(Mark Twain and William Shakespeare are characters in Neil Gaiman's The Sandman. All imaginative literature connects.)
HG Wells wrote about the Time Traveller, the Time Machine and "time travelling." His successors write about time travellers, time machines and time travel.
Robert Heinlein wrote the Future History. His successors write future histories.
Poul Anderson perfected time travel and future histories.
"Perfected" is a value term. James Blish thought that:
no one had written any good time travel fiction yet;
Heinlein's circular causality stories were quite limited applications of the concept;
it would be possible to base a novel on a finite spinning universe theory that allows for time travel;
(I think that) all the characters would be built up from one character.
But Blish never wrote it.
11 comments:
Kaor, Paul!
At the very least Blish will be best remembered for writing A CASE OF CONSCIENCE, one of the classics of science fiction.
Ad astra! Sean
Sean,
Also BLACK EASTER/THE DAY AFTER JUDGEMENT.
Paul.
Paul: that's classic fantasy... 8-).
Poul noticed a weakness in Future Histories: that if they started too soon in the future, they'd turn in to Alternate Histories.
Kaor, Paul and Mr. Stirling!
Paul: I agree.
Mr. Stirling: I don't think that's a necessarily a weakness, a future history turning into an alternate history. We can still enjoy Pournelle's Co-Dominium timeline stories even tho there never was an actual Co-Dominium set up by the USA and USSR of our real history.
Ad astra! Sean
Sean: yes, but they weren't -written- as alternate history. That's why I make any near-future setting a actual alternate history, as with TO TURN THE TIDE.
Mind you, the time travelers in TO TURN THE TIDE don't know if there are multiple timelines or not. One-way time travel is more novelistically convenient...
Kaor, Mr. Stirling!
I think I first truly understood your MO in writing stories when you explained that if readers looked hard they will see that the late 20th century Earth seen in DRAKON was not "our" Earth. Something I should remember the next time I read it.
The mere fact the Americans stranded in Antonine Rome began to successfully introduce innovations that would drastically change/prevent the history leading to their original timeline implies the existence of multiple timelines.
Ad astra! Sean
Sean: it would indicate it, but it would be a non-falsifiable hypothesis.
Kaor, Mr. Stirling!
I agree, only an indication, a possibility.
Ad astra! Sean
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