Melee

"The rest were in a melee with the Protectorate men-at-arms, horses circling and snapping as blades swung in bright, glittering arcs."
-SM Stirling, A Meeting At Corvallis (New York, 2007), Chapter Nine, p. 247.

I quote this sentence because the word "melee" recalls:

ER Eddison;
James Blish;
John Brunner;
Poul Anderson.

For this particular connection between these four authors, see here - and the same post also addresses yet another parallel between Poul Anderson and Neil Gaiman.

A Meeting At Corvallis is set in a period when medieval terms like "melee" are back in practical use.

Another Pathetic Fallacy

We have frequently highlighted the pathetic fallacy in works by Poul Anderson and SM Stirling and have made some comparisons between Anderson and Stieg Larsson. I have just found a beautiful pathetic fallacy in Larsson's The Girl With The Dragon Tatttoo (London, 2008).

Retired industrialist Henrik Vanger has hired journalist Mikael Blomkvist to investigate the disappearnce of his great-niece decades previously. Several family members resent and resist Blomkvist's prying. When Blomkvist is discussing the matter with Vanger's lawyer, Dirch Frode:

"Blomkvist looked up at the sky, where rain clouds had begun to gather.
"'Looks like a storm is brewing,' Frode said. 'If the winds get too strong, I'll have to back you up.'" (p. 315)

A Few Coincidences

Copied from "Personal and Literary Reflections" here:

I am reading SM Stirling's Emberverse series in which many people, including the present Queen of England, have died and Prince Charles has become King Charles III. By coincidence, I recently heard part of a radio drama by Val McDermid in which many people are dying and the Queen is too ill to perform state functions so the Prime Minister asks Prince Charles to dissolve Parliament.

By another coincidence, I am rereading Stieg Larsson's The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo in which Mikael Blomkvist reads Val McDermid's The Mermaids Singing. The phrase "...mermaids singing..." is part of a poem by John Donne which Neil Gaiman quotes at the beginning of his novel, Stardust.

The Poul Anderson Appreciation blog has found many connections between SM Stirling, Poul Anderson and Neil Gaiman. We have also discussed Stieg Larsson in relation to Poul Anderson, e.g., see here.

Not Fanfic But

Copied from "Science Fiction" here:

I cannot write fan fiction but can speculate about obscure potential sequels to existing texts:

What becomes of country roads in Cumbria after the fall of Poul Anderson's Terran Empire (see here)?

Might SM Stirling's Rangers and Tolkien's Elves meet in Anderson's Old Phoenix Inn between the universes (see here)?

What will become of Lancaster in James Blish's Okie History (see here)? (I do not think that it will go Okie.)

Might Ys have gone Okie if, instead of being inundated, it had survived into the Okie future history (see here)?

Might the Time Traveller, the Doctor and the Time Patrol interact (see here)?

Examples could be multiplied but I think that these five are sufficiently suggestive.

Magic And Entropy

Copied from "James Blish Appreciation" here:

In James Blish's Black Easter and The Day After Judgment, magic is control of demons, which are fallen angels, and is practised in the twentieth century although most people do not believe in it. It is theorized that stable negative entropy would be eternal life. See here.

In Poul Anderson's Operation Otherworld, set on a parallel Earth, magic, practised in earler centuries, was protogoetics whereas goetics is a new energy source. See here. Demons are inhabitants of Hell, a chaotic, entropic universe.

Thus, Blish and Anderson present alternative imaginative takes on magic, demons and entropy.

Logic And Timelines

Copied from "Religion and Philosophy" here:

When I studied logic at University, I learned:

if p, then not not-p;
not (p and not-p);
either p or not-p.

For example, if it is the case that Socrates was executed in 399 BC, then it is not the case that Socrates was not executed in 399 BC - unless there are alternative timelines, in which case logical consistency is maintained by making our propositions, p and not-p, more specific. Thus, if it is the case that Socrates was executed in 399 BC in timeline 1, then it is not the case that Socrates was not executed in 399 BC in timeline 1.

This may seem obvious but I meet people who get their idea of logic not from Aristotle or his successors but from Mr Spock. "Logic" means something like thinking rigidly and unemotionally instead of just thinking and speaking consistently which everyone tries to do. No one openly contradicts himself on a matter of fact, then says, "I am free to contradict myself because I am not bound by logic like Mr Spock." And anyone who did say that would not succeed in telling us anything. "Socrates both was and was not executed in 399 BC in timeline 1 and I am free to contradict myself..."

It might be imagined that a rigidly "logical" thinker, having denied that Socrates could both be executed and not be executed in 399 BC, would then compound his rigidity by denying that there can be alternative timelines. Merely to reply that Mr Spock experiences alternative timelines is to confuse a conceptual question with an empirical question.

A conceptual question: Are alternative timelines possible?
Answer: Yes. There is no reason why not. No contradiction is involved.

An empirical question: Do alternative timelines in fact exist?
Answer, within the framework of the Star Trek narrative: Yes. They have been discovered and entered.

Not only Star Trek. We are grateful for the alternative timelines of Poul Anderson, SM Stirling and Harry Turtledove.

Temporal Intelligence

Copied from "Logic of Time Travel" here:

When James Bond gathers intelligence during his mission to Japan or when Dominic Flandry gathers intelligence by penetrating the Merseian Roidhunate, the gathered intelligence is accessible to Bond's or Flandry's colleagues after, not before, it has been gathered but how does this work in the Time Patrol?

Herbert Ganz, based in the 1850s, suggests that the Patrol can begin to record the history of the Gothic milieu by retrieving oral stories and poems from the Dark Ages. To this end, Carl Farness, based in the 1930s, spends a lot of time in the period 300-372. Before Carl and his wife have moved to the 1930s from later in the twentieth century and before Carl's first journey to 300, Manse Everard, Unattached agent, reviews Carl's proposed mission with him in 1980. At this stage, Everard agrees that Ganz's proposal is:

"'...an opening wedge, the single such wedge we've found, for getting the history of that milieu recorded.'"
-Poul Anderson, "The Sorrow Of Odin The Goth" IN Anderson, Time Patrol (New York, 2006), pp. 333-465 AT p. 356.

In any other context, if the history has not yet been recorded, then the historians and their colleagues do not yet have access to the history but this is the Time Patrol. When Carl returns from 372 to the 1930s with all his data recorded, then those data become accessible to any Patrol member who may need them including Ganz in the 1850s, Carl Farness in the 1930s and Everard in 1980. However, the data must be withheld from Carl pre-mission so that he will be able to gather those data without prejudice.

Swedish Comics

Copied from "Comics Appreciation" here:

Stieg Larsson, The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo (London, 2008), p. 261.

Investigating the disappearance of a young woman, Harriet Vanger, Mikael Blomkvist finds some comic books on a bookshelf:

The 91;
Phantomen;
Romans;

- also a copy of Lektyr magazine.

Blomkvist has studied photographs of Harriet and others taken on the day when she disappeared. He intuits that he has spotted something significant in one of the photos but does not yet know what it is. This rings true. It sounds like the experience of other fictional detectives including Poul Anderson's Trygve Yamamura and Anderson's other characters, Nicholas van Rijn and Dominic Flandry, who must also apply detective skills to diverse situations.

Versions

Copied from "Personal and Literary Reflections" here:

See Versions.

Generally, book publication presents a single version of a character whereas periodical publication and screen adaptations present multiple versions. However, there is a long history of different versions of a story. Hesiod and Homer present alternative birth stories of Aphrodite; Plato rationalizes them.

The Smallville and Arrow TV series present different versions of Oliver Queen played by different actors. Smallville is a prequel to a version of Superman but not a version that we have ever seen before. Everything important is happening before Clark dons the costume or flies, even Lois Lane knowing of his powers and agreeing to marry him.

There are two versions of Poul Anderson's Kith History (see here) and a few stories in his Technic History exist both in an original version and in a version that has been revised to make it consistent with the History, e.g., "Margin of Profit" (see here) and "The White King's War" (see here).

Multi-Blogging

Copied from "Personal and Literary Reflections" here:

My mission today, which I chose to accept, was not to post on Poul Anderson Appreciation but instead to post on six other blogs. However, these posts should be of interest to readers of PAA and will be copied to that blog tomorrow:

Versions
Not Fanfic But
Swedish Comics
Temporal Intelligence
Logic And Timelines
Magic And Entropy