Some fictional futures are recognizable projections of the past or present, e.g.:
"'The Space War had occurred, and in China the Protector was overthrown but the Council of Nine was worse...'" (p. 63)
After civil wars, international wars, World Wars, a Cold War and a War On Terror, a Space War would be a plausible next step and we are familiar with dictatorships succeeding each other in China and elsewhere.
I read but do not have The Canopy Of Time, an earlier version of Brian Aldiss's single-volume future history, Galaxies Like Grains Of Sand. In the earlier version, some of the italicized interstitial passages began with statements to the effect that: "Again we can only say that there was change without change..." Although I was hoping for more concrete information, I nevertheless found this uninformative refrain curiously persuasive.
"This is the way Time has of fulfilling itself: while the depths of adversity are being reached, the foundation stones of future greatness are laid."
-Brian Aldiss, Galaxies Like Grains Of Sand (London, 1979), THREE, p. 50.
Aldiss echoes Asimov's Foundation and Anderson's Long Night.
1 comment:
Kaor, Paul!
Again I thought of Anderson's "Kings Who Die." If it was too dangerous for the great powers to resolve their quarrels ON Earth, I can see them doing that OFF Earth, in space.
Ad astra! Sean
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