Basil Donovan wears two tarnished insignia, stars for a captain and silver leaves for an Ansan earl. The blue-skinned, rhinoceros-bodied, gorilla-armed, ape-faced, tusked Donarrian, Wocha, has been Donovan's slave all their lives and was his batman during the recently concluded space war against Terra. Ansa has been defeated and occupied. After becoming very drunk in the Golden Planet among the bombed buildings of Lanstead, Donovan leads the singing of an Ansan rebel song, starts an anti-Terran bar fight and is arrested. Sam Olman, a peasant still loyal to the now dis-ennobled Donovans, is bayonetted in the fight.
I like to think that, even if "Sargasso..." is a fiction within the fiction, its author researched Ansan history and chose a real Earl Basil as his hero. Thus, we can imagine that that historically real former earl and space captain did get drunk and start a fight even if we do not swallow the main narrative in which he accompanies a Terran expedition to the mysterious Black Nebula.
1 comment:
Kaor, Paul!
I agree, however mild some conquerors might be, it's going to take time before a conquered people accepts the new regime. So it is likely a genuine former Ansan space captain and earl could have gotten drunk and started a pointless bar brawl.
Ad astra! Sean
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