-Poul Anderson, The Day Of Their Return IN Anderson, Captain Flandry: Defender Of The Terran Empire (Riverdale, NY, February 2010), pp. 74-238 AT 1, p. 75.
"On the fourth day he rose, washed, ate, and filled his lungs with the warm clear air."
-Conan: Blood Of The Serpent, 25, pp. 284-285.
Conan's rising is more prosaic.
Language resonates, whether or not it is intended to. We all know what "On the third day, he arose..." means. When we read "On the fourth day he rose...," we are bound to remember the third day whether or not the author intended us to make this association.
(That The Day Of Their Return cover is superb, juxtaposing a cloaked, staff-bearing figure on a tower with passing air- or spacecraft: the prophetic with the technological; the ancient with the futuristic.)
2 comments:
That's a decent cover. I was wroth for Poul's sake at most of the Baen ones; he deserved better. Mind you, we SF authors are used to colorful absurdities, but those...
Kaor, Paul and Mr. Stirling!
Paul: Almost every Christian will instantly recall where "On the third day..." came from! And "On the fourth day...." should remind him of that.
Mr. Stirling: Alluding to what a certain Person said, an enemy sowing tares in the field did that to Anderson, inflicting so many ghastly covers on his books.
Ad astra! Sean
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