Poul Anderson's Psychotechnic History begins with a story named after the Roman general, Marius.
In Anderson's Technic History:
Minamoto describes the mid-twentieth century as an unhappy period and also refers to its passive entertainment like television;
Le Matelot compares early interstellar travelers to Greeks in the Mediterranean and to Europeans in America and also compares the Polesotechnic League to medieval mercantile guilds;
Manuel Argos consciously models his Terran Empire on the Roman Empire, for example by allowing non-humans to become citizens;
Chunderban Desai analyses Technic civilization in the light of his studies of the rise and fall of Terrestrial civilizations;
"A Tragedy of Errors" begins by referring to Christopher Wren.
The Technic History is in the same historical territory as Anderson's Time Patrol series.
8 comments:
I don't think there are significant patterns in the rise and fall of civilizations, except as they reflect human nature.
Eg., the 20th and 21st centuries are a product of the World Wars, but they were accidental.
The James Bond books are not only Cold War books but also very much post-WWII books. Bond fights not only Russians but also Nazis left over from the War. There are ex-Gestapo men in SPECTRE. "Octopussy" is about a murder committed at the end of the War. In YOU ONLY LIVE TWICE, Bond works with the head of the Japanese Secret Service who had volunteered for kamikaze.
The Soviet (and East German) secret services did recruit Germans who'd worked for the SS and other internal security organizations in WW2 Germany.
Kaor, Mr. Stirling!
Not in the least surprised! I can easily see the Soviet thugs finding it very useful to recruit ex-SS and Gestapo goons.
Ad astra! Sean
Sean,
And "our side" would not recruit such goons?
Paul.
Kaor, Paul!
No, because the UK/US, for all their faults were/are better than the Communists and Nazis. Nor did they run extermination camps and gulags.
Ad astra! Sean
Sean,
So "our side" would never use goons?
I don't buy this "for all their faults" argument. The world now urgently needs something far better than any past imperialism.
Paul.
A guy told me that, "despite all its faults," the USSR saved the world from total domination by US imperialism. I disagreed with him too.
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