A prisoner, Jehanan, spits on an image of Set in front of his guards. This is unwise. Set is powerful and his worshippers are vengeful. In any case, maybe Set as a deity merits some passive respect although no more than that.
Addressing Ramwas, who is a Stygian military officer, minor nobleman and large landholder, Topathis says:
"'Though the penalty for failure is unbounded, the reward for success can be high.'" (p. 16)
This is a characteristic of evil organizations in fiction and probably also in fact. Failure is punished as if it were deliberate wrong-doing! Knowledge that I was working for such a regime would certainly make me want - and plan - to get out. Ramwas is concerned not about that but only about the dangers of the task that Topathis sets for him.
As in Ian Fleming's From Russia, With Love, the villains assemble before we see much of our hero.
I appreciate Conan The Rebel as one part of Poul Anderson's works but not as an instalment of the Conan series, not having read any other volumes of the latter.
3 comments:
Kaor, Paul!
Exactly! That kind of unjust punishment for failure was all too typical of life in the USSR and is still the case in Maoist China.
I was reminded of how, in 1915, the failure of the Dardanelles campaign he had urged so vehemently led to Churchill being "punished" by resigning as First Lord of the Admiralty. Much more civilized and WSC was still able to play a role in UK politics.
Ad astra! Sean
Well, Ramwas is a Stygian -- he's grown up with that setting.
Kaor, Mr. Stirling!
True, as did the ex-Chekist Putin, reared in the pit of vipers that was the unlamented USSR.
Ad astra! Sean
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