Monday, 8 March 2021

Incorporating "The White King's War"

"The White King's War" begins:

"The sun that men had once named Mimir burned with four times the brightness of Sol..."
-Poul Anderson, "The White King's War" IN Rick Katz (Ed.), The Collected Short Works Of Poul Anderson, Volume 5: Door To Anywhere (NESFA Press, Framingham, MA, 2013), pp. 168-200 AT 1, p. 168.

A Circus Of Hells, CHAPTER FOUR, begins:

"The next stage of the adventure came a month afterward. That was when the mortal danger began.
"The sun that men had once named Mimir burned with four times the brightness of Sol..." (p. 221)

"The White King's War," section 2, begins:

"Their acquaintance had only begun after Flandry struck his bargain with Leon Ammon. That had been toward the end of a night on the Imperial frontier world Irumclaw.
"Soon after the red-orange sun had set, the Terran had left the Naval compound where he was quartered and had walked downhill. No one had paid him any heed." (p. 171)

A Circus Of Hells, CHAPTER TWO, begins:

"Such was the prologue. He had practically forgotten it when the adventure began. That had been on a certain night about eight months later.
"Soon after the red-orange sun had set, he left the naval compound and walked downhill. No one paid him any heed." (p. 203)

We appreciate this seamless incorporation of a short story into a novel with a flashback in the short story becoming an earlier chapter in the novel. I think that, apart from these necessary changes, the texts of the story and of the corresponding chapters are identical.

1 comment:

Sean M. Brooks said...

Kaor, Paul!

If my recollection is correct, you will still find some fairly minor changes between these two texts, "The White King's War" and the first ten chapters of A CIRCUS OF HELLS.

To me, the chief flaw in A CIRCUS OF HELLS is that we don't see enough of the Wayland AI, which I regret. I do wish Anderson had added three or more pages about that AI in Chapter X.

Ad astra! Sean