"Night rolled out of the east, like a message from Soviet lands plunged into chaos and murder."
-Poul Anderson, "Marius" IN Anderson, The Psychotechnic League (New York, 1981), pp. 13-28 AT p. 14.
"The last thing he heard was thunder. It sounded like the hoofs of horses bearing westward the Hunnish midnight."
-Poul Anderson, "The Sorrow of Odin the Goth" IN Anderson, Time Patrol (Riverdale, NY, December 2010), pp. 333-465 AT 374, p. 465.
Night from the east. Usually, we think of the sun as coming from there:
"Out of the east, the morning behind them, rode the Anses into the world."
-Poul Anderson, "Star of the Sea" IN Time Patrol, pp. 467-640 AT II, p. 557.
"Above the cliffs, a few eastern clouds turned red."
-Poul Anderson, Mirkheim IN Anderson, Rise Of The Terran Empire (Riverdale, NY, March 2011), pp. 1-291 AT XXI, p. 291.
Light from the east, morning; but also sunset colours signifying the end of this novel and of an era.
Wisdom also comes from the east except for Chinese Buddhists whose wisdom came from India, the West! We have gone off the point here. Unless the point is the symbolism of directions - up, down, east, west.
9 comments:
Kaor, Paul!
And the real world has seen the "East" associated with the tyranny and brutality of the unlamented USSR and the Maoist regime still misruling China.
Tolkien's THE LORD OF THE RINGS also has the "East" associated with the Dark Lord Sauron, ruling Mordor.
Ad astra! Sean
Sean,
And the West associated with the accumulation of capital.
Paul.
I came across an absurd song:
"From the east rises the sun.
"China has brought forth a Mao Tse-tung."
Accumulation of capital is a very good thing. It's what freed us from the animalistic suffering and slavery of preindustrial existence.
Kaor, Paul!
To rephrase or expand on what Stirling said: that accumulation of capital thru free enterprise economics was necessary if genuine technological, material, and scientific progress was ever going to be made. No other form of economics has succeeded so well!
That should tell the naysayers of "capitalism" something!
Ad astra! Sean
Sean,
All I said this time was that capital accumulation was associated with the West, not that it was bad. Of course it was necessary. THE COMMUNIST MANIFESTO opens with the hymn of praise for the forces unleashed by capitalism that had previously lain dormant in the ground. But what was necessary in one set of circumstances can become no longer necessary in another set. When industry and technology have produced an abundance of wealth, then it will no longer be necessary, indeed would be increasingly destructive, for rival companies to continue to compete to accumulate capital only to reinvest it in further competitive accumulation of capital. We have to look not only back to what has happened in the past but also forward to what can happen in a future which can be different from the past. Of course, accumulators of capital can continue to destroy wealth in renewed wars so that there can be further war-time and post-war booms.
Paul.
Sean,
I am concerned that you seem to have assumed that someone of my persuasion would argue that it would have been better if capitalism had never existed. How could I possibly argue for the future social use of advanced technology if I meanwhile argued against the necessity of the historical process that had generated that level of technology?
With such mutual incomprehension, we achieve not disagreement but merely misunderstanding. This alone is enough to explain a lot of the argumentative repetitiveness.
Paul.
From Sean M. Brooks:
Kaor, Paul!
Apologies for so often misunderstanding you. But I don't believe in Marx's Utopian hopes. First, free enterprise economics works, when allowed to function, and nothing else ever has. Second, we don't know if a post scarcity economy is possible or when it will come, if at all. Third, that will not eliminate the innate flaws we all have.
I believe in sticking to what has been shown to work: the limited state and free enterprise economics.
Ad astra! Sean
Sean,
Nothing else has ever worked? But production of abundance has not been possible before. We do know that post-scarcity is possible. We would have it now or at least be much nearer to it if the great powers did not mass produce and stockpile weapons and continually use them to destroy already produced wealth as well as people. We do not have innate flaws. Some flaws only operate in particular social contexts. Yes, I would be tempted to steal money if I was down and out. Other flaws can be worked on. We can have a culture where we are encouraged to examine and make changes to our own attitudes and behaviours.
The present global economic system is tearing up the world right now.
Paul.
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