And I remember that some old-style novels did conclude by summarizing subsequent biographies for one or two of the major characters. That constrains what can be written in a sequel. However, many novels are constructed as self-contained units neither requiring nor expecting a sequel.
A sequel published twenty years later can either reflect the passage of time in the real world by commencing its action exactly twenty years after that of the first book or, alternatively, can begin five minutes after that action because fictional time is not real time.
Poul Anderson never describes the death of a major series character - except Harald Hardrada, The Last Viking, because Harald was a historical figure with a known time and place of death.
It is useful to have a copy of The Earth Book Of Stormgate alongside The Technic Civilization Saga even though the entire contents of the Earth Book are reproduced in their chronological positions in Volumes I-III of the Saga.
Hloch, fictitiously editing the Earth Book, does satisfy some of our curiosity about what happened afterwards. First, he informs us that the curiously off-stage first person narrator of "Wings of Victory" was called Maeve Downey. She was a planetologist who later wrote an autobiography, Far Adventure, from which "Wings of Victory," about the discovery of Ythri, is extracted. Ythri was discovered after the first three years of the Grand Survey and:
1 comment:
Kaor, Paul!
I'm assuming the "Olga" also discovered the planet named Imhotep because the ancient human town we see there in THE GAME OF EMPIRE was named Olga's Landing.
A pity we never see more about the First Grand Survey--and nothing about the Second. I've also mentioned other lacunae in the Technic series.
Ad astra! Sean
Post a Comment