Fair Winds Forever

Poul Anderson was able to invent new characters for specific purposes, then invest them with substance. An omnibus collection contains twelve works (eleven stories and one novel) set before, during and after the period of the Polesotechnic League. Another novel, The People of the Wind, is set after this period. From this further novel, Anderson generated a title and interstitial passages for the collection. The People of the Wind is set on the planet Avalon where some humans and Ythrians are organised as the Stormgate Choth so the collection became The Earth Book of Stormgate. The rationale for the title is that the works in the collection present human perspectives on events preceding the founding of the Stormgate Choth on Avalon.

Five of the works feature Ythrians. Of these, four focus explicitly on human-Ythrian relations, three are set on Avalon, two are set after the joint colonisation of Avalon and one is about Falkayn, the founder of the Avalonian colony, and his employer, van Rijn. Of the seven non-Ythrian works, one is about Falkayn, one about his future travelling companion, one about a planet previously visited by Falkayn and three about van Rijn. The one remaining story mentions van Rijn. Thus, all twelve works are connected to each other but not all in ways that link them directly to Avalon. Anderson makes this further connection in the specially written Earth Book introductions to the works.

In "Esau," Emil Dalmady reports to van Rijn. The Earth Book introduction informs us that Dalmady's children joined the Avalonian colony where one of them wrote "Esau." The introductions to two other stories inform us that she also wrote them. Earth Book introductions mention three Stormgate members from The People of the Wind: Lythran, Blawsa and Christopher Holm/Arinnian. They also introduce new characters: the historian Rennhi, who wrote The Sky Book of Stormgate about Ythrian perspectives but who died before she could start the companion volume, the Earth Book, and her son Hloch who wrote the Earth Book. Arinnian wrote one Earth Book story and collaborated with Hloch on two others which were based on Rennhi's decipherment of records left by van Rijn and Falkayn on Falkayn's home planet, Hermes.

Hloch's other sources are:

Far Adventure by Maeve Downey, the autobiography of a planetologist;

a private correspondence recorded on Terra and kept in the archives of the University of Fleurville on the planet Esperance;

the reminiscences of James Ching, a spaceman who settled on Catawrayannis;

Tales of the Great Frontier by A. A. Craig;

stories by Judith Dalmady in the Avalonian periodical Morgana;

a historical novel about van Rijn originally published on either Terra or Hermes;

a tale brought to Ythri by the xenologist Fluoch of Mistwood and translated into Anglic by Arinnian;

the private journal of the spaceship captain Hiraharouk of Wryfields Choth on Ythri.

Hloch writes of Rennhi that her Sky Book, which we do not read, describes the history of the choth, the Ythrian ancestors, the Avalonian founders and their descendants to her own day.

"...of how past and present and future have forever been intermingled and, in living minds, ever begetting each other - of this does her work pursue the truth, and will as long as thought flies over our world." (1)

Thus, Anderson adds significantly to the works gathered in the Earth Book. Hloch signs off with:

"Now The Earth Book of Stormgate is ended. From my tower I see the great white sweep of the snows upon Mount Anrovil. I feel the air blow in and caress my feathers. Yonder sky is calling. I will go.
"Fair winds forever." (2)

(1) Poul Anderson, The Earth Book of Stormgate, New York, 1978, p. 2.
(2) op. cit., p. 434.

League and After, Empire and After

To those who have read Poul Anderson's History of Technic Civilization, imagine a new Complete Edition structured as follows:

Volume I, an introductory collection of nine stories from "The Saturn Game" in the twenty first century to "A Little Knowledge" in the twenty fifth century, with intermediate stories introducing Ythrians, van Rijn, Adzel and Falkayn, who will re-appear in later Volumes;
II, a Star Trader (van Rijn) omnibus, starting with The Man Who Counts;
III, a Trader Team (Falkayn etc) omnibus, ending with Mirkheim;
IV, an Avalon and Empire collection, ending with The People of the Wind;
V, a Flandry and Empire I omnibus, ending with The Day of Their Return;
VI, Flandry and Empire II collecting all seven shorter works about Dominic Flandry;
VII, Flandry and Empire III, ending with The Game of Empire;
VIII, The Long Night, including The Night Face.

Of these eight proposed volumes, three would each include one novel plus shorter works. Another three would include two, three and four novels respectively. Thus, the entire series comprises twelve novels plus thirty one shorter works, my point being that the Technic History is long and substantial. In this respect at least, it surpasses Robert Heinlein's original Future History which comprises two novels and twenty three shorter works. The Technic History also covers more space and time than the Future History. Heinlein's characters take four stories to get off the Earth and four volumes to get out of the Solar System whereas Anderson's characters start in the Saturnian system and are well outside the Solar System in their second story. In very general terms, the two Histories follow a common pattern of economic expansion followed by political collapse and dictatorship but later progress towards a stabler culture.

The first four Volumes of the proposed Complete Edition correspond to the expanded The Earth Book of Stormgate (See here). Unfortunately, Anderson did not devise any corresponding narrative framework for the later Imperial period or its aftermath. The Technic History can be described as "League and after, Empire and after." We can add "Commonalty" but this third form of interstellar organization appears only once in the concluding story and we do not see its aftermath.

  I hope that by the twenty ninth century, humanity will have transcended imperialism but Anderson helps us to appreciate human, and vividly imagined alien, life whatever its social structures.

"Where the mighty Sagittarius flows into the Gulf of Centaurs, Avalon's second city - the only one besides Gray which rated the name - had arisen as riverport, seaport, spaceport, industrial center, and mart. Thus, Centauri was predominantly a human town, akin to many in the Empire, thronged, bustling, noisy, cheerfully corrupt, occasionally dangerous. When he went there, Arinnian most of the time had to be Christopher Holm, in behaviour as well as name." (1)

(Holm is human but has joined an Ythrian choth where his name is Arinnian.)

Two centuries later, on another planet:

"Life spilled from narrow streets and surged between the walls enclosing the plaza..." (2)

Flandry's daughter sees shops and booths selling, among many other exotic items, "...miniature computers of the inner Empire..." and illegal blasters "...doubtless found in wrecked spacecraft after the Merseian onslaught was beaten back." (2)

Life remains vivid and colourful despite the persistence of military conflict.

(1) Anderson, Poul. The People of the Wind, London, 1977, p. 57.
(2) Anderson, Poul. The Game of Empire, New York, 1985, p. 3.

Aliens in Anderson and Niven

(A brief look at a big topic)

Niven

One of the most imaginative alien races in science fiction (sf) is Larry Niven’s Pierson’s Puppeteers. A Puppeteer is somewhere described as resembling a headless, three legged centaur with a Cecil the Sea Sick Sea Serpent hand puppet on each hand. Another description would be a furry ostrich with one extra head, neck and leg, malleable lips and only one eye on each head. Mouths and necks double as hands and arms and the brain is protected inside the body. Thus, this alien form can be described by comparing it with familiar organisms. (Similarly, years ago, Dan Dare’s alien pet, Stripey, was describable as a cat- or dog-sized, zebra-striped, tusk-less elephant.)

With alien bodies, Niven imagines alien body language. What does it mean when a Puppeteer’s eyes meet? Laughter? A shrug? Something else? Psychologically, Puppeteers are what men and kzinti call cowards. Their elected leader is the Hindmost, He Who Leads From Behind, and cautious Conservatives usually win elections. However, risk-taking Experimentalists win during crises. Further, a cornered Puppeteer can turn its back, look behind itself with adjustable binocular vision, balance on two legs and kick its assailant’s head off, whereas the Puppeteer has no vulnerable head on top.

Niven acknowledges through a character that the Puppeteers are unique in Known Space, where kzinti are large, upright cats and other species are more or less humanoid. (This does not matter in the case of the Pak because human beings are mutated Pak.) Can anyone imagine a galaxy full of non-humanoid races? And are such beings out there? Is any intelligence out there and, if so, does parallel evolution instead favour former quadrupeds with forelimbs freed for manipulation and sense organs near a bone-protected brain at the top?

This would still allow for wider variation than mere pointed ears and bumpy heads, pace Star Trek. If two eyes above one nose above one mouth with an ear at each side were arbitrarily inherited from our earliest amphibian ancestors, then how different might heads and facial features have been? They could probably have been something that we would simply not recognise as any part of an organism.

Anderson

“The Technic History and Potential Histories” briefly discusses Poul Anderson’s aliens.

In After Doomsday, Anderson immediately establishes the alienness of an avian-descended extraterrestrial by giving him an exotic name, “Ramri of Monwaing’s Katkinu,” aka “Ramri of Tantha.” Ramri is a personal name. Monwaing is a home planet. Katkinu is a colonized planet. Tantha is a Monwaingi Society. Thus, the first version of Ramri’s name reflects the fact that Monwaingi are space travelers whereas the second version expresses their internal organization. In fact, space travel facilitates Monwaingi organization because Societies preserve their distinctiveness by spreading to other planets although not on the basis of one Society per planet. Individualistic Tanthai and communistic Kodau sharing Katkinu simply ignore each other although, recognizing that conflicts may occur, they also accept a common peace-keeping technology.

Anderson alternates between recognizing that alien bodies would have alien body languages and projecting human body language onto alien bodies. Ythrians express more with their feathers than human beings can with their faces. On the other hand, a man viewing a visual recording of an intelligent quadruped under Monwaingi interrogation thinks that the quadruped seems nervous because he shuffles his legs and twitches his trunk… A biped encountered by Dominic Flandry shakes her head in disbelief… (I believe that the significance of head shaking varies even within Europe. In "A Tragedy of Errors," about human miscommunication, Anderson recognises that head shaking can mean yes, no or maybe.)

In Fire Time, Anderson expands on the theme of intelligent quadrupeds. If they effortlessly trot or gallop further than bipeds can walk, then their belongings, dwellings, workshops and meeting places are dispersed across geographical areas, not concentrated in a single building or group of buildings. The small physical difference of two more legs entails immense social differences and enables Anderson to comment on human society. Working eight hours and sleeping eight hours leaves only eight hours for food, recreation and commuting. There is therefore an absolute limit to how much time we can spend commuting. Technology changes not the length of time but how far we can travel in that time. If commuting consumes too much time, then we move house, work or both. There are few absolute limits but this is one.

Winged, carnivorous Ythrians need large estates to support meat animals and therefore are very territorial. Ythrians and human beings jointly colonizing a planet initially avoid contact before integrating. Human beings import Parliamentary institutions from Earth whereas Ythrian Khruaths are fully representative communes or soviets that do not recognize any authority as having the sole right to exercise violence, although they must unite against a Terran attack. Ythrian hunting instincts affect their theology in ways that had earlier upset a Christian man who worked for them. Although Ythrians remain inwardly alien, interactions continue: some human beings, flying with anti-gravity equipment, join Ythrian "choths." Elsewhere, some quadruped Wodenites convert to terrestrial religions.

Van Rijn met two species with a common environment that formed a single intelligence when physically joined. Flandry met three similarly symbiotic species. A partnership of units A, B and C and a partnership of units A, B and D share the memories of A and B though not, directly, of C or D. However, two thirds of ABD remembers having shared memories with C which in turn would have remembered other partnerships. Therefore, the Didonian sense of identity and concept of self is unhuman. Their shifting and overlapping selves are unlikely to imagine that any single self will remain intact through an indefinite future. They directly experience the fading of selves.

However, since Didonian intelligence exists only when three individually unintelligent organisms are conjoined, might some Didonians imagine or infer that a greater intelligence directs the conjoining? Anderson, of course, shows us how evolution did it.

Anderson’s novel, The Rebel Worlds, leaps straight into Didonian consciousness:

“Make oneness.

“I/we: Feet belonging to Guardian of North Gate and others who can be, to Raft Farer and Woe who will no longer be, to Many Thoughts, Cave Discoverer, and Master of Songs who can no longer be; Wings belonging to Iron Miner and Lightning Struck the House and others to be, to Many Thoughts who can no longer be; young Hands that has yet to share memories: make oneness.” (1)

Young Hands learns about humanity from Feet of Cave Discoverer and Woe:

“(Blurred, two legs, faceless…no, had they beaks?)…strangers, who had but single bodies and yet could talk…” (2)

The new Hands learns quickly:

“This goes well. More quickly than usual. Perhaps i/we can become a good oneness that will often have reason to exist.” (1)

Didonian oneness has a practical purpose:

“…each oneness We create must know of those who come from beyond heaven, lest their dangerous marvels turn into Our ruin.” (3)

and also a transcendent purpose:

“Beyond this and greater: How shall We achieve oneness with the whole world unless We understand it?” (4)

But the attempt to understand humanity might fail:

“The unit that led them said…that he/she/it? doubted if they understood themselves, or ever would.” (3)

One Didonian assesses humanity as follows:

“Be not afraid of the strangers with single bodies…Rather pity that race, who are not beasts but can think, and thus know that they will never know oneness.” (5)

This is substantial speculation about alien life forms and modes of consciousness. It may be that Ythrians, with two eyes, a mouth, claws and feathers, are still too close to a terrestrial norm but Anderson successfully imagines genuine biological and psychological differences, probably to a greater extent than any other sf writer.

    Poul Anderson, The Rebel Worlds, London, 1972, p. 5.
    ibid, pp. 5-6.
    ibid, p. 6.
    ibid, p. 140.
    ibid, p. 141.