Inga And Ilis

For Inga, see City Life.

Poul Anderson's Technic History includes some texts that have been revised to fit them into this future history series. Similarly, Anderson's For Love And Glory, which was potentially a new series, contains revised versions of Anderson's two contributions to the multi-authored Isaac's Universe (or Isaac Asimov's Universe) series.

At least in the opening passages, only the names have been changed:

Inga becomes Ilis;
Harul Vargen becomes Gerward Valen;
Laurice Windfell becomes Lissa Windholm;
the Brettan people become the Brusan people;
the planet, Ather, is renamed "Asborg";
the Ronaic Alps become the Hallan Alps;
"Erthuma settlement" becomes "human settlement";
a spaceship name is changed from "Darya" to "Dagmar";
etc.

Having recently reread FLAG closely, I will decision-make as to whether to continue to check the two texts for any further comparisons.

Windholm

On Aeneas in Poul Anderson's Technic History: a hereditary seat called Windhome.

On Asborg in Anderson's For Love And Glory: a House of Windholm (scroll down) -

"They were at the original family home, on Windholm itself. A stronghold as much as a dwelling, Ernhurst offered few of the comforts, none of the sensualities in mansions and apartments everywhere else." (XII, p. 70)

Points of interest:

the dwelling is called Ernhurst, not Windholm;

Ernhurst is not yet ancestral or hereditary because Davy, Head of the House, has lived in it for the two hundred years since the colonization of Asborg;

"...on Windholm..." tells us that Windholm is an island, I think. I thought of a continent but we do not say "on North America" or "on Eurasia."

To the south, Lissa sees the sea on the horizon but to the north are forested hills and to the west are a power station, a synthesis plant and a village. So Windholm is a big island.

Wind ripples not grass but "...herbage..." (ibid.) It also booms, bites and bears odors, thus addressing four senses in total.

Lissa's Sister And The Milky Way

For Love And Glory, XI.

In X, Lissa is about to tell Valen a secret but first they discuss preliminaries and the chapter ends with him serving her coffee. Thus, it seems that we will not learn the secret until later. However, XI continues their conversation.

Lissa shows Valen a recorded message from Evana Davysdaughter Windholm. Same House, same father, different personal name. Thus, Lissa's sister, in fact eighty years older but looking younger because of a recent rejuvenation. After two hundred years, Asborg remains underpopulated despite longevity so these guys must practice a lot of birth control.

Evana uses the adjective, "Asborgan," so I have corrected "Asborgian" wherever it appeared on the blog.

"The scene cut to a magnified image of the outsider vessel, a black blade athwart stars and Milky Way." (p. 63)

Objects can be seen against, across or athwart the Milky Way.

Asborg II

For Love And Glory, X.

See Asborg.

Asborg is on the "...far fringe of human settlement." (p. 58)

- although, in this timeline, hyperjumps eliminate distance. Interstellar jumps are instantaneous, as in World Without Stars.

The planet has been settled for two hundred years and Davy, Head of House Windholm, has been on the World Council for nearly that long.

Houses, run by the ruling families of Asborg, also include client families bound by oaths of fealty. Gerward Valen, a resident foreigner not owing any fealty, is a mate on an ore freighter of the Comet line owned by House Eastland whose Head, Arnus Eastland, is a religious fanatic according to Lissa Davysdaughter Windholm who also describes another House, Seafell, as "...reckless commercialists..." (p. 60)

As ever, societies are more complicated than they appear on the surface.

Rigid Furniture

For Love And Glory, X.

It has been established that Gerward Valen's apartment in Inga on Asborg lacks books. See Public Database. Furthermore, it is small and sparse with rigid chairs. We have become used to reading about self-adjusting furniture. See here.

"Well, maybe he'd picked these quarters because a transparency offered what must be a spectacular daylight view of bay, headlands, and ocean." (p. 57)

In this respect at least, Valen's small sparse space matches the roomy rich residences of Nicholas van Rijn and Dominic Flandry in another timeline. Valen is "...a Comet line officer." (p. 56)

Asborgan society is organized around "Houses" - like Ythrian choths, Merseian Vachs, Hermetian domains or Monwaingi Societies? So what business does Lissa's House of Windholm have with a Comet line officer? Read on.

City Life II

See City Life.

Inga is described as "...a lively town." (FLAG, Chapter XXXII, p. 168) Torben Hebo, returning from Earth to Asborg after his memory editing, finds a small apartment and studies the public database on the black hole collision. Not finding a Neocatholic church, he occasionally attends Josephan.

Through the wall transparencies in his apartment, he sees the city lighting up at dusk while losing sight of the hills where he had walked during the day. Called by Romon Kaspersson Seafell on the screened telephone, he is invited to dinner at the Baltica, located in a clear dome on the top of one of the tallest towers with a view of city lights and of an Asborgan moon. Between the tables, designer flowers display multiple colors and sing.

The dinner conversation soon turns to business so that might be the end of our information about the lively town. We learn that a man changes one part of his name when he changes his patronage. Esker Harolsson Windholm has become Esker Harolsson Seafell. We already know of some of the underlying conflicts.

Leadership

Poul Anderson, For Love And Glory (New York, 2003), Chapter XIV.

Here, we compared Poul Anderson's Nicholas van Rijn and SM Stirling's John Rolfe as different kinds of leaders. Now we find a third example. Lissa Davysdaughter Windholm thinks:

"'I'm only a planetarist. And even that title is a fake. I don't do geology, oceanography, atmospherics, chemistry, biology, ethology, or xenology. I dabble in them all, and then dare call myself a scientist." (p. 85)

So what is her contribution?

"I help get the specialists together, and keep them together, and sometimes keep them alive. That's my work. That justifies me being here..." (ibid.)

It does indeed. So that work must be generally acknowledged and respected? No:

"...though I had to force it every centimeter of the way." (ibid.)

Leadership indeed.

I googled "planetarist" but found a different meaning for it.

Traditions And Institutions

Poul Anderson, For Love And Glory (New York, 2003).

An Asborgan is identified by a personal name, a patronymic and the name of a House. Thus, Romon Kasperson Seafell converses with Lissa Davysdaughter Windholm.

When Romon suggests that Lissa dislikes the Seafell approach, she replies:

"'I don't hate it. A matter of taste. The communal versus the corporate style? ...They say diversity makes for a healthy society.'" (p.45)

I took this to mean that Seafell was communal whereas Windholm was corporate. See here. But maybe I got them the wrong way round? Later, Lissa refers to:

"'...a clutch of reckless commercialists like the Seafell.'" (p. 60)

When reading about a fictitious future society, we do not already know any background details and are entirely dependent on the unfolding narrative. The author can hint, conceal, imply etc but must eventually tell us enough for complete comprehension - at least for the current narrative. A skilfully written sequel can overturn some of our impressions.

Asborg

When an sf novel involves regular FTL interstellar travel, I would like to be told:

the galactic positions of the inhabited planets;
the distances between them;
the velocity of the FTL drive.

In the opening chapters of Poul Anderson's For Love And Glory (New York, 2003), Lissa returns from Jonna to Asborg via Gargantua and Xanadu whereas Hebo returns directly from Jonna to Earth. Hebo's companion, a Rikhan, may have returned to her home planet. So where are all these planets and how far apart are they?

Asborg is Sunniva III, thus the third planet of a star called Sunniva, just as Earth is Sol III.

Lissa is Lissa Davysdaughter Windholm of Asborg. Her father, presumably David or Davy, "'...has a major voice in Windholm's space operations.'" (p. 44) Windholm, Seafell and other Houses hold land on Asborg and "'...share in its governance...'" (p. 45) So what form does that governance take? Houses have different traditions and styles. Seafell's is commercial whereas Windholm's is communal. We have not been told much but it has not become necessary as yet.

Back To The Future

My edition of Poul Anderson's Mother Of Kings ends with a five page trailer for For Love And Glory, Anderson's last futuristic hard science fiction (sf) novel, which I have also not yet read.

Regular readers look out for any clue that a new novel belongs to an existing series. For example, a reference to an alien race of "Merseians" would instantly place any  new novel within Anderson's main future history series, the History of Technic Civilisation.

Theoretically, this need not be the case. A fictitious species could inhabit more than one future timeline just as readily as terrestrial human beings do. For example, Lithians and their planet are destroyed in 2050 in James Blish's Trilogy yet still exist millennia later in one of his tetralogies. Nevertheless, an author usually signals that two stories are set in different futures by having the human protagonists of the stories meet different alien species.

This question arises here because For Love And Glory does return to the earlier sf idea of faster than light (FTL) interstellar travel in a multi-species galaxy where at least some extra-solar planets are humanly inhabitable whereas Anderson's other later works, the Harvest Of Stars Tetralogy and Genesis, had featured slower than light (STL) interstellar travel by artificial intelligences encountering very little organic life.

The trailer mentions:

" '...the Orcelin civilization...' " (p. 615);
"...an anthropard from Rikha or a Rikhan colony..." (p. 616);
the planet Gargantua;
Asborg - Sunniva III.

(That last must be either a planet called Asborg which is the third planet of a star called Sunniva or a city called "Asborg" on the third planet etc.)

None of these names is familiar so most probably this new novel exists in its own timeline. Another clue is that the human language spoken is "Anglay," not "Anglic" - as it would have been in the Technic History.

Artifacts left by Forerunners, clearly an earlier space traveling race, are mentioned. There were such forerunners in the Technic History although there they were variously referred to as Foredwellers, Ancients, Elders, Others and Old Shen. Even the use of a slightly different term, "Forerunners," implies that the new novel is set in a different timeline.

The Gargantuan resembles a tyrannosaur which makes him sound like a Wodenite from the Technic History except that the latter are centauroid/quadrupedal. Also, Wodenites appropriately speak in deep, rumbling voices whereas the Garagantuan, called "Karl" for human purposes, speaks inaudibly and communicates through an artificial translator.

Characters in the Technic History often refer to " '...this fraction of a single spiral arm which we have somewhat explored...' " (1) whereas Lissa Davysdaughter Windholm of Asborg reflects that "The galaxy's so huge, so various, and always so mysterious." (2) So maybe Lissa's people have fared further - with faster FTL?

The word "Windholm" occurs in the Technic History but as a place name, not as a surname. Patronymics are familiar from Anderson's Norse fiction. I cannot avoid the impression that familiar story elements are being rearranged somewhat.

(1) Poul Anderson, Flandry's Legacy, Riverdale, NY, 2012, p. 207.
(2) Poul Anderson, Mother Of Kings, New York, 2003, p. 617.