Across The Milky Way

We might start a sub-thread of objects seen in front of the Milky Way:

"Aycharaych nodded, his crest a scimitar across the Milky Way."
-Poul Anderson, A Knight Of Ghosts And Shadows IN Anderson, Sir Dominic Flandry: The Last Knight Of Terra (Riverdale, NY, 2012), pp. 339-606 AT IX, p. 461.

A scimitar is a weapon and Aycharaych works for the Merseians who aim to conquer the Milky Way.

"They had left the shining nebula far behind; an unlit mass of cosmic dust reared thunderhead tall across the Milky Way."
-op. cit., XII, p. 503.

The Hooligan flies from light towards darkness and a metaphorical thunder storm threatens the Empire.

"...the dreadnought...was Nova class; its hull curved over him, monstrous as a mountain, guns raking the Milky Way."
-Poul Anderson, "Hunters of the Sky Cave" IN Sir Dominic Flandry..., pp. 149-301 AT XV, p. 266.

"...guns raking..." is not metaphorical but quite explicit.

"His profile, vaguely seen against the Milky Way..."
-Poul Anderson, The Byworlder (London, 1974), VI, p. 62.

"Silhouetted athwart the Milky Way, as if hovering free among clustered stars, Ahasuerus' pine-cone bulk..."
-The Byworlder, XIV, p. 166.

"A gob of thick digestive fluid sailed past the Milky Way." (XV, p. 185)

See also:

Night On Ivanhoe
Starting The Jumps
Shadows And Milky Way
Blaze Of Stars, Milky Way And Meditation
The Milky Way And The Promised Land
The Voyage Begins
Zamok Sabyel'
Progress
A Reminiscence Of Ferune
Five Interesting Features In "Cold Victory"
Coffin's Coffin
Mercury, Milky Way And Moon
Past The Milky Way
A Mountain Against The Milky Way
Embarrassment And The Milky Way
Hirharouk's Head
Athwart The Milky Way
Mirkheim And The Milky Way
Fringe Of Battle
Leaving Hermes
Night On Avalon
Lissa's Sister And The Milky Way
Galactic Vastness And The Milky Way
Tjorr And The Milky Way
Irony, Highlanders And The Milky Way
The Trader Team On Merseia
Abrams II
Clans And Tribes
Diomedes, Starkad And Talwin
Djana Remembers And Imagines
Near The End Of The Rebel Worlds...
Battlements Against The Milky Way
Falkayn's Father's Castle Or Mansion And The Milky Way
A Flying Mountain Across The Milky Way
Gigantic Against The Milky Way

Jupiter And The Milky Way 

Dayspring And Milky Way

Against Sagittarius
A Turban Against The Milky Way
A Scullery And A Glade

A Silhouette And Birds Of Prey 

In Space

Across The Milky Way II

A Wisp Of The Milky Way 

Frozen Fire And Glowing Maelstrom

The Milky Way And The Gate Of Death 

A Weapon, Stars And A Funeral

On A Comet

End Of The Long Way Home

"The Bitter Bread": End

A Soothing, Then Unsettling, Helicopter Ride

Night In The Freehold Forest

"Inside Earth"

A Mountain Against The Milky Way

"Territory," see here.

"Due north rose the sheer black wall of Kusulonga the Mountain, jagged against the Milky Way. The city carved from its top could be seen only as a glimpse of towers like teeth." (p. 13)

Anderson describes night on t'Kela with unfamiliar constellations, the larger moon and the Milky Way which must be visible from everywhere in the Milky Way. I always look out either for a description of the Milky Way or for some object seen against it, as above.

Anyone who wants to know what happens in "Territory" had better read the story. Although I am rereading it, I am currently posting only about details that catch my attention like van Rijn's hoarse basso or Kusulonga the Mountain. Alternatively, searching the blog either for this title or for the name of the planet, T'Kela, generates a search result of previous posts on the subject. And there have been enough posts for today, I think (ten). Tomorrow, we will walk by the river or canal and attend a moot with food and a ritual. "High is heaven and holy."

Shadow And Milky Way

Chinook's boat, Williwaw, has been incommunicado but is at last returning safely from the turbulent atmosphere of the gas giant planet, Danu. Brodersen announces:

"'Good night. A real good night, ain't it? A real good night.'"
-Poul Anderson, The Avatar, XXX, p. 262.

Usually, in an Anderson text, such a piece of dialogue would be followed by something like: "Suddenly, the sun rose from behind the planet." We have often commented on the Pathetic Fallacy. Instead, this time, we get:

"(Chinook entered the shadow cone of Danu, and half of heaven was blotted out.)" (ibid.)

A negative Pathetic Fallacy, clearly intended to warn us that all is not alright. Anderson would have known the effect of what he was writing.

Meanwhile, the Milky Way is never far away:

"He felt her tense in his arms, saw in the ring of the Milky Way how she mastered her lips." (XXX, p. 264)

"...the galactic river..." (XXXI, p. 265)

"The Milky Way in a viewscreen crowned her uplifted head." (XXXI, p. 268)

Again we distinguish between descriptions of the Milky Way and objects, including human heads, seen against the Milky Way.

Dayspring And Milky Way

The Peregrine, CHAPTER XIV.

I will quote a short passage in full because it has at least five points of interest:

"By the hazy sheen of the Milky Way, river of suns spilling across infinity, he saw Nicki. Remembered words came to him, as if someone else were speaking into that great silence. "Hast thou commanded the morning since thy days; and caused the dayspring to know his place?..."
"Joachim stared out at heaven. 'Where are we?' he asked.
"'The constellations don't look any different! No, wait, they do a little. ' Ferenczi was at another port, his body black against the Milky Way." (p. 116)

Points of Interest
(i) A new description of the Milky Way: "...hazy sheen..."
(ii) It is immediately followed by a further description: "...river of suns spilling across infinity..."
(iii) A Biblical passage which we have cited before. See The Peregrine II.
(iv) Scripture sounds like Someone Else speaking. (That's the idea.)
(v) Yet another object seen against the Milky Way.

A Turban Against The Milky Way

Operation Chaos, III.

"The sentry came by. He was a tall bearded fellow with gold earrings that glimmered wanly under the stars. The turban wrapped around his helmet bulked monstrous against the Milky Way." (p. 20)

The turban looks "monstrous" because it is big, enclosing a helmet, and also because it is on the head of an enemy.

The number of objects seen against the Milky Way grows and I now note each new one.

For descriptions of the Milky Way itself, see here.

("Operation Afreet" is part of Operation Chaos which is part of Operation Otherworld which is part of the Old Phoenix multiverse sequence.)

Bellatrix And The Milky Way

Bodin Miyatovich, whom we have seen conversing with Kossara Vymezal and with Dominic Flandry, is the viewpoint character as he leads a Dennitzan raid into Merseian space. To stimulate his crew:

"...it was cool here, with a thunderstorm tang of ozone."
-Poul Anderson, A Knight Of Ghosts And Shadows IN Anderson, Sir Dominic Flandry: The Last Knight Of Terra (Riverdale, NY, 2012), pp. 339-606 AT XIX, p. 579.

I mention this because, in an Ythrian ship:

"The air blew warm, ruffling their plumes a little, scented with perfume of cinnamon bush and amberdragon. Blood odors would not be ordered unless and until the vessel got into actual combat; the crew would soon be worn out if stimulated too intensely."
-Poul Anderson, The People Of The Wind IN Anderson, The Rise Of The Terran Empire (Riverdale, NY, 2011), pp. 437-662 AT VII, p. 518.

In one of Bodin's viewscreens:

"Glory brimmed the dark, stars in glittering flocks and Milky Way shoals, faerie-remote glimmer of nebulae and a few sister galaxies. Here in the outer reaches of its system, the target sun was barely the brightest, a coal-glow under Bellatrix." (ibid.)

And a second Ythrian ship presents yet another image of a significant object outlined against the Milky Way. Captain Hirharouk is:

"Poised on his perch, crested carnivore head lifted against the Milky Way..."
-Poul Anderson, "Lodestar" IN Anderson, David Falkayn: Star Trader (Riverdale, NY, 2010), pp. 631-680 AT p. 663.

Athwart The Milky Way

Here is yet another reference that I had missed until now:

"The aquiline shape glided low above, black athwart the Milky Way... The Ythrian swung by, returned for a second pass."
-Poul Anderson, The Day Of Their Return IN Anderson, Captain Flandry: Defender Of The Terran Empire (Riverdale, NY, 2010), pp. 74-238 AT p. 157.

Here is not only another object seen against the Milky Way but even a second Ythrian see against it. For the first, see Hirharouk's Head.

The attached cover of The Day Of Their Return shows the Ythrian, Erannath of Stormgate Choth on Avalon, albeit not athwart the Milky Way. But I think that only the Rise Of The Terran Empire cover presents any adequate image of Ythrians. See here. Good covers for The Day Of Their Return are those that evoke the ambience of the planet Aeneas, e.g., see On The Third Day...

Frozen Fire And Glowing Maelstrom

Starfarers, 29.

"Optical amplifiers turned the stars into a sphere of dazzlement, bright ones become beacons, thousands upon thousands more leaping into visibility, the Milky Way a river of frozen fire, the Andromeda galaxy a glowing maelstrom. Only the pinpoint neutron star was dulled, lest it sear eyes that strayed in its direction." (p. 268)

On this occasion, the Milky Way is a river of frozen fire and the Andromeda galaxy is a glowing maelstrom. Quite often, sister galaxies are mentioned alongside the Milky Way although I have not separately listed such references.

We have separately listed objects seen against the Milky Way and another of those shows up over the page.

"A blackness crossed the Milky Way. 'Here comes the repair robot.'" (p. 270)

Progress

Poul Anderson, Vault Of The Ages, Chapter 9.

After participating in a battle here and discussing theology here, Carl creeps out of the camp:

"Looking upward, he saw the [guard] go past, a dim sheen of metal against the Milky Way. Snakelike, he writhed over the line." (p. 97)

The list of items seen against the Milky Way is shorter than the list of descriptions of the Milky Way but is growing.

Carl intends to defy taboo by learning the secrets of the ancients and using them against the otherwise invincible invaders. Hence, his creeping around in the dark.

Carl seeks knowledge only in response to an external threat. Things must get worse before they get better? People began to cultivate plants and herd animals only because climatic changes made hunting and gathering no longer viable? If threats to survival instigate progress, then the present period is potentially very progressive.

A Bit Of The Milky Way

We have a list of descriptions of the Milky Way here and a list of objects seen against the Milky Way here. Next we find another celestial object compared to a bit of the Milky Way:

"...the supernova nebula, thirty parsecs off, was only an irregular blur, a few minutes across, among the constellations opposite, as if a bit of the Milky Way had drifted free."
-"The Pirate," p. 148.

Poul Anderson writes as if he had been there. Now mankind needs to go there.

Starting The Jumps

Is that what a Betan looks like? Reading prose sf, I mostly forget how the aliens have been described. In a visual medium, they would be in front of us all the time.

I reread and posted about The Avatar in June 2012. See the posts from "An Elder Race?" to "The Avatar VIII." However, I am pausing on more details this time.

In XXVII, Brodersen's ship, Chinook, has made its first random jump. I previously summarized the jumps here and here.

After the jump, the stars as seen from space are so numerous that an untrained eye cannot see how the constellations have altered:

"...nor did the argence of the Milky Way pour through channels greatly different from those above Earth or Demeter." (p. 233)

In XXIV, Caitlin had seen:

"...the Milky Way stream past Fidelio's head." (p. 208)

We have one list of descriptions of the Milky Way and another of objects seen against the Milky Way.

Embarrassment And The Milky Way

Satan's World.

I started out looking for insights into van Rijn but have got diverted into discussing every other aspect of Poul Anderson's Technic History but here is a good one. Thea Beldaniel, domesticated by the Shenna, stares fixedly at the approaching Shenn ships. Van Rijn cannot name the feeling that he gets while seeing her like that:

"'Embarrassment, probably,' the Wodenite suggested.
"'Oh, is that how it feels?'" (XX, p. 537)

Next, Adzel watches the nearest approaching ship:

"Its gaunt high-finned shape was partly silhouetted black upon the Milky Way, partly asheen by the distant orange sun." (ibid.)

That joins our list of descriptions not of the Milky Way, here, but of objects seen against the Milky Way, here.

Van Rijn hopes to negotiate with the horrible Shenna on behalf not just of the Solar Spice & Liquors Company but of Technic civilization.

Pathetic Fallacies, The Milky Way And A Future Christmas

Being without a computer for a few days was an opportunity to catch up with some other reading and rereading. I have become sensitized to literary devices that I had first noticed in Poul Anderson's works. For example, in graphic works by Alan Moore and Neil Gaiman:

Meteorological Pathetic Fallacy

"Thunderheads , iron-black in the blue distance. The air is suddenly dry and heavy. The sky holds its breath...

"It's coming this way. And it's a monster."

-Alan Moore, Miracleman: A Dream of Flying (Forestville, California, 1988), CHAPTER 3, p. 2, panel 7, captions 1-2.

This "monster" is an approaching storm.

"Uneasy, Mike Moran can hear it, prowling around the perimeter of their conversation. A tiger, circling, closing in...

"It's coming this way. And its a monster."

-ibid., p. 4, panel 7, caption 2; p. 8, panel 1.

This "monster" is the man with whom the viewpoint character, Moran, is conversing. Moran articulates what he feels:

"'I can tell by your voice, by the way you stand... You're not human, John. I can feel it.'"

-ibid., p. 8, panel 7, caption 1.

Scary. Maybe even more evocative than some of Poul Anderson's storm-dialogue parallels?  And I have appreciated Moore's text more by quoting it here.

A Colourful Description of the Milky Way Seen from Space

"I met with Avril in deep space, her costume bright against the Milky Way's pearly blur..."

-Alan Moore, Miracleman No. 14 (Forestville, Calif., April 1988), p. 4, panel 2, caption 1.

A Future Take on Christmas

"...Christmas, when we remember all the dead gods and lost mythologies, and exchange presents."

-Neil Gaiman, Miracleman No. 20 (Forestville, Calif, March 1991), p. 3, panel 1.

Each of these passages reminded me of Poul Anderson to whom we must soon return.

A Wisp Of The Milky Way

"The battle in space was, to the naked eye, hardly visible - brief flashes of radiation among the swarming stars, occasionally the dark form of a ship slipping by and occulting a wisp of the Milky Way. But Admiral Walton smiled with cold satisfaction at the totality of reports given him by the semantic integrator."

-Poul Anderson, "Tiger By The Tail" IN Anderson, Agent Of The Terran Empire (London, 1977), V, p. 31.

 

Two points of interest:

 

yet another set of objects seen against the Milky Way; 

the data-processing machine called an "integrator" recalls Anderson's use of that term in his Psychotechnic History. See here. (Scroll down.)

I had to find that paragraph in the original version of this story because it is entirely rewritten in the revised version:

 

"The unaided eye could never really see a battle in space. Nothing but flashes between the stars betokened rays, warheads, incandescent vapor clouds, astronomically nearby. Further off, across distances measured in planetary orbits, the deaths of ships were invisible.

"Instruments sensed more fully, and computers integrated their data to give a running history of the combat. Admiral Thomas Walton, Imerial Terran Navy, laid down the latest printout and smiled in stark satisfaction."

-"Tiger By The Tail," p. 271.

 

Terminology has been updated. The "semantic integrator" has become computers integrating data.   

Tjorr And The Milky Way

The Golden Slave, XI.

Eodan sees:

"...Tjorr blocky against the Milky Way." (p. 150)

We have collected:

Andersonian descriptions of the Milky Way here;

objects seen against or across the Milky Way here.

To our editorial surprise, Tjorr now joins the latter list.

It feels as if we are getting right inside Poul Anderson's ways of thinking and perceiving. This passage links Tjorr to Aycharaych and to many other Andersonian characters who share a common galactic background. It is all one multiverse.

Ghostliness And The Milky Way

Poul Anderson, Vault Of The Ages, Chapter 3.

"In the moonless dark, the City was a place of looming shadows, streets like tunnels of night, a ghostly breeze and the tiny patter of a hurrying rat. A pair of bats swooped blackly against the dim glow of the Milky Way, and a wild dog howled far off in the woods. Ghostly, flitting through the enormous night silence and the small fearful noises below a wheeling sky, the four humans made their way to the forbidden place." (p. 39)

Comments
The Milky Way is always with us.

We met wild dogs before.

I always write "human beings," not "humans," because I heard that "human" was an adjective, not a noun. However, if enough people write "humans," then "human" becomes a noun.

Tribespeople believe that there are ghosts and devils in the City. No wonder, if the breeze and humans are described as "ghostly." Long before electric light, brave men feared the dark. See Niall In Combat.

Pulling Everything Together, Maybe

The previous post, Gods And Wars, referred to a battle between Dalesmen and Lann. For the Dalesman battle formation, see A Blunt Wedge. For three young Dalesmens' discussion of whether someone must have made the world, see not only Just A Story but also Someone. For one of several items seen, in different contexts, against the Milky Way, see Progress. And that Milky way reference is part of yet another of Poul Anderson's vivid descriptive passages appealing to at least three of the senses:

"Carl lay in tall, wet grass, hearing the sigh of wind and the distant creaking song of crickets. Looking upward, he saw the [guard] go past, a dim sheen of metal against the Milky Way."

-Vault Of The Ages, Chapter 9, p. 97.

Sighing wind is appropriate to the Dalesmen's post-battle exhaustion whereas the crickets are indifferent to human conflict.

Battlements Against The Milky Way

"A Tragedy of Errors."

"The headland loomed before him, and battlements against the Milky Way. Tom made a vertical landing in the courtyard." (p. 522)

Another of our many objects seen against the Milky Way (see here) and also an appropriate image for it.

Sometimes it feels as if someone else is writing this blog and I am merely transcribing it.

Gigantic Against The Milky Way

"Holmgang," IV.

Barely surviving after being shot on the"holmgang" asteroid, Bo either dreams or remembers the sights and sounds above the Sound. Next:

"Then he made out the bulky black-painted edge of it, gigantic against the Milky Way, and it was Lundgard, moving unhurriedly up to kill him." (p. 35)

Our old friend, the Milky Way, is getting good coverage, in fact here appears for the third time, in this story. Also present is Orion, described as "marching past," while also reminding us of Anderson's Orion Shall Rise. Familiar constellations should be all the more discernible in interplanetary space and therefore should be mentioned in this kind of fiction. In addition, I expect that new patterns of stars would be seen and named.

Wind And The Milky Way

The Avatar, XXXI. 

The Milky Way is described as:

"...the galactic river..." (p. 265)

I do not know whether I have noted this particular use of this phrase before. For others, see:

Meanwhile, Back On Earth, Time Passes

This chapter presents yet another item, in this case Caitlin's head, seen against the Milky Way but we have noticed this one before. See:

Shadow And Milky Way

Caitlin's newly composed song invokes the wind as inspiring wanderlust:

"A bugle wind is blowing

"It's time that I be going..." (p. 268)

I cannot imagine that song being sung though but maybe someone has done it at a Con?

Things go as well as they might but not perfectly for the crew after a drunken party and they prepare for the next jump.