The aquatic Ai Chun bred the land-dwelling Niao for intelligence. The Niao have dog-like devotion to the Ai Chun. Some Niao went feral and became the Azkashi whose inbred devotedness is expressed in their monotheistic worship of the galaxy which the Ai Chun fear and hate when it rises at night because their eyesight is adapted to dimness and darkness. Thus, a simple-seeming planet has a complicated set-up which is what we expect when it has been carefully crafted by Poul Anderson. Like Nicholas van Rijn on Diomedes, the stranded spacemen must make a revolution just to get back off the planet.
Are they justified in doing this? The Ai Chun culture is one of those that definitely do not deserve to survive. But, paradoxically, the Ai Chun have bred a free people by making the Azkashi possible.
1 comment:
Kaor, Paul!
It's been a long time since I last read WORLD WITHOUT STARS, but I am not sure the Ai Chun were that bad--and they're certainly nothing as nasty as Stirling's Draka! But they did have a very hard time understanding other races. I think Felipe Argens characterized as neither evil or insane, just different.
Ad astra! Sean
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