Labyrinthine Links

The human colony planet Ansa has been forcibly annexed by the Terran Empire in "Sargasso of Lost Starships," Planet Stories, 1952;

 Nicholas van Rijn likes Ansan onion soup;

Per Stenvik drinks Ansan vermouth;

Tabitha Falkayn hopes to visit Imperial planets, including Ansa;

Ensign Helen Kittredge may have had leave "...on Ansa, which is like an idyll of Terra." (Flandry's Legacy, p. 278);

Sandra Miesel's Chronology of Technic Civilization lists "Sargasso of Lost Starships" but did not mention that this story involves the forcible annexation of Ansa until it was revised for Baen Books' The Technic Civilization Saga, Vol I, 2009;

"Sargasso..." is collected for the first time in Vol III, 2011.

This summary of references to Ansa was prompted by rereading "The Master Key," in which Per drinks his vermouth and recounts his experiences on the planet Cain. The recent post, "Bargaining On This Basement," (see here) gives a link to "Cain" and the link displays the results of a search for "Cain." The results include two very recent posts, including "Bargaining..." itself - and now probably also this one -, but also the two that I was looking for from 2012 and 2013. However, these posts do not disclose as much as I had expected about the Cainites so I will continue to reread the story. (See here.)

In "Hiding Place" and "Territory," van Rijn himself is out in space. In "Margin of Profit," he is on Earth but receives a report from one of his captains and, after conferring with colleagues, accompanies the captain into space. In "Esau," he is on Earth and receives a report from a factor. The narrative conventionally switches from conversation to the factor's adventures on Suleiman, then back to conversation. "The Master Key" remains a conversation with five speakers while Per and his ensign recount their adventures on Cain. Thus, the van Rijn stories differ considerably in structure.

Similar Cases

Sherlock Holmes:

"'As a rule, when I have heard some slight indication of the course of events, I am able to guide myself by the thousands of other similar cases which occur to my memory. In the present instance I am forced to admit that the facts are, to the best of my belief, unique.'"

-Arthur Conan Doyle, "The Red-Headed League" IN Doyle, The Adventures Of Sherlock Holmes IN Doyle, 3 Books in 1 (Mumbai, 2007), pp. 28-54 AT p. 29.

What Holmes said reminded me of something that Nicholas van Rijn said:

"'I think maybe I see a pattern. When you have been swindling on so many planets like me, new captain, you will have analogues at your digits for much that is new....'"

-Poul Anderson, "The Master Key" IN Anderson, David Falkayn: Star Trader (Riverdale, NY, January 2009), pp. 195-233 AT p. 201.

"'Sweating is not so common on cold terrestroid planets,' Van Rijn remarked. 'Always you find analogs to something you met before, if you look enough. Evolution makes parallels.'"

-Anderson, op. cit., p. 203.

Van Rijn also claims that his brain:

"'...has stored away more information about the universe than maybe the universe gets credit for holding. I see now what the parallels are. Xanadu, Dunbar, Tametha, Disaster Landing...oh, the analogue is never exact and on Cain the thing I am thinking of has gone far and far...but still I see the pattern, and what happened makes sense.

"Not that we have got to have an analogue. You gave us so many clues here that I could solve the problem by logic alone. But analogues help, and also they show that my conclusion is not only correct but possible.'"

-ibid., p. 229.

(Close examination of the text has revealed a spelling inconsistency.)

Both Holmes and van Rijn rely on their vast knowledge to interpret new phenomena.

"Per fiddled with a glass of Ansan vermouth."

-ibid., 199.

We recognize "Ansan" as a Technic History background detail.

The dustcover blurb claims that Anderson's Technic History equals Heinlein's Future History, Herbert's Dune and Asimov's Foundation. It surpasses them.

Outsystem Food

My favorite food for eating out is Indian but we also have Chinese, Japanese, Thai, Italian etc. James Ching likes:

"...a snack in a restaurant featuring outsystem food."
-Poul Anderson, "How To Be Ethnic In One Easy Lesson" IN Anderson, The Van Rijn Method (Riverdale, NY, 2009), pp. 175-197 AT p. 187.

Adzel, on Earth, eats (a lot) at the Silver Dragon Chinese Food and Chop Suey Palace. Nicholas van Rijn likes onion soup a la Ansa here, Dominic Flandry recommends an Ansan vermouth here and I think that the Technic History has more about mixing Terrestrial and extraterrestrial foods?

In fact:

The only other Avalonian city is Centauri at the mouth of the Sagittarius in the Gulf of Centaurs. In the Phoenix House, Tabitha/Hrill orders a catflower cocktail. She and Chris/Arinnian eat piscoid-and-tomato chowder, beef-and-shua pie, salad of clustergrain leaf and pears and drink coffee spiced with witchroot and a bottle of vintage dago. The Nest, a tavern for ornithoids, is the tallest building in Centauri with a gravshaft to its rooftop for humans who have not brought flying gear. It is unwalled, protected from rain by a vitryl canopy. Insectoids circle fluoroglobes and a service robot serves New African beer.
-copied from Who Knows Of Avalon?

A Wealth Of Details In A Single Story

"The Master Key."

The narrator's flitter lands on the Winged Cross at the beginning of the third paragraph only two lines above the bottom of the opening page of the text, p. 275.

The opening two paragraphs set the scene. The first paragraph refers to the public discomfiture, by the narrator and his friend, Harry Stenvik, of a local king on an unnamed planet. The second informs us that Nicholas van Rijn has invited these two experienced merchants, the narrator and Stenvik, to dinner in his penthouse on the Winged Cross.

The narrator, on a very brief business trip to Earth, has recently been to a planet with ammonia in the atmosphere; previously, methane. Stenvik, Norse and married to Sigrid:

"...had built a house on the cliffs above the Hardanger Fjord..." (p. 276) 

His oldest son, Per, was apprenticed on a Solar Spice & Liquors ship in the Hercules region several years previously and has recently become a Master Merchant. 

Per's ensign, Manuel, attends dinner wearing a much-used, holstered blaster. Would you feel safe in the society of the Polesotechnic League? Manuel is from Nuevo Mexico which is beyond Arcturus. Someone with a grasp of astronomy might figure out these different interstellar directions. Per drinks Ansan vermouth: yet another background reference to the colony planet, Ansa.

Although the narrator remains anonymous, van Rijn addresses him as "'...Captain...'" (p. 277) The narrator in turn describes van Rijn as:

"...the single-handed conqueror of Borthu, Diomedes, and t'Kela!" (p. 281)

When we read "The Master Key" in Trader To The Stars, we knew only of t'Kela. Diomedes had been in War Of The Wing Men/The Man Who Counts. The Earth Book of Stormgate includes The Man Who Counts and also "Margin of Profit," about Borthu, amended to fit into the Technic History.

Cain, where Per has been stationed, is a planet of a G-nine dwarf star "'...out Pegasus way.'" (p. 280)

The characters proceed to outline the details of the intelligent life forms on Cain. There is an action-adventure story but also a problem in alien biology and psychology that is solved by van Rijn who remains sunk in his lounger until near the end of the story. They eat dinner after the discussion.

Future History Background Details

Because Ansa is a planet in a story in Poul Anderson's Technic History, we appreciate later references in that History to Ansan vermouth, onion soup etc. See here. Also,"livewell" is an Avalonian flower imported to Earth. 

Early in Jerry Pournelle's The Mercenary (London, 1977), there are references to:

"...badges of the dark rich bronze alloys found on Kendicott, berets made from some reptile that swam in Tanith's seas."

-I, p. 30.

However, we have not been shown either Kendicott or Sparta yet. (At least, I do not think that we have. The publication history of this series is complicated. I have not read it all and there is much of what I have read that I do not remember.)

When Falkenberg and his men arrive on the planet Hadley, something large and black rises from the water but immediately sinks back. A local seems not to notice it whereas Falkenberg's Marines shout excitedly. Readers need to be shown more of native life.

What does Pournelle do well? He shows us a large number of plausible individuals in believable economic and political predicaments and conveys a strong sense of important events occurring both on- and off-stage. I am committed to rereading The Mercenary at least until the plot development which has been the subject of recent combox discussion. Whether I stay with the text after that depends on whether it is able to hold my attention.

Let's democratize the CoDominium instead of building an old-style Empire... Too late! That is what is going to happen.

Is Dominic Flandry A Gourmet?

Flandry dines well because he is a Terran aristocrat and is served by Chives but is he himself a gourmet? See here.

When Flandry and his son dine in elegance beneath the rings of Saturn on Iapetus with expensive and expert women, their attention is on their surroundings and their companions at least as much as on their dinner. However, there is another occasion when the menu is perhaps more important:

"Three, count 'em, three gorgeous girls, ready and eager to help me celebrate my birth week, starting tomorrow at Everest House with a menu I spent two hours planning..."
-Poul Anderson, The Rebel Worlds IN Anderson, Young Flandry (Riverdale, NY, 2010), pp. 367-518 AT p. 380.

(Maybe such a passage partly excuses the Baen Books cover of Young Flandry?)

When Flandry dines with Catherine Kittredge, he says:

"'I prescribe this before dinner: Ansan aurea. Essentially, it's a light dry vermouth, but for once a non-Terran soil has improved the flavor of a Terran plant.'"
-Poul Anderson, "Hunters of the Sky Cave" IN Anderson, Sir Dominic Flandry: The Last Knight Of Terra (Riverdale, NY, 2012), pp. 149-301 AT pp. 205-206.

- which is interesting because Nicholas van Rijn, definitely a gourmet, likes onion soup a la Ansa. See here.

Captain's Dinner

Ansan aurea, a light dry vermouth;
egg flower soup;
Maine lobster;
Liebfraumilch '51;
coffee;
liqueur;
cigar.

Poul Anderson mainly recounts the conversation between Flandry and Kit. There are no more details about what they consume.

Sheila and I were in Boothbay Harbor in the summer of 1973 but did not eat lobster because we were both vegetarian then.

See The Food Thread.