Sunday 2 January 2022

Earth Book And Saga

In The Earth Book Of Stormgate, we read, in this order:

"Lodestar"
an unheaded interstitial passage by Hloch, summarizing Mirkheim and introducing "Wingless"
"Wingless"
 
In The Technic Civilization Saga, Volume II, David Falkayn: Star Trader, concludes with "Lodestar" and Volume III, Rise Of The Terran Empire, opens with Mirkheim followed by that passage by Hloch, now headed "INTRODUCTION," then "Wingless." Thus, the Earth Book is integrated into the Saga.

The text of "Wingless" reveals only that, on Avalon, Nat Falkayn has a father called Nicholas and a grandfather called David. (David Falkayn's son, Nicholas, was born near the end of Mirkheim.) It is the interstitial passage/INTRODUCTION that informs us that David and Coya Falkayn had led human beings to Avalon. Without Hloch's commentary, we would have waited until The People Of The Wind at the end of Volume III to learn that David Falkayn, by this time long dead, had been the Founder of the colony on Avalon.

Hloch also informs us that "Wingless," like two earlier Earth Book stories, was written for the Avalonian periodical, Morgana, by Judith Dalmady/Lundgren, daughter of Emil Dalmady, hero of Judith's earlier story, "Esau," which also appears in Volume I of the Saga.
 
A complicated and convincing history.

1 comment:

Sean M. Brooks said...

Kaor, Paul!

I have sometimes thought it would have made more chronological sense if Hank Davis had included MIRKHEIM in the second volume of the SAGA. But that might have made DAVID FALKAYN: STAR TRADER, too inconveniently thick.

Ad astra! Sean