Wednesday, 2 February 2022

A Venture Into Humor

OK. I am rereading "Captive of the Centaurianess." This story is clearly intended as humor so is not really comparable with the other Planet Stories stories that became incorporated into Poul Anderson's Technic History.

The introduction describes the three main characters in glowing terms yet, as soon as we start to read about them, we realize that in no way do they match up to this. In fact, the introduction ends ironically :

"The essential selves of the glorious three will always be mysterious." (p. 149)

No way. The essential selves are decidedly unglorious.

The Jovian system is ruled by an independent ideological dictatorship:

"Whatever you could say about the Jovians - and some people said quite a bit - they did maintain the best transport in the Solar System." (p. 154)

That sounds exactly like: "You can say what you like about Mussolini. At least he made the trains run on time!"

(I don't know if anyone knows who said that but it was certainly said and has been repeated ironically.)

I will continue to reread "...Centaurianess" but my soul yearns back to the Technic History.

2 comments:

S.M. Stirling said...

Poul could be quite subtle. And he could send up SFnal tropes with a deadly sense of humor, probably because of his genuine liking for the field.

Sean M. Brooks said...

Kaor, Paul and Mr. Stirling!

Both: "Captive of the Centaurianess" was a wonderful story and I loved the comic contrast between that glowing buildup of the three main characters and the inglorious reality!

Ad astra! Sean