Seeds Of Knowledge

"...as Trevelyan had wisely foreseen, the self-sufficient, enterprising Nomads bore various seeds of knowledge through the Third Dark Ages. The antecedents of our own civilization were among those who reaped what the Nomads had sown."
-Sandra Miesel, interstitial material IN Anderson, Starship, p. 252.

Does Trevelyan explicitly predict that the Nomads will bear seeds of knowledge through the coming Dark Ages? I will find out by continuing to reread The Peregrine. The following story, "The Chapter Ends," describes a later civilization although it does not indicate any Nomadic influence.

However, the idea that such a group would survive and would preserve something of value is entirely consistent with everything that Poul Anderson wrote, for example in his Technic History. And not just surviving groups - the Bronze Age and the Roman Empire also leave legacies.

"He found the Nomads' closeknit, tradition-laden ways more satisfying than the atomized, cerebral existence considered normal on Earth." (ibid.)

Really? I would be quite happy with an atomized, cerebral existence - but I also recognize the value of traditions. And it makes sense to think of Trevelyan, after a career in Coordination, joining a Nomad ship. According to the Chronology, the Third Dark Ages were then less than a century hence.

An Old Problem

Two Coordinators, Trevelyan and Smokesmith, discuss their suspect, Murdoch:

"'...available data indicate that his companions are quite unintegrate.'
"'...yes, hard cases, none Earth-born, several nonhumans from raptor cultures among them.'"
-Poul Anderson, "The Pirate" IN Anderson, Starship (New York, 1982), pp.211-251 AT p. 220.

Later, when confronting this "unintegrate" crew, Trevelyan:

"...was aware that his own body quivered and went dry in the mouth. A remote part of him decided this was an unintegrate reaction and he needed more training." (p. 249)

These passages shed further light on some earlier posts. I thought that psychological conflicts had destroyed the Solar Union whereas it was cosmic complexity that was to overwhelm and destroy the Stellar Union. This view was correct as far as it went. However, the first problem had not yet been eradicated and indeed it also contributed to the fall of the Stellar Union. People on Earth had attained, or at least had begun to approach, integration of emotion with reason but two other groups had not:

some human beings born off Earth;
nonhumans from raptor cultures.

Thus, Sandra Miesel commented:

"One - even many - foes without could be vanquished; against the enemy within there was no defense. Given the prevailing stage of psychodevelopment, the innate contradictions with individuals and societies could not be resolved. Critical data that needed to be gathered surpassed the capacity of any organization to comprehend, much less coordinate. The Stellar Union flew apart like an overwound spring." (p. 252)

There are two points to note here -

(i) Against the enemy within, there was some defense. Coordinators received integration training. However, many more beings in extrasolar cultures did not.

(ii) Miesel mentions both problems, the stage of psychodevelopment and the inability to comprehend or coordinate critical data, but maybe runs them together, making them sound like a single problem? Of course, they interact. The Coordination Service:

"'...can't coordinate as many planets as are included in our civilization-range today. And that range is still expanding.'"
-Poul Anderson, The Peregrine (New York, 1979), Chapter IV, p. 30.

- and the problem is made even greater because many of those planets are inhabited by unintegrated populations. Noticing that Nomad fliers are armed, Trevelyan thinks:

"Earth thought it had achieved peace...and now this has blossomed again between the stars." (The Peregrine, Chapter VII, p. 51)

The Pirate And The Peregrine

"The Pirate" is a prequel to The Peregrine, although the latter was the earliest written installment of the Psychotechnic History and the former was the last. "The Pirate," as a new installment of this future history, has to account for faster than light interstellar flight in terms of "hyperspace" but adds the phrase, "...the tachyon mode...," (Starship, p. 219). This mode gives "...only a weak emission of super-light particles..." (ibid.) but nevertheless enables a Cordy ship to track a suspect.

Poul Anderson wanted to make a point about the importance of valuing the past (see The Pact) and the Coordination Service suited this point so this story got written. It was not intended to add to the History as such.

"The Pirate"/The Peregrine diptych forms the culmination of the Stellar Union period of the Psychotechnic History. This period is characterized by the Coordination Service, which tries to prevent chaos, but also by the Nomads who cause it - or who at least travel and trade freely without any thought of the long term consequences. The novel describes a fruitful collaboration between one Cordy and a Nomad crew who come to realize that they face a common threat to humanity.

We have come a long way from the covert war between the UN and its protean enemy but this is an authentic fictitious history.

A Few Details In "The Pirate"

"Ship Harpsong of Nerthus, out of Highsky for David's Landing, is long overdue..." (Starship, p. 211)

Three words in this passage remind us of no less than four features of the same author's later Technic History:

Highsky Choth on Avalon;

David Falkayn, Founder of Avalon;

Thursday Landing on Diomedes;

Olga's Landing on Imhotep.

A mother trying to protect her child is said to be "...driven by the instinct of Niobe." (p. 238)

A planet with a slain population is described as "'...an archaeological and biological Golconda.'" (p. 243)

Two spaceships are called the Campesino and Genji. (p. 219)

Trevelyan "...had been living for a while at Laugerie Haute..." (p. 212)

On the dead planet, he found an "...ossuary..." (p. 238) - where people, poisoned by radiation, gathered to die.

There are a few unfortunate typos, e.g.:

"...clouds panted briefly to show high towers by a lake..." (p. 232)

The Pact

Poul Anderson's "The Pirate," about Stellar Union Coordination Service field agent, Trevelyan Micah, is narrated a generation later by another Cordy who begins:

"We guard the great Pact: the young generation, the folk of the star frontier, so often do not understand."
-Poul Anderson, Starship (New York, 1982), p. 211.

What "Pact"? The Social Contract? A Constitution? A Pax? A Pax enforced by nuclear or other futuristic weapons? (Remember the Space Patrol in Robert Heinlein's Future History or the Lunar Guard earlier in Anderson's Psychotechnic History.)

In this story, a planetary population has been killed by radiation. The title character aims to get rich quick by selling the idyllic planet with its empty dwellings to would be colonists. The Cordies say no, first, scientists and scholars need as long as it takes to study the dead civilization. The story ends as its narrator explains what he meant by the Pact:

"We guard the great Pact, which is the heart of civilization, of society, and ultimately of life itself: the unspoken Pact between the living, the dead, and the unborn, that to the best of our poor mortal abilities they shall be kept one in the oneness of time. Without it, nothing would have meaning and it may be that nothing would survive. But the young generations so often do not understand." (p. 251)

Anderson had to put the narration into the mouth of another Cordy. The omniscient narrator would not have been able to preach or philosophize like this. Having read to the end, surely we realize that "The Pact" would have been a more appropriate title?

Disaster

"...the supernova was aloft by day, invisible. Disaster, Trevelyan thought with a shudder. How little had Earth's ancient astrologers known of how terrible a word they were shaping!"
-Poul Anderson, Starship (New York, 1982), p. 234.

Why does Trevelyan think that? Because just as "nova" is short for nova stella, meaning "new star," "disaster" means disastro, "bad star." (Latin: stella; Greek: aster.) I learned that by googling after rereading Anderson's "The Pirate."

Two words not related to astronomy but frequently used on this blog came to have their present meanings in similar ways:

"novels" are so called because very recently, historically speaking, they were a new/novel form of literature;

"comic strips" are so called because originally their contents were exclusively comical - hence also, "funny papers."

Words encapsulate history. To be bewildered is to be lost in the wilderness.

Trevelyan And Smokesmith

Smokesmith says:

"'In my race, messages are always intended as vectors on the world line of the percipient.'" (Starship, p. 229)

I don't understand that. Do you?

Do the Reardonites, Smokesmith's race, directly perceive world lines? It sounds as if he treats them as more than a theory or a mathematical abstraction.

Trevelyan and Smokesmith discover a supernova. Thus, Poul Anderson's "The Pirate" becomes a supernova story like:

"The Star" by Arthur C Clarke;
"Day of Burning" by Poul Anderson;
"Lodestar" by Poul Anderson.

In "The Pirate" and "The Star," a rational species has been destroyed. In "Day of Burning," such a species is saved. In "Lodestar," the explosion occurred long ago but had scientifically interesting, and industrially exploitable, consequences.

Trevelyan says that civilization is based on communication. Yes. He adds that life:

"'...depends on communication and feedback loops between organism and environment, and between parts of the same organism.'"
-Poul Anderson, The Peregrine (New York, 1979), Chapter IV, p. 28.

"...communication and feedback loops..." is redundant - unless "communication" implies conscious communication, in which case it is wrong.

Trevelyan argues that there are natural limits to the size of information-processing brains and computers and that the number of extrasolar planets contacted is growing beyond anyone's ability to coordinate them. Anderson's fiction primarily celebrates those who value and exercise freedom. His Psychotechnic History mainly focuses on successive guardians of social order. Trevelyan of the Coordination Service is about to come into contact/conflict with the Nomads. Asked why the Cordys dislike the Nomads, he replies:

"'They're the worst disruptive factor our civilization has...They go everywhere and do anything, with no thought of the consequences. To Earth, the Nomads are romantic wanderers; to me, they're a pain.'" (p. 30)

Anderson always presents both (or all) sides of any argument.