"...the tall strangers..." (p. 663) have demonstrated guns although not audiovisual transmitters to their local guides which implies that the strangers are extra-planetarians and that the guides are either non-humans or inhabitants of a human colony planet cut off from interstellar contact during the Long Night. In fact, they turn out to be the latter.
This story, like many others, opens with the point of view of a particular character, in this case an individual named "Moru," rather than an exposition by a distanced narrator, e.g.:
"As far as we know - but how much do we really know, in this one corner of this one galaxy which we have somewhat explored? - Avalon was the first planet whereon two different intelligent species founded a joint colony."
-Poul Anderson, "Wingless" IN Anderson, Rise Of The Terran Empire (Riverdale, NY, March 2011), pp. 293-306 AT p. 295.
- which raises questions like "Who are 'we'?," "How much time has elapsed between the events narrated and their narration?" etc.
In each of these stories, something matters to someone.
No comments:
Post a Comment