bond gazes into his unknown future, hopefully a good one - the sky is clear. Janne Floris of the Time Patrol gazes into her subjective future but also into the objective past because she is traveling backward in time to identify an event that her arrival at that earlier time has already caused.

Both characters gaze toward what is physically before them - the sky, the river and forest. Both also focus on what is as yet unknown, whatever is going to happen to them next.

 

And, in both cases, we read on...

Aycharaych And Mr. Big

Another brief Flandry-Bond comparison.

Flandry's continuing villain, Aycharaych, and Bond's second villain, Mr. Big, accurately depicted in this book cover image, are very dissimilar characters. However, there are two similarities:

each works for the major hostile power, Russia, Merseia;

Flandry hypothesizes that Aycharaych's espionage and sabotage are a kind of artistry and Aycharaych confirms this when Flandry confronts him on Chereion;

Mr. Big tells Bond that he takes pleasure only from the artistry and finesse of his operations.

Two masterminds speak to each other across the timelines.

Life In Three Universes II

Which kind of universe is ours?

Many exo-planets have been detected. The laws of physics and chemistry are universal. In any environment, energized complex molecules should change randomly until one becomes self-replicating and natural selection can begin but how probable are:

multi-cellular organisms;

central nervous systems;

consciousness;

manipulation;

self-consciousness;

language;

thought;

complex societies;

technology;

stable and enduring civilizations?

 

In Harvest Of Stars, human personalities are recorded and duplicated. A person is compared to a song sung by many singers and recorded in many forms. Is that a valid analogy? Would you die happy if you knew that you were to be succeeded by a duplicate? I think that it is the only plausible kind of survival after death - and the technology for it does not yet exist.

LIfe In Three Universes

Life Abundant

"We are one more-or-less intelligent species in a universe that produces sophonts as casually as it produces snowflakes."

-Poul Anderson, "Outpost of Empire" IN Anderson, Captain Flandry: Defender Of The Terran Empire (Riverdale, NY, 2010), pp. 1-72 AT p. 7.

 

Life Rare

"Those mats, stalks, fluttering membranes, and spongy turrets were purple, ruddy, gold, in a thousand mingled shades. Now and then swarms of tiny creatures whirled aloft. Light shattered into sparks of color where it struck them.

"To Brannock the world was beauty and marvel. It did not threaten him. Nor did raw rock or empty space; but here was life. That it was primitive hardly mattered, in a universe where life of any kind was so rare as to seem well-nigh a miracle. That it was altogether alien to Earth's made it a wellspring of knowledge, from which Intelligence Prime, and through its communications, intelligences across the known galaxy had been drinking for these past seven hundred years. The farthest off among them had not yet received the news; photons fly too slowly."

-Poul Anderson, Genesis (New York, 2001), PART ONE, VII, pp. 85-86.

 

Life Made Abundant

"'...once folks have taken root yonder, once they've built an industry in places that will last, why, they won't have to destroy any other life they may find, ever again. They won't need to start with oxygen in the air. They'll have the power, and the time, to begin from scratch, and make naked rocks blossom.'"

-Poul Anderson, Harvest Of Stars (London, 1994), 63, p. 529. 

Anderson addresses all angles and answers.

What Might Happen In Imperial Space?

See Numbers Of Sophont Species.

There could be local interplanetary space travel in any of two million planetary systems. There could also be hyperspatial interstellar travel provided that it is more than a light-year away from the nearest Terran base or spacecraft. If a large fleet from anywhere outside the Empire were to travel as far as a hundred light-years into Imperial space, then someone would detect its instantaneous hyperspatial "wakes." However, the Ardazhiro war fleet, constructed within the Imperial sphere, is able to invest Vixen before anyone knows that the Ardazhiro even exist. The sun of Ardazir is not in Imperial catalogues because it is located in an unexplored region beyond a dark nebula. Intelligence agent Dominic Flandry acquires its coordinates and thus saves the Navy a lengthy search. It seems that most of "known space" is not only not known but also potentially dangerous.

In the earlier Solar Commonwealth period, trade pioneer crews initiated by Nicholas van Rijn had explored some of the many planetary systems that the frontier explorers had bypassed, thus demonstrating that the unknown parts of known space could also be profitable.

Numbers Of Sophont Species

Can there really be:

Scores Of Thousands Of Sophont Species -

- in the Terran Empire? Yes. We are repeatedly told that the 400 light-year diametered Empire encompasses an estimated four million stars, most with planets, that maybe half of these planetary systems have been visited at least once and that a mere hundred thousand have, often sporadic, Imperial contact and bear, often purely nominal, allegiance. See Djana And Rax. Djana asks who can remember all the races in the Empire and reflects that even the hundred thousand are too many to keep track of.

Thus, within the Imperial sphere:

two million stars have never been visited;

one million, nine hundred thousand have merely been visited, maybe just once;

one hundred thousand have contact that, in many cases, is sporadic.

 

So there is plenty of room for scores of thousands of intelligent species. One hundred is five score. Among those one hundred thousand planetary systems:

 

Do some species occupy more than one planet?

 

Does this number include the humanly colonized planets, Hermes, Aeneas, Vixen, Dennitza, Unan Besar, Germania, Atheia, Imhotep, Daedalus, Llynathawr, any others?

 

How many have more than sporadic contact?

 

Sean Brooks estimates that each Imperial sector encompasses 1,000 planets. See:

 

Sector Governors in the Terran Empire by Sean M. Brooks.

When Aycharaych arrives on Llynathawr, the capital planet of Sector Alpha Crucis, he claims to be from the planet of Jean-Baptiste in Sector Aldebaran. Some Merseian agent has inserted false data in the files on Llynathawr, confirming the existence of the non-existent Jean-Baptiste. There is no interstellar internet connection. When Chunderban Desai, High Commissioner of the Virgilian System in Sector Alpha Crucis, requests information about Aycharych, a data reel must be physically transported under high security from Catawrannis on Llyanathawr to Nova Roma on Aeneas where Desai is based.. See Imperial Administration III. The size of the Empire works against it. Deception is easy, even including a falsehood about the existence of an entire planet and its rational species.

This MIGHT be the only post for today:

running out of inspiration (?);

needing to slow down (?);

other stuff going down (!)

It would be possible to reduce the frequency of posts significantly while still continuing to post regularly but this would require some mental readjustment on my part. We will find out.