A good book should be read at least twice. A very good book can be reread endlessly. CS Lewis pointed out that the difference between "high brow" and "low brow" readers is not just that they read different things but also that they read them in different ways. A genre romantic novel, read once, is discarded like an empty cigarette packet - "I've read that one!" - whereas English literature is reread endlessly.
Poul Anderson's History of Technic Civilization should be read at least twice. Therefore, it makes sense to possess two complete sets, the first set arranged in the original book publication order, the second in fictional chronological order, i.e., Baen Books' The Technic Civilization Saga.
The original publication order opens with Trader To The Stars, collecting the last three of the six Nicholas van Rijn instalments. (I say "six" because I initially exclude from consideration those four other instalments featuring van Rijn alongside David Falkayn etc.) Several volumes later, we read The Earth Book Of Stormgate and thus learn what van Rijn, Adzel and others had done before the opening story of Trader To The Stars. Indeed, we also learn about some events before their births and after their deaths.
The first of the three stories in Trader To The Stars is the last of the eleven in The Technic Civilization Saga, Volume I, The Van Rijn Method. The third Traders story describes van Rijn as:
"...the single-handed conqueror of Borthu, Diomedes, and t'Kela!"
-Poul Amderson, "The Master Key" IN Anderson, Trader To The Stars (New York, 1966), pp. 115-159 AT p. 121 -
- thus referring to the previous two stories but also to The Man Who Counts, collected in the Earth Book. By the time of "The Master Key," van Rijn has appointed David Falkayn to lead his first trade pioneer crew and that crew has saved the planet Merseia from the effects of supernova radiation. "The Master Key" is the fourth of seven instalments in The Technic Civilization Saga, Volume II, David Falkayn: Star Trader.
The two reading orders present completely different perspectives on events.
1 comment:
Kaor, Paul!
While I don't have two complete sets of the Technic stories the way you suggested I have read all of them at least twice (except "Sargasso," read only once, so far). And I've read my most favorite Technic stories three, four, five or more times. Examples being "Hiding Place," "Territory," THE MAN WHO COUNTS, ENSIGN FLANDRY, A CIRCUS OF HELLS, THE REBEL WORLDS, THE PLAGUE OF MASTERS.
Ad astra! Sean
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