Details: Introduction And Convergence

I think that Poul Anderson's Technic History is unique among future history series in that characters and other details introduced gradually converge eventually. In the following summary, numbers represent instalments, e.g., 1 = "The Saturn Game." The details listed are significant later if not also at the time. 

1. A character who was raised in the Jerusalem Catholic Church.

2. Ythrians as a species but not yet as individuals.

3. An Ythrian family of the New Faith interacting with Aenean human beings on the planet that will be Avalon.

4. Nicholas van Rijn, the Polesotechnic League and Earth in the Solar Commonwealth.

5. The Wodenite Adzel and domestic life on Earth in the Commonwealth.

6. The Hermetian David Falkayn on Ivanhoe.

7. Falkayn working for van Rijn's company although he has not yet met van Rijn.

8. Later events on Ivanhoe.

9. Van Rijn on Diomedes with the future Duchess of Hermes.

10. An Altaian describes his encounter with Baburites to van Rijn.

11. The captain of van Rijn's yacht is from Ramanujan.

12. Van Rijn with Joyce Davisson from Esperance.

13. Falkayn, Adzel and Chee Lan are van Rijn's first trade pioneer crew/trader team. Van Rijn cameos.

14. The trader team on Merseia. No mention of van Rijn.

15. Van Rijn back on Earth.

16. The trader team and van Rijn. A Ferran.

17. Other characters, one of whom quotes van Rijn.

It continues like that. There are twenty-six more instalments.

Addendum:

It is hard to stop thinking about this but also difficult to remember every detail that should be included in a brief summary.

18. Van Rijn, Coya Conyon and the trader team at Mirkheim.

19. Grand finale for the League characters, Mirkheim and the Baburites. Major events on Hermes.

20. Falkyan-led colonization of islands on Avalon.

21. Later colonization of a continent on Avalon. Ivar Holm.

22. References back to the Commonwealth and forward to the Terran Empire.

23. The Terran Empire.

24. The Terran-Ythrian War and its effects on Avalon where Tabitha Falkayn marries Christopher Holm, son of Daniel.

25. Dominic Flandry, defending the Empire from Merseia, meets Max Abrams and John Ridenour on Starkad and Brechdan Ironrede and Tachwyr on Merseia - and fathers a son although we do not know that yet. Some Starkadians will be evacuated.

26. Flandry meets Tachwyr again on Irumclaw.

27. Flandry defeats the Aenean Rebellion and expels rebels. A Ferran.

28. Ridenour on Freehold.

29. Chunderban Desai from Ramanujan and Aycharaych of Chereion are on Aeneas in the aftermath of the Rebellion.

30. Flandry on Scotha.

31. Flandry meets Aycharaych.

32-34. Flandry elsewhere.

35. Flandry saves Vixen and captures Aycharaych but loses him in a prisoner exchange. Chives.

36. A brief mission for Flandry and Chives.

37. Flandry meets Tachwyr and Aycharaych again, loses his son and bombards Chereion.

38. Flandry joins up with Max Abrams' daughter.

39. Flandry's daughter teams up with the son of a Starkadian evacuee and with a Wodenite Jerusalem Catholic priest who studies Chereionite inscriptions. This new team thwarts a Merseian plot that had originated with Brechdan and Ironrede, thus demoralizing Tachwyr.

40. The Empire has fallen.

41-42. Interstellar civilization is restored.

43. A New Vixenite contacts descendants of Aenean exiles.

This does not cover all the connections.

Anderson's GENESIS

We stand on a very high mountain-top when we contemplate alternative futures imagined by Wells, Heinlein, Anderson and others. I omitted Olaf Stapledon. In his Last And First Men, mankind evolves and even devolves through various species, migrates through the Solar System and is eventually destroyed when the Sun expands. In this context, the TV adaptation of Dune that I watched for the first time today has its place as just one of these many fictional futures.

I think that Poul Anderson's Genesis is the most advanced futuristic speculation and will not be outdated in the foreseeable future but maybe this is just because I am not familiar with more recent works by other authors? 

Issues In Future Histories

(Image of the Old Pier Bookshop.)

HG Wells' The Time Machine: Control of the environment causes human degeneration.

HG Wells' The Shape Of Things To Come: Reorganization of society causes human emancipation.

Robert Heinlein's Future History: Technology progresses but society regresses until a technologically based religious dictatorship has to be overthrown but then, after some further difficulties, the first mature civilization emerges.

Isaac Asimov's Foundation: A predictive science of society is used merely to manipulate populations without their knowledge or consent. A mental science becomes merely a means of mental control.

Frank Herbert's Dune: Power politics. Paul Atreides gains sole control of a unique natural resource with the result that other factions unite against him.

Poul Anderson's Psychotechnic History: A predictive science of society is applied with mixed results.

Poul Anderson's Technic History, in particular A Knight Of Ghosts And Shadows: A serious discussion of how bad decisions might prevent the free growth of a society, thus causing successive stages of decline.

Poul Anderson's Genesis: Post-organic intelligence.

There are others, of course.  

Watching DUNE

When, like today, I visit Andrea above the Old Pier Bookshop, I do not post on this blog during the day but often have something to post about when I get back home. Today Andrea and I watched Dune, TV series, episode one. I do not think that Frank Herbert's Dune deserves three different screen adaptations when Poul Anderson's History of Technic Civilization still has none.

Observations:

Interstellar empires, complete with Emperors, are big in American sf! What happened to Presidents? In James Blish's The Quincunx of Time, the President of the Milky Way announces federation with the Magellanic Clouds in 3480. In Isaac Asimov's The Stars Like Dust, the Constitution of the United States is considered for use on an interstellar scale. However, in novels set later in that future history, there is a Trantorian Empire that becomes the Galactic Empire. Dune presents an already established Empire whereas Anderson shows us the rise, decline and fall of the Terran Empire together with some very different and plausible individual Emperors.

Herbert presents organized religion only as a vehicle for cynical manipulation of planetary populations whereas Anderson shows us genuine piety and devotion, e.g., in Kossara Vymezal who wants to be married in St. Clement's Cathedral by Father Smed who had christened and confirmed her. Andrea went as far as to say that the evil of organised religion was the entire point of Dune but that might be going too far.

Zmay Religion

Merseians living on Dennitza in the Terran Empire and loyal to the Emperor, not to the Roidhun, are called "zmayi" (dragons) in Serbic and "ychani" (seekers) in archaic Eriau.

Trodhwyr is:

"...an old-fashioned pagan ychan..."

-Poul Anderson, A Knight Of Ghosts And Shadows IN Anderson, Sir Dominic Flandry: The Last Knight Of Terra (Riverdale, NY, March 2012), pp. 339-606 AT II, p. 366 -

- from the Black Ocean. As such, he invokes:

"'Aferdhi of the Deeps, Blyn of the winds, Haawan who lairs on the reefs...'" (p. 365)

These beings must be neither worshipped nor obeyed but just "'...held afar...'" so that they "'...trouble us not in our rest.'" (p. 366) (!)

This has to be the most primitive form of paganism: fear of the elements. Some monotheists would say that Aferdhi etc are demons.

A zmay as sophisticated as Kyrwhedin is not going to be a pagan but what then is he? He will not subscribe to the supremacist monotheism of the Roidhunate but is there a more universal Merseian momotheism? Or have educated zmayi become secularists either of their own accord or under human influence? But the human culture on Dennitza is Orthochristian so have any of the zmayi converted to that?

Time Scales

Recently, in discussing Poul Anderson's Technic History, we have referred to Robert Heinlein's The Past Through Tomorrow and to Olaf Stapledon's Last And First Men and Star Maker. The Technic History transcends Heinlein's Future History. In other works, Anderson matches Stapledon's cosmic time scales and updates Stapledonian futuristic speculations. Anderson's Tau Zero presents a literally cosmic time scale but only for the small number of people inside a time dilated relativistic spaceship. They survive this universe and colonise the next universe.

In Anderson's Genesis, we find the following time scales:

"Seventeen hundred years later..."

-Poul Anderson, Genesis (New York, February 2001), PART ONE, VI, p. 57.

"Sol swung onward through its orbit, once around galactic center in almost two hundred million years, and onward and onward."

-ibid., IX, p. 96.

"Thought had just had time for a thousand or two journeys across [the galactic brain's] ever-expanding breadth."

-ibid., PART TWO, I, p. 102.

"'Human Earth is preserved in memory. What is posthuman Earth but a planet approaching the postbiological phase?'"

-ibid., p. 107.

HG Wells' Time Traveller visited that pre-postbiological phase and, in Anderson's "Flight to Forever," another time traveller bids farewell to Sol herself a hundred billion years in the future - before travelling around the circle of time and back to his starting point in 1973 which had been twenty-three years in the future when this story was published. We look back at the ultimate sf writers looking forward. Then we look forward to the shadow of God the Hunter across our future.

Beginnings And Endings ( A Familiar Theme)

Poul Anderson's Technic History began with Ythri, in "Wings of Victory," until "The Saturn Game" was added so that now the History begins with the end of the Chaos although The Earth Book Of Stormgate still begins with Ythri. As in some other series, there are two beginnings. The Technic History ends with the discovery, in "Starfog," of descendants of rebels expelled by Dominic Flandry in The Rebel Worlds. Thus, there are some long term historical continuities - very long term: it is down to consecutive readers to recognise that the Kirkasanters must be descended from the exiled Aeneans. So far, this summary of beginnings and endings has made no reference to that most prominent of Technic History phenomena, the Polesotechnic League. The League is founded centuries after the Chaos and dissolved millennia before the discovery of Kirkasant. However, Daven Laure in "Starfog" summarizes four historical periods, more for our benefit than for his:

"'...the League, the troubles, the Empire, its fall, the Long Night...'"

-Poul Anderson, "Starfog" IN Anderson, Flandry's Legacy (Riverdale, NY, June 2012), pp. 709-794 AT p. 722 -

- and then brings the narrative up-to-date by referring to his own period, that of the Commonalty.

That single phrase, "the League," stands for the sixteen instalments featuring Nicholas van Rijn and his contemporaries. The phrase, "the Empire," stands for seventeen instalments featuring not only Dominic Flandry and his contemporaries but also, before them, two earlier generations. There is one story each for "the troubles" and "the Long Night." That still leaves three instalments at the beginning, two in the middle and three at the end of the History.

It is ironic that the larger than life van Rijn and his dynamic period are referenced in just two words. Olaf Stapledon's cosmic history, Star Maker, refers in a single sentence to the Martian invasion of Earth and to the human colonisations of Venus and Neptune that had formed major sections of his future history, Last And First Men. The Technic History is populated by individuals, not just by species.

EARTH BOOK And Flandry

In Poul Anderson's Technic History, the Terran Empire:

is first mentioned as a possible successor to the Solar Commonwealth and the Polesotechnic League by Chee Lan in "Lodestar";

is next mentioned by Manuel Argos who announces that he will found the Empire in the wake of the fall of the Commonwealth - and also of the League although that is not explicitly mentioned here - in "The Star Plunderer";

annexes Ansa in "Sargasso of Lost Starships";

wages war against its post-League counterpart, the Domain of Ythri, in The People Of The Wind -

- four works that delineate a historical process.

On this basis, The Earth Book Of Stormgate prepares the way for the pivotal Flandry period of the Terran Empire. On the one hand, the Earth Book is fictitiously compiled during the aftermath of the Terran-Ythrian War, thus in the pre-Flandry Imperial period. On the other hand, the Earth Book backtracks to complete the histories both of the Polesotechnic League and of human-Ythrian colonization of Avalon. Although the Earth Book cannot refer to a character who has not yet been born, readers know that the Terran Empire first appeared in the earlier-published Captain Flandry series. Thus, it is no surprise when the Earth Book is followed by Ensign Flandry.

The Earth Book also includes "Day of Burning" which sets the scene for the Terran-Merseian conflict that permeates the Flandry period. Young Flandry of Terra and young Tachwyr of Merseia meet in Ensign Flandry. Both beings, now aged, are still involved in interstellar affairs in the concluding Flandry Period volume, The Game Of Empire. We feel that we live and breathe history.

Lords And An Ogre Planet

"The Longest Voyage."

"Imagine, my lords." (p. 97)

The first person narrator addresses his "lords." We wonder whether we will see these lords before the story ends. We do not but by then we have forgotten about them - but their mere presence at this stage tells us something about the kind of society that is involved here. These mariners are not on Earth:

they had "...sailed from Lavre Town..." (ibid.);

they seek "'...the Aureate Cities...'" (ibid.);

they steer by an "...ogre planet..." (ibid.) that ascends as they sail west;

they hear sea monsters breaching at night;

the ogre planet is called "Tambur" (p. 98) -

- and so on.

Of course, it turns out that this human population has "'...Fall[en] From Heaven.'" (p. 102) This means that they are descendants of extra-planetary space travellers but have lost the secret of space travel. What will they find when sailing west and will they re-establish contact with "Heaven"? Poul Anderson knows exactly where he is going with this narrative but we must read on to find out.

Visuals

I have copies of comic strip adaptations of Hamlet and of parts of the Mahabharata. In Hamlet, the speech balloons contain extracts from the script of the play but there are also explanatory captions. In Mahabharata, colour coded panels depict the recital of the epic. The latter is rich in colourful details. For example, Agni, the fire god, tries to burn a forest but Indra, the sky god, quenches the fire with a rain storm.

I imagine not only cinematic but also graphic adaptations of Poul Anderson's Technic History. At the beginning of The Earth Book Of Stormgate, we should see Hloch on Mount Anrovil in the Weathermother followed by scenes of everything that he mentions:

Spearhead Lake

the Avalonian cities, Gray and Centauri

a copper mine

guests of Hloch's parents, roaming and hunting

human members of Stormgate Choth, flying with Ythrians

Rennhi writing The Sky Book Of Stormgate

ruined landscapes under skies gone strange after the Terran War

etc

Any visual adaptation that included every detail would be lengthy like the Mahabharata - where Bumper Issue No. 59 is about "THE PRELUDE TO WAR"! - but also worthwhile.

The Significance Of The EARTH BOOK

Hello. We have been very busy here for several days. I have had no original thoughts for this blog, let alone time to post any. I do reflect on what I have learned from the blog. Publishing this blog has vastly enhanced my appreciation of Poul Anderson's The Earth Book Of Stormgate. I regard that volume as the absolute peak of American future historical writing, far surpassing either Robert Heinlein's Future History or anything else by Anderson. 

The Past Through Tomorrow (Putnam, 1967), Heinlein's Future History revised and almost complete, collects twenty-one instalments, including two novels. That is indeed almost complete and the two remaining stories, collected as Orphans Of The Sky, do not really advance the history of mankind. They merely recount some subsequent subsidiary events.

It is impossible that the Earth Book alone should contain Anderson's Technic History "almost complete" since that future history series comprises forty-three instalments, including eleven full length novels. That history is complete in seven omnibus volumes as Baen Books' The Technic Civilization Saga. But the Earth Book, considered as a single volume, is pivotal. It collects over a quarter of the instalments, including one full novel. Some regular blog readers will probably find it tedious that I have made several attempts to summarize the contributions made by the Earth Book. The summary remains recognizably the same but also grows as I come to appreciate further aspects of the collection. 

The Earth Book Of Stormgate:

has a very good, and also appropriate, cover illustration;

"Spans, illuminates and completes the magnificent future history of the Polesotechnic League," as its front cover blurb rightly proclaims;

is the fifth Polesotechnic League volume and the second Ythrian volume;

completes the history of the Polesotechnic League and almost completes the history of human-Ythrian interactions;

presents twelve new introductions and one afterword that substantially enhance the Technic History;

refers to the Terran Empire although not to Dominic Flandry because that important character has not been born yet;

prepares the way for the nine-volume Flandry Period and its single-volume sequel.

This summary conveys to its readers that the Technic History comprises at least sixteen volumes. In fact, three further stories could be collected as an additional volume to be read between the fourth Polesotechnic League volume and the first Ythrian volume, thus making the total number of volumes seventeen. OK: I am obsessed not only with the content but also with the structure of the Technic History and everything becomes focused through the Earth Book.

Comparing Three Editions Of "The Longest Voyage"

I originally read Poul Anderson's "The Longest Voyage" in The Hugo Winners, edited by Isaac Asimov. I no longer have that volume but do own three other editions.

"...a planet akin to Diell of Coint..."

-"The Longest Voyage," p. 103.

Should that read "Diell or Coint"? Yes:

"...a planet akin to Diell or Coint..."

-Poul Anderson, "The Longest Voyage" IN Anderson, The Collected Short Works Of Poul Anderson, Volume 2, The Queen Of Air And Darkness (Framingham MA, 2009), pp. 114-136 AT p. 117.

"...a planet akin to Diell or Coint..."

-Poul Anderson, "The Longest Voyage" IN Anderson, The Book Of Poul Anderson (New York, 1975), pp. 153-183 AT p. 157.

Next:

"'...this journey was on its own goal...'"

-"The Longest Voyage," p. 106.

Should that read "'...this journey was its own goal...'"? Yes:

"'...this journey was its own goal...'"

-The Queen Of Air And Darkness, p. 119.

"'...this journey was its own goal...'"

-The Book Of Poul Anderson, p. 159.

Next:

"'When he came, he saw his chance...'"

-"The Longest Voyage," p. 124.

The context and meaning make me think that this passage should read "When we came..." However:

"When he came, he saw his chance...'"

-The Queen Of Air And Darkness, p. 128.

"When he came, he saw his chance..."

-The Book Of Poul Anderson, p. 171.

I suspect that this last is an error in three editions.

Is Rovic Right?

"The Longest Voyage."

If Val Nira is helped to depart in his Sky Ship, then his people will return and will immediately reincorporate this long isolated planet into interstellar civilization. In order to prevent that outcome, Captain Rovic stuffs the Ship with gunpowder and blows it up. He does not, as I had misremembered, deliberately kill Val Nira although the latter is in fact killed when he runs toward the Ship as it is about to explode. 

Rovic's reason:

"'Someday Froad's successors will solve the riddles of the universe,' he said. 'Someday our descendants will build their own Ship, and go forth to whatever destiny they wish.'

"Spume blew up and around us, until our hair was wet. I tasted the salt on my lips.

"'Meanwhile,' said Rovic. 'we'll sail the seas of this earth, and walk its mountains, and chart and subdue and come to understand it. Do you see, Zhean? That is what the Ship would have taken from us.'

"Then I was also made able to weep. He laid his hand on my uninjured shoulder and stood with me while the Golden Leaper, all sail set, proceeded westward." (p. 149)

Is Rovic right? 

The spume and salt of his "earth" punctuate his speech. The name of their ship seems to indicate that they are moving in the right direction. They continue their westward journey, circumnavigating their globe, like their remote ancestors on the original Earth.

Governments

"'Why?' she wondered in hurt. 'A whole galaxy, a whole universe, a technology that could make every last livin' bein' rich - why are we and they locked in this ceaseless feud?'

"'Because both our sides have governments,' Targovi said, calming down."

-Poul Anderson, The Game Of Empire IN Anderson, Flandry's Legacy (Riverdale, NY, June 2012), pp. 189-453 AT CHAPTER FIFTEEN, p. 349.

But why do both sides have governments? On one level, the answer is that the author projects governments onto a future human society and onto an alien society. But why did human governments start? I suggest that economics (how we survive/earn a living/maintain our physical existence) is more basic than politics (how we organize society). More complex economic systems require and generate more complex political systems, although not vice versa. I suggest the following material sequence:

economics: production and distribution

politics: power and resistance

history: progress or regression

An economy based on competitive accumulation requires a state to enforce property laws - hence, the "governments" to which Targovi refers - whereas a society in which "...every last livin' bein' [was] rich..." would not require any such laws.

In Poul Anderson's "The Longest Voyage," Val Nira describes an interstellar civilization in which there is almost no coercive government:

advanced technology enriches everyone (Why should it not be used for this? What else would it be used for?);

crime is rare and is cured, not punished;

a devoted fellowship does not rule anyone but supervises the common welfare.

Sufficiently advanced technology should make something like this possible, if not inevitable. Outmoded power structures and mind-sets will have to be overcome but this is possible. 

What Val Nira Said

"The Longest Voyage."

"'No nation on this world could even reach my people unaided - let alone fight them - but why should you think of fighting? I've told you a thousand times, Isklip, the dwellers in the Milky Way are dangerous to none, helpful to all. They have so much wealth, they're hard put to it to find a use for most of it. Gladly would they spend large amounts to help all the peoples on this world become civilized again.'" (p. 120)

"Ah, greater marvels than the poets have imagined for Elf Land! Entire cities built in a single tower half a mile high. The sky made to glow so that there is no true darkness after sunset. Food not grown in the earth, but manufactured in alchemical laboratories. The lowest peasant owning a score of machines which serve him more subtly and humbly than might a thousand slaves - owning an aerial carriage which can fly him around his world in less than a day - owning a crystal window on which theatrical images appear, to beguile his abundant leisure. Argosies between suns, stuffed with the wealth of a thousand planets; yet every ship unarmed and unescorted, for their are no pirates and this realm has long ago come to such good terms with the other starfaring nations that war has also ceased.'" (pp. 126-127)

"In this happy land there is little crime. When it does occur, the criminal is soon captured by the arts of the provost corps; yet he is not hanged, nor even transported overseas. Instead, his mind is cured of the wish to violate any law. He returns home to live as an especially honored citizen, since all know he is now completely trustworthy. As for the government - but here I lost the thread of discourse. I believe it is in form a republic, but in practice a devoted fellowship of men, chosen by examination, who see to the welfare of everyone else.

"Surely, I thought this was Paradise!" (p. 127)

(Platonic-Wellsian government.)

Usually, I write list summaries rather than quote at such length but, in this case, the text is already sufficiently condensed.

In Poul Anderson's Technic History, Diana Crowfeather asks why anyone fights when there is already a technology that could make every individual being rich. Her idea has been implemented in the interstellar civilization of "The Longest Voyage."

"The Longest Voyage" In The Technic History?

Is "The Longest Voyage" incompatible with the Technic History? The stranded space traveller, Val Nira, describes an interstellar civilization that sounds as if it is even more technologically advanced and wealthy than Technic civilization but:

Maybe he exaggerates in order to impress his hosts and gain their cooperation?

Maybe his long isolation has deranged him so that he has lost touch with reality?

Since known space is a big place, maybe he comes from a region that is more advanced?

Maybe he comes from one of the post-Technic civilizations in the further future after "Starfog"?

Normally, I would start into quoting and analysing the details of what he does say but life is busy here right now. Maybe this evening.

God's Daughter

"The Longest Voyage."

These guys have a fairly good approximation to Christianity:

God

the Fall

prayers

scriptures

Paradise

a Minster with bells and saints in its windows

a distinction between themselves and "heathens"

God's Daughter

Daughter? Well, something is going to be different a long time later on another planet. As a father of an only daughter, maybe I can relate to that.

Will the future hold religious figures comparable to those of the past? Olaf Stapledon's future history has a Daughter of Man and a Divine Child. In this single story, Poul Anderson imagines a Daughter of God although, unfortunately, he then tells us nothing about her. There is a Messenger from Heaven but he is a stranded space traveller - which is what the story is about.

Before The Fall

 

"The Longest Voyage."

Inhabitants of the planet where this story is set have their own bizarre myth to explain why:

"'...men must work...'" (p. 99)

Originally, human beings could command their environment but this made one man so lazy that God withdrew the power. They also refer to a Fall:

"...since the Fall of Man..." (ibid.)

An attempt to explain gravitation:

"'The same pressure, maybe, that hurled mankind down onto the earth, at the time of the Fall From Heaven.'" (p. 102)

"'Scripture tells us man dwelt beyond the stars before the Fall.'" (p. 108)

OK. An extra-solar colony has lost space travel, has retrogressed scientifically and now confuses the Biblical Fall with their ancestors' descent from space onto this planetary surface: "the Fall."

We find the same theology in another sf work. See All That Fall.

"Among Thieves"

Of course I had misremembered some of the details in the Poul Anderson short story that I was trying to identify here. There was a mutiny but it was of allies against allies, not of subordinates against their masters. Other details, a mutation in human motivation and political power in Africa, were correct. On further reflection, I remembered that the story in question had been the last in a Mayflower Dell paperback. Returning to the shelves, I found only one such paperback for Poul Anderson, Strangers From Earth, and examined its last story with greater care. The title, "Among Thieves," had not seemed relevant and indeed I had thought that it was one of the three Wing Alak stories but it is not. It is the story in question.

Our present project is to reread some non-series Poul Anderson short stories that occupy the same "imaginative space," or whatever we want to call it, as his Technic History: FTL space travel; extra-solar colonies, interstellar civilization. So far, there are three stories on the agenda:

"The Longest Voyage"

"High Treason"

"Among Thieves"

In the Technic History, the Solar Commonwealth, then the Terran Empire, lead Technic civilization and English has become Anglic. In "Among Thieves," the Terran Federation leads "Civilization" (capitalized), Schakspier is Old Anglic and Terrans speak Tierrans. 

The Terran Empire is ruled from Archopolis somewhere on a fully urbanized Terra whereas the Terran Federation in "Among Thieves" is ruled from Capital City by the Zambesi River where each slim tower is surrounded by its own park.

We observe variations on similar ideas.

(Afrikaans: Tierrans.)

Wind On An Ocean

"When first we heard of the Sky Ship, we were on an island..."

-Poul Anderson, "The Longest Voyage" IN Anderson, Winners (New York, 1981), pp. 97-140 AT p. 97.

Is this story fantasy or sf? Will the Sky Ship be a spaceship or something else? We have to read on to find out. It is soon clear that the story is not set on Earth. A strange planet is overhead.

When representatives of the crew ask the captain to turn back from their perilous voyage, he stands "...mute for a long while..." and:

"The stillness grew, until the empty shriek of wind in our shrouds, the empty glitter of ocean out to the world's rim, became all there was." (p. 98)

We notice that yet again the wind punctuates and comments on the dialogue. It is described not as wild or as gentle but as empty like the ocean which seems without end, especially to sailors who still think that their world is flat. We must read on to learn about the Sky Ship which we have temporarily forgotten while reading about potential mutiny.

Imaginary Space II

All fictions happen in imaginary space. Even the fictional London, New York, Stockholm etc are not the same as ours. If there were no difference, then they would not be fiction. Alan Moore thinks that imaginary spaces literally exist but I think that he is objectifying subjectivity. Fictions exist in our language, shared texts and individual imaginations but not also in some invisible, incorporeal realm. 

We saw that there is a vast body of sf that shares premises (i)-(vi). Conventionally, stories set in this vast set of imaginary spaces either are instalments in some particular series or are one-off, stand-alone narratives. Authors could be freer to mix and match elements of different stories and sometimes do but usually they stay with the conventional distinction between series and non-series stories. 

Thus, both "The Longest Voyage" and "High Treason" by Poul Anderson are one-off stories that do not fit into his Technic History or into any other such series but nevertheless are recognizably part of that larger imaginary space, or set of spaces, that includes FTL and related premises.

I have a problem that will be familiar to other readers of sf and particularly of Poul Anderson. I remember a story by Anderson but not its title. I thought that the story was in a collection in my possession but now cannot find the story. There was FTL. Human beings had colonized extra-solar planets. One planetary population had mutated and now lacked normal human motivations. A naval expedition crewed by members of a master race and of a subordinate race embarked on an expedition. By clandestine prearrangement, the subordinate class mutinied and slaughtered their masters in space. When the action of the story moved back to Earth, we learned that the centre of political power was now in Africa. Does anyone know what I am talking about? 

Imaginary Space

Much American sf shares these premises:

(i) that faster than light (FTL) interstellar travel is possible - a tall order;

(ii) that such travel will become easily affordable, at least to some sections of society, and will even become an entirely routine matter like contemporary air travel - a considerably taller order;

(iii) that many uninhabited terrestroid extra-solar planets are humanly colonizable without needing to be terraformed;

(iv) that there are also many inhabited planets;

(v) that human beings will quickly communicate and interact with the inhabitants of such planets;

(vi) thus, that civilization, trade and warfare will, in the next few centuries, occur on an interstellar scale - that contemporary human international relations will simply be continued in future human and non-human interstellar relations.

Does that seem implausible and anthropomorphic to you? There is a non-human universe out there. What is it really like? Premise (iii) has become a lot more plausible in my life-time but I remain sceptical about the rest.

Poul Anderson wrote sf that accepted these premises but also other sf that did not.

Robert Heinlein, James Blish and Poul Anderson thought about these premises, instead of just assuming them, and tried to make FTL believable. Blish's main future history begins with the composite premise that both FTL and antiagathics are necessary for interstellar travel. Heinlein's Future History has the long-lived Howard Families hijacking a generation ship, then a mathematical genius inventing the FTL drive in flight. In Heinlein's Time For The Stars, a slower than light interstellar expedition confirms that telepathy operates instantaneously across interstellar distances, thus providing a theoretical basis for an instantaneous irrelevant drive. The most ingenious FTL drive is Anderson's quantum jump hyperdrive although he also imagined several others. But, in one later story, Blish as author commented on this whole idea by labelling his newest version of an FTL drive the "Imaginary Drive." 

The League Returns

Poul Anderson's sf novel, Mirkheim:

describes the first civil war in the Polesotechnic League - a conflict, furthermore, that initiates the beginning of the end of the League; 

is the concluding volume of Anderson's Polesotechnic League Tetralogy where it is preceded by two collections, Trader To The Stars and The Trouble Twisters, and by one previous novel, Satan's World;

in terms of fictional chronology, is the last instalment in the Polesotechnic League sub-series of Anderson's major future history series, the History of Technic Civilization;

is followed first by the novel, The People Of The Wind, set centuries later in a different volume of space, and secondly by The Earth Book Of Stormgate, an omnibus collection compiled, in terms of the fictional chronology, shortly after the events of The People Of The Wind.

This third novel and third collection constitute an "Ythrian" diptych that is the second main section of the Technic History after the aforementioned Polesotechnic League Tetralogy.

Someone who has consecutively read through the Tetralogy, The People Of The Wind and the two opening Ythrian short stories in the Earth Book could be forgiven for thinking that by now he has left the Polesotechnic League far behind in both space and time. However, if he has appreciated:

the League

Nicholas van Rijn

David Falkayn

Coya Conyon/Falkayn

the trader team

the planets, Ivanhoe and Mirkheim

two of the many alien races, the Baburites and the Merseians

- then he might be not only surprised but also pleased to learn that all of these return in the Earth Book which, fictitiously, is compiled later but nevertheless collects stories set earlier. 

Indeed, the Tetralogy contains six stories and two novels about the League whereas the Earth Book contains seven stories and one novel about the League. Thus, this single volume presents an entire second League series plus a lot more information about human-Ythrian interactions. However, we at last leave the League behind and must instead focus first on the Ythrian Domain and then, more significantly, on the Terran Empire in conflict with the Merseian Roidhunate. A future history, indeed.

Planetary Parameters

Brian Aldiss wrote somewhere that an sf writer works hard for his living. A contemporary novelist writes about the interactions between a cast of characters. An sf novelist - at least sometimes - devises the parameters of an extra-solar planetary system, then places a cast of characters in that environment.

Poul Anderson outlines this in his AFTERWORD to The Man Who Counts:

the mass, age and chemistry of a star

its consequent luminosity

the length of the year of a planet in a given orbit

the quantity of radiation received by that planet

surface features

the kind of life on the planet

the evolution of that life

these parameters affecting others

the odour of a flower

what it is like to be an inhabitant of that planet

This is what CS Lewis called the Engineer's Story. Not everyone who can write fiction knows enough science which is why there is some "soft" sf by Lewis, Bradbury and Simak. (Bradbury's Mars, cold by night but hot (!) by day, is an abomination.)

Avalonians Learn Their History

In Poul Anderson's History of Technic Civilization, we read:

about Nicholas van Rijn in Trader To The Stars;

about David Falkayn in The Trouble Twisters;

about both in Satan's World and Mirkheim;

and about the antecedents and origins of the Avalonian colony in The Earth Book Of Stormgate.

The series progresses and broadens out instead of remaining focused on a single individual.

The Avalonians learn about van Rijn and Falkayn in reverse order. They already knew about Falkayn because he had founded their colony but, in the Earth Book, they must be informed or at least reminded that Falkayn had been a protege of van Rijn. This explains why Hloch, editing the Earth Book, includes within it the first van Rijn story, "Margin of Profit." The real world reason why "Margin of Profit" had not been included in Trader To The Stars, although it was quoted there, was that its text had to be revised to make it consistent with the rest of the Technic History.

Hloch writes:

"You may well be surprised to learn that on numerous other worlds, it is [van Rijn] who lives in folk memory, whether as hero or rogue."

-Poul Anderson, INTRODUCTION MARGIN OF PROFIT IN Anderson, The Van Rijn Method (Riverdale, NY, December 2009), pp. 135-136 AT p. 136.

This is a timely reminder not to Hloch's Avalonian readers but to Anderson's Terrestrial readers that the history which is known to us is not automatically transparent to subsequent generations.

The Internet And Library Central

One part of the fictional future has come to pass.

"...a good many accounts of [Nicholas van Rijn] exist in Library Central..."

-Poul Anderson, INTRODUCTION MARGIN OF PROFIT IN Anderson, The Van Rijn Method (Riverdale, NY, December 2009), pp. 135-136 AT p. 136.

"To screen a glossary of obscure terms, punch Library Central 254-0691."

-Poul Anderson, INTRODUCTION HOW TO BE ETHNIC IN ONE EASY LESSON IN The Van Rijn Method, pp. 175-176 AT p. 176.

"Vaguely remembering that San Francisco had once had special ethnic sections, I did ask Library Central. It screened a fleet of stuff about a district known as Chinatown."

-Poul Anderson, "How To Be Ethnic In One Easy Lesson" IN The Van Rijn Method, pp. 177-197 AT p. 183.

The Library Central in the two INRODUCTIONs is on Avalon whereas the version that is consulted about San Francisco is earlier and on Earth.

In the second quotation above, the fictional editor directly addresses his contemporaries as the narrator of Heinlein's Future History does sometimes.

IIRC, in Larry Niven's Known Space future history, two-hundred-year-old Louis Wu has not learned to read because he is used to receiving audio info from voice-controlled computers. Maybe that doesn't fit because, IIRC, Wu was then on the Ringworld which would have had an unfamiliar script in any case. I have lost touch with Known Space but maybe someone more familiar with that future history would be able to clarify this point and also to comment on how Niven continues the future historical tradition of Heinlein and Anderson?

Daily Life In Three Future Histories

We have discussed the Future History Triad:

Robert Heinlein's Future History

Poul Anderson's Psychotechnic History

Anderson's Technic History

The Future History was the model for later future histories.

The Psychotechnic History was modelled directly on the Future History.

The Technic History was not planned but grew organically when two futuristic series merged into a single larger scale Heinleinian future history.

In the Future History, several short stories show daily life on the Moon. In "'It's Great To Be Back!,'" a young couple returns from daily life on the Moon to daily life on Earth but then find that they had preferred the former and return to the Moon. This story and "'- We also Walk Dogs'," show something of life on Earth.

In the Psychotechnic History, during the recovery from World War III, populations inhabit two-miles-long, three-hundred-stories-high units containing shops, offices, services, education, entertainment and apartments. Much later, Earth is underpopulated with individuals living far apart except in the single interstellar spaceport.

In the Technic History, we see life on Earth during the Solar Commonwealth in "How To Be Ethnic In One Easy Lesson" and, to a lesser extent, in "Lodestar" and life on Avalon in the Earth Book.

Everyday Life On Avalon

Hloch enhances our knowledge of everyday life on Avalon in his first Earth Book introduction.

First, his parents, Ferannian and Rennhi:

"...held the country around Spearhead Lake..." (p. 75) (For full reference, see here.)

(Poul Anderson was merely inventing extra details for the sake of these framing passages in an omnibus collection. However, these newly invented details enhance our future historical knowledge, nevertheless.)

Ferannian, an engineer, met human beings during many visits to Gray, Centauri and other towns.

Travel routes crisscrossed above Spearhead Lake and there was also a nearby copper mine.

Some Ythrians, including Hloch's parents, are "guest-free," meaning that they have house guests for several days at a time, allowing them to roam and hunt.

Stormgate is close to Gray and therefore accepts many human Avalonians into membership.

All this adds up to Hloch having many human acquaintances which qualifies him to edit the Earth Book.

Saga And Earth Book

In Baen Books' seven-volume The Technic Civilization Saga, we read Hloch's AFTERWORD to The Earth Book Of Stormgate at the mid-point of Volume III, Rise Of The Terran Empire, then read the novel, The People Of The Wind, at the end of that omnibus volume even though we understand that the Earth Book is composed in the aftermath of the events of The People Of The Wind. In the alternative and earlier reading order, the Earth Book immediately follows The People Of The Wind. Reading it that way, we already understand a great deal before we open the Earth Book. 

We already know that:

Stormgate is the name of an Avalonian choth;

Avalon is a human colony planet with a large Ythrian minority;

the "choth" is the basic unit of Ythrian social organization after the family;

Ythrians are flying carnivores so their psychology, sociology and theology differ from ours.

Reading Hloch's first Earth Book INTRODUCTION which, in the Saga, comes near the beginning of Volume I, The Van Rijn Method, we find:

"To those who read, good flight. 

"It is Hloch of the Stormgate Choth who writes, on the peak of Mount Anrovil in the Weathermother. His Wyvan, son of Lythran and Blawsa, has asked this. Weak though his grip upon the matter be, bloodpride requires he undertake the task."

-Poul Anderson, INTRODUCTION WINGS OF VICTORY IN Anderson, The Van Rijn Method (Riverdale, NY, December 2009), pp. 75-77 AT p. 75.

We know that:

the Weathermother is theYthrian name for the Andromedas, the highest mountain range on Avalon;

Stormgate is based in the Weathermother;

a Wyvan is a judge;

Lythran and Blawsa are the heads of a household;

bloodpride, also called deathpride, is the highest obligation for an Ythrian.

Further along, we find references to the human towns, Gray and Centauri, and to the Terran War. The People Of The Wind describes a lot of activity in both those towns and is entirely focused on the Terran War. In the Saga, these references are tantalizing hints of what is to come. We should read the Technic History in one order and reread it in the other.

Winter And Summer (On Different Planets)

The People Of The Wind, XIX.

"The treaty was signed at Fleurville on a day of late winter." (p. 654)

Winter again so soon? Yes, Fleurville is on a different planet!

"Summer dwelt in Gray when word reached Avalon." (p. 659)

We have seen winter, spring and summer in Gray and winter on St. Li. Seasons pass in cyclical time while history is made in linear time.

Out last sight of Avalonian natural beauty:

north from Gray, a red and gold sunset above a quiet sea glimmering toward the darkening horizon;

trefoil and sword-of-sorrow growing amongst the imported grass;

the Avalonian evening star, we are not told its name;

ringing harp vines and twinkling jewelleafs.

The following morning, Eyath flies toward:

"...the mountains of home." (p. 662)

As I have quoted before:

"Snowpeaks flamed. The sun stood up in a shout of light.

"High is heaven and holy." (ibid.)

Rain On Avalon

The People Of The Wind.

What might rain symbolize? 

Eyath, alone, grieving:

"...rain fell, slow as tears." (XV, p. 606)

Rain as tears is obvious. 

However, Eyath and Arinnian, now reconciled:

"Her head she lay murmuring against his shoulder. Raindrops glistened within the crest like jewels of a crown." (XIX, p. 654)

Rain as a crown! It all depends on the point of view, of course.

Also relevant is the following. Eyath with Tabitha:

"A strangled sound, though Ythrians do not weep." (XVIII, p. 648)

Since Ythrians do not weep, "...rain fell, slow as tears..." is human symbolism. Who makes this comparison? Is it the omniscient narrator or Eyath reflecting on human expression of grief?  

Back In Gray

The People Of The Wind, XVIII.

When Tabitha visits Philippe in the hospital, we know that the window is:

"...open to the blue and blossoms of springtime." (p. 644)

- so we have got away from the winter that we saw in Gray and on St. Li but where are we now? He sees from her complexion that she has not been in Gray so is that where they are? Yes. When she leaves the building, we learn that it has:

"...been hastily erected on the outskirts of Gray." (p. 646)

- and then we read our last description of the city:

"Where she stood, a hillside sloped downward, decked with smaragdine susin, starred with chasuble bush and Buddha's cup, to the strewn and begardened city, the large curve of uprising shoreline, the glitter on Falkayn Bay. Small cottony clouds sauntered before the wind, which murmured and smelled of livewell.

"She inhaled that coolness. After Equatoria, it was intoxicating. Or it ought to be. She felt curiously empty." (p. 647)

We have seen Scorpeluna in Equatoria. Gray should certainly be refreshing after that. Gray, seen by Arinnian in flight, at least twice through Daniel Holm's office window and now by Tabitha, has been described often enough to generate a real sense of place. 

The Environment And The War II

The People Of The Wind, XVII.

A dust storm makes the sunset:

"...the color of clotted blood." (p. 634)

- a very appropriate pathetic fallacy. Back to the literal effects of the environment: in Scorpeluna, days are horribly hot, nights gnawingly cold. Avalon's high irradiation and rapid spin make tropical storms so unpredictable and also so violent that one such storm delays the Terran evacuation for a day and a night. The rain would have killed patients as they were carried from shacks to ships. Flash floods threaten the base. After the storm, by interdicting the escape route but offering medical help, the Avalonians gain a second Terran withdrawal and ceasefire.

The People Of The Wind and The Earth Book Of Stormgate are companion volumes. The characters, Lythran, Blawsa and Arinnian, introduced in The People Of The Wind, are referenced in the background information in Hloch's Earth Book introductions. The lethal aspects of the Avalonian environment, crucial to The People Of The Wind, are introduced in "The Problem of Pain" in the Earth Book. Ythri, seen briefly in The People Of The Wind, is explored in "Wings of Victory" in the Earth Book. Hloch's first introduction refers to the devastation caused by the Terran War which is the subject-matter of The People Of The Wind. It makes sense to read the Earth Book immediately after The People Of The Wind.

The Environment And The War

The People Of The Wind, XVII.

We are shown some glimpses of the Avalonian environment even during the onslaught of the second attack. The planetary environment, of course, includes the moon, Morgana. When Morgana is bombarded, its mountains crumble and its valleys run molten. Later, the moon is:

"...murky-spotted and less bright than formerly. So much had it been scarred." (XIX, p. 660)

During the attack, Terran Meteor boats, including Rochefort's, attack a missile launch silo which:

"...lay beyond the mountains, in the intensely green gorge of a river." (p. 631)

When the boats have finished:

"A set of craters gaped between cliffs which sonic booms had brought down in rubble. Rochefort wished he could forget how fair that canyon had been." (ibid.)

On the Scorpelunan plateau, where the invaders establish their bridgehead:

the air broils

the sky is brazen

the bloated sun glares

the entire horizon is blue mountain peaks

the earth is hard and red

red-leaved bushes grow apart

the land rises in gnarled mesas and buttes

it opens "...in great dry gashes..." (p. 633)

a few hexapodal animals graze under parasol membranes

heat shimmers

dust devils

dog-sized hexapodal lycosauroids attack a geological survey team

even mutilated, they continue to advance

later teams leaving camp need aerial escort

It gets worse. The planet kills unprepared invaders. They do not yet know the effects of those red bushes. I wanted nature apart from the war but the two merge.

The Attack On Centauri

The People Of The Wind, XVII.

The Terrans are about to attack the Avalonian's chief seaport and industrial capital, Centauri. Two Terrans have this exchange:

"Sweat broke out on Ozumi's brow. 'Woman and children -'

"'If the enemy has any sense, he evacuated nonessential persons long ago,' Monteanu snapped. 'Frankly, I don't give a curse. I lost a brother here, last time around. If you're through snivelling, let's get to work.'" (p. 628)

First, this is a realistic representation of reactions during a war. Secondly, analyse Monteneau's remarks. His brother joined the navy and therefore was prepared to be sent into combat, to kill or be killed. He was in fact killed during an attack on Avalon. Yet, because he was killed, Monteneau does not give a curse about women and children... Forgive me for thinking that there is something very wrong with this kind of reaction. There are peace demonstrations on Esperance. Demonstrators are concerned about women, children and Monteanu's brother.

Imperial Intelligence About Avalon

The People Of The Wind, XVI.

Admiral Cajal has three sources of intelligence about Avalon.

(i) "'...our analysis of enemy fire patterns, as recorded at the first battle of Avalon, does indicate Equatoria is a weak spot.'" (p. 622)

(ii) Not only do Avalonian defectors bring some information with them but also officials secretly of the peace group have given some of the more recent defectors additional information to pass on.

(iii) Philippe Rochefort spent months on the planet and become closely acquainted with officers of the home guard, even including the son of the First Marchwarden.

Unsuspected problems (for the Terrans):

Equatoria is poorly defended but it will be disastrous to land there;

information fed to the defectors and to Rochefort has been designed to encourage the Terrans to land there.

The rest is future history.

Betrayals

The People Of The Wind, XV-XVI.

Some spy fiction - and presumably also spy life - features endless betrayals. There is some of this in The People Of The Wind. Philippe Rochefort does not kiss the sleeping Tabitha Falkayn before he creeps away. I misremembered him as thinking that it would make him feel like Judas but all that he does think is that it might wake her up. But he does invoke Joan of Arc and all saints. (He is a Jerusalem Catholic.)

Arinnian reflects on multiple betrayals:

"Terra-Ythri. Ythri-Avalon. Tabitha-Rochefort. Eyath-Draun, no, Draun-Eyath...Vodan-whatsername, that horrible creature in Centauri, yes, Quenna...Eyath-anybody, because right now she was anybody's..." (XVI, p. 613)

Then, when Arinnian and Tabitha/Hrill hear his stolen flitter take off:

"'Phil!' she shouted. Ah, thought Arinnian. Indeed. The next betrayal." (p. 618)

Tabitha gave Phil disinformation which he takes to his Admiral. Do they betray each other?

Draun And Eyath

The People Of The Wind, XVI.

What Draun did to Eyath does not count as "rape" under choth law. Indeed, Ythrians do not and cannot have such a concept. Her grief brought on premature ovulation, he was nearby and sex happened. At most, he might owe a gild for wounded pride but it is not a deathpride matter. No Wyvan will call Oherran. No other male has cause to challenge. Arinnian has to insult Draun and Highsky Choth so that Draun will challenge. In fact, however, Draun was not merely nearby and even then could have veered off. Instead, he deliberately sought Eyath out and this he blames on human influence. Some Ythrian males wonder what it is like to have sex all year round. It is true that the two species influence each other and this can be either positive or negative. Poul Anderson's texts seem to address every detail.

(Among human beings, some Evangelicals do not need a concept of consensual sex. According to them, a woman should never say yes before or outside of marriage and should never say no inside it so the question of her consent need not arise.)

Morning On St. Li

The People Of The Wind, XV.

At the request of Arinnian and Draun, Hrill feeds misleading military intelligence to their prisoner, Philippe Rochefort. Although Rochefort has given his parole to Tabitha/Hrill, he escapes and takes the intelligence to the Terran fleet, believing that this will prevent the bombardment of her planet. 

He leaves in the morning while she is still asleep. Roofs and the peak of St. Li stand impossibly clear. Laura and distant wings share the sky. Greens, umbers and brilliant red shine. The air is fragrant with growth and with the tumbling sea. He reflects:

"No. This much beauty is unendurable." (p. 610)

He walks between quiet orchards and plantations where no one works in winter. The landing field is so small that it has only automated ground control. Arinnian's spaceable flitter has been left (deliberately) unlocked. Rochefort has a very easy escape. Every small incident progresses the plot.

Eyath's Experiences

The People Of The Wind, XV.

Perched on an offshore rock, surrounded by shouting, spouting surf, Eyath eats raw kill. Then she flies inland, intending to rest among trees and flowers before returning aloft, always remembering Vodan. Skimming through rising steam, she is made lightheaded by:

"...the strong odors of living earth..." (p. 607)

When she lands among orange trees, damp brown soil embraces her feet. Laura warms it and dazzles her. Musk ascends. Light, then Draun, descends. He has come for Eyath who is on heat because of her bereavement. Her sensations become of a different quality. Arinnian finds her:

"...clawed, bitten, and battered..." (p. 609)

There will be conflict between Avalonians even as they are obliged to unite against Terrans. Consciousness certainly complicates natural processes.