GUARDIANS And THE SHIELD II

We are comparing Poul Anderson's Guardians Of Time with his The Shield Of Time. See the previous post. Their titles are interchangeable. The "Guardians" are the Time Patrollers and the "Shield" is the Patrol.

Guardians... culminates with "Delenda Est." The Shield..., as it stands, culminates with PART SIX, "Amazement of the World." Even if, in accordance with my earlier suggestion, a future edition of The Shield... were instead to conclude with "Death And The Knight," this short story would serve as an epilogue rather than as an alternative culmination.

In both "Delenda.." and "Amazement...," history is altered and the Patrol must change it back. "Amazement..." is "Delenda..." writ large. The author has had more time to elaborate the idea and his characters discuss it in greater detail.

In "Delenda...":

Manse Everard and Piet Van Sarawak time travel from the Patrol Pleistocene lodge to what should be New York, 1960, only to arrive in the wrong timeline.

Thus, we see how the alteration affects two travellers on a single timecycle.

In "Amazement...":

in 1137alpha, Emil Volstrup, Patrol agent, learns that King Roger of Sicily, who should have lived until 1154, has been killed in battle;

Keith Denison time travels from 1765 BC not to 1980 AD but to 1980alpha AD;

Wanda Tamberly time travels from the Pleistocene lodge in 18,244 BC not to 1989 AD but to 1989alpha AD;

Manse Everard at the lodge in 18,244 BC is informed of a temporal upheaval on about Julian day 2,137,000.

Thus, we see how the upheaval affects four individuals in different periods.

The question of why only some time travellers enter the altered timeline is raised but not answered in "Delenda..." and is answered, although inadequately, in "Amazement..."!

In "Delenda...," the Patrol restores its preferred timeline with a single intervention whereas, in "Amazement...," a second intervention becomes necessary because the first intervention generates the beta timeline.

In "Delenda...," Neldorian time criminals have altered history whereas, in "Amazement...," the upheaval is caused by a quantum fluctuation in space-time-energy.

Like the same author's History of Technic Civilization, the Time Patrol series definitely goes somewhere.

It's got legs.