Somewhere recently I read that a fictional character was as wealthy as a troll. Was it Lizbeth Salander in Stieg Larsson's Millennium Trilogy? (I think so.) In any case, having just found Nicholas van Rijn described as "...troll-burly, tugging his beard..." (p. 358) immediately after Coya Conyon has discoursed on the wealth to be found on the surface of the planet Mirkheim (not named yet), I searched this blog and found a troll's face on Mirkheim. Poul Anderson knew what he was doing when he linked trolls and wealth in this way.
Coya explains:
a supernova explosion floods out astronomical quantities of neutrinos, particles and quanta at every energy level;
the very small percentage of supermetals scatters thinly and is effectively lost;
however, the planet Mirkheim captured a minute fraction of these supermetals amounting to billions of tons, easily extractable or even pure, and more than Technic civilization can ever consume;
"'It took a genius to think this might be!'" (p. 358)
It is when she makes this concluding remark that she becomes aware of van Rijn's eyes on her and he stands like a burly troll. He has thought that this might be but does he suspect that she speaks of someone else who might have been here before him?
1 comment:
Kaor, Paul!
A man as wily and shrewd as Old Nick could very easily start wondering who might have previously discovered Mirkheim.
I've also wondered just now if Anderson was inspired to use that name from the Mirkheim we see in Tolkien's THE HOBBIT. That story also trolls in it!
Ad astra! Sean
Ad astra!
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