Where Is The Black Nebula?

In Poul Anderson's History of Technic Civilization, the author writes the introductions that are fictitiously written by:

Francis L Minamoto;
Hloch of the Stormgate Choth;
Vance Hall;
Noah Arkwright;
Le Matelot;
Urwain the Wide-Faring;
Donvar Ayeghen, President of the Galactic Archaeological Society.

(Have I missed any?)

In Baen Books' The Technic Civilization Saga, the first complete uniform edition of the Technic History, editor/compiler Hank Davis writes the one new introduction that is fictitiously written by Michael Karageorge, a contemporary of Donvar Ayeghen.

Karageorge writes that the few clues as to the location of the Black Nebula use names of stars that fell into disuse centuries previously. The story, "Sargasso of Lost Starships," informs us that the nebula is a spherical dust cloud a light year in diameter ten parsecs beyond Ansa towards Sagittari. This sounds clear enough. And Ansa, a colony planet, is still inhabited a few centuries later in Dominic Flandry's time.

However, "Ansa" is the Anglic name of a planet. We are not told the name of its star. Further, Ayeghen and Karageorge live a very long time after Flandry. Ayeghen refers to the Empire founded by Manuel Argos as "...the First Empire..." (Rise Of The Terran Empire, p.325). We know of no subsequent Empires although we do know that human beings spread further during the four or more millennia after Flandry. Daven Laure, a Ranger of the service organization called the Commonalty, reflects that:

humanity has thinly occupied parts of two or three spiral arms;
the Commonalty operates in only one civilization, where it has members on ten million planets;
other branches of humanity have distinctive ways;
there are rumors of even stranger ways.

Thus, although the Commonalty has no wars or imperialism, there could well be empires elsewhere and Ayeghen's phraseology confirms this. Sol and Old Earth are fifty light years from Ansa but two spiral arms away from Daven Laure so Karageorge, wherever/whenever he is, is probably right when he says that the Black Nebula will be difficult to locate, especially if the name of their organization, the Galactic Archaeological Society, means that Ayeghen and Karageorge belong to a civilization that is not confined to part of one spiral arm but spans the galaxy.  

The Major Turning Point In The Technic History

The major turning point in the Technic History just has to be that moment, at the midpoint of Rise Of The Terran Empire, when Hloch concludes the Earth Book and passes the baton of historical commentary to Donvar Ayeghen. The Earth Book ends with peace on Avalon after the Terran War whereas Ayeghen, although writing many millennia later, backtracks to the violent beginnings of the Terran Empire:

"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.

"-Hloch of the Stormgate Choth

"The Earth Book Of Stormgate"

 

"...the author himself must have lived through that great and tragic and triumphant age...

"-Donvar Ayeghen, President of the Galactic Archaelogical Society"

- from Rise Of The Terran Empire, pp. 323, 325. 

Galactic Civilization

We have perhaps three sources of information about the galactic civilization that will exist long after the Terran Empire and the Long Night:

"Starfog";

Donvar Ayeghen's Introduction to "The Star Plunderer";

Michael Karageorge's Introduction to "Sargasso of Lost Starships."

It was inappropriate that The Long Night (see image) included "The Star Plunderer," about the founding of the Terran Empire, and "Outpost of Empire," set during the Imperial period, since the Long Night is precisely what happens after the Fall of the Empire.

Strictly speaking, the Long Night is the period between the Fall and the restoration of civilization. However, an Imperial might use the term more loosely just to mean anything and everything happening after the Empire. In that broader sense, the Introductions to "The Star Plunderer" and "Sargasso" are written during the Long Night. Ayeghen and Karageorge must be later even than the Commonalty described in "Starfog" because that organization serves just one spiral arm of the galaxy whereas Ayeghen, to whom Karageorge refers, is the President of a Galactic Archaeological Society.

Winston P Sanders was a pen-name of Poul Anderson and a character in Anderson's Tales Of The Flying Mountains and now we learn that a Winston P Sanders IX is a contemporary of Ayeghen and Karageorge! However, since Karageorge's Introduction is neither written by Anderson nor even intended seriously, perhaps we should treat it with some skepticism? Fortunately (?), it does not tell us a great deal except that the history and literature of the early Empire remain well known in that remote period.

Since Ayeghen refers to the Empire founded by Manuel in "The Star Plunderer" as the First Empire and since Laure in "Starfog" reflects on strange forms of humanity in other spiral arms, we might deduce that some of those strange forms remain Imperialist?

Later Technic History Introductions

Fictional introductions are a significant feature of the Polesotechnic League period of Poul Anderson's Technic History. There is a total of eighteen such introductions and one afterword in the three collections that cover that period. By contrast, at the very dawn of the Imperial period, Donvar Ayeghen, President of the Galactic Archaeological Society, introduces the single story about the Founder of the Terran Empire but there is almost nothing else after that:

an extract from a pilot's manual about Starkad at the beginning of Ensign Flandry;

a Didonian recalling human beings at the beginning and end of The Rebel Worlds;

italicized passages praising Gospodar Bodin at the beginning and end of A Knight of Ghosts and Shadows;

italicized passages about a King of England at the beginning and end of "A Tragedy of Errors."

Nothing more. The Technic History was not written to a plan. We would have liked it if Donvar Ayeghen had analysed the Terran Empire in the same detail as Hloch of the Stormgate Choth analyses the Solar Commonwealth and the Polesotechnic League.

Translation Of Metafiction

Hank Davis:

compiled The Technic Civilization Saga, Baen Books' seven-volume omnibus collection of Poul Anderson's major future history series, the History of Technic Civilization;

introduced each volume;

wrote a fictional introduction to one story, "Sargasso of Lost Starships."

The fictional introduction begins:

"Many scholarly works of varying lengths have been written on both the history and the literature of the early years of the Terran Empire, and the majority completely ignore the piece which follows. The few who do mention it mostly do so only in passing, describing it as 'obvious fiction,' or even scorn it as a hoax. The eminent Donvar Ayeghen once hastily changed the subject when the present document was brought up in an interview."
-Michael Karageorge, INTRODUCTION IN Poul Anderson, Rise Of The Terran Empire (Riverdale, NY, 2011), pp. 363-365 AT p. 363.

Karageorge wrote at a time when Anglic had become an ancient language. Translating (very freely) from Karageorge's post-Anglic into modern English gives us something like this:

"Many volumes have collected parts of Poul Anderson's Technic History but the following piece has never been collected since its original magazine publication. The story is perhaps inconsistent with the rest of the Technic History. Donvar Ayeghen is the fictional author of the introduction to the previous installment of the series, "The Star Plunderer," so let's have a joke at his expense here!"

Donvar Ayeghen And Michael Karageorge

So far, the process has been:

a short story is published in a magazine;

it is collected with a new introduction in Trader To The Stars, The Trouble Twisters or The Earth Book of Stormgate;

it is re-collected together with its more recently acquired introduction in The Technic Civilization Saga.

We now find two exceptions that are also companion stories:

"The Star Plunderer" was introduced by Donvar Ayeghen of the Galactic Archaeological Society in its original magazine publication;

"Sargasso of Lost Starships" acquired its introduction by Michael Karageorge in The Technic Civilization Saga.

(Also, the author behind Michael Karageorge is not Poul Anderson but the Saga compiler, Hank Davis.)

We might eventually get to perceive The Technic Civilization Saga in all its aspects.

Sol City

Of course, Poul Anderson wrote "The Star Plunderer" (1952) nine years before he initiated the Technic History in "A Plague of Masters" (1961). Thus, nothing in the fictional introduction to "The Star Plunderer" was originally intended to inform its readers about a future history. However, we now try to fit whatever is written in this introduction into what we know about the History of Technic Civilization. We are like Sherlockians trying to resolve inconsistencies in Conan Doyle's texts.

"The Star Plunderer" features Manuel Argos who will found the Terran Empire. In Dominic Flandry's time, the Imperial capital will be Archopolis, Terra. Donvar Ayeghen, author of the Introduction to "The Star Plunderer," tells us that the story is Chapter V of the Memoirs of Rear Admiral John Henry Reeves, Imperial Solar Navy, and that this book, written in the early period of the First Empire, was excavated from the ruins of Sol City, Terra.

We deduce that:

there are at least two Empires;

the capital of a later Empire will be not Archopolis but Sol City;

that city is ruined in Ayeghen's time;

Ayeghen is a long way in the future after Manuel and even after Flandry.

 

New thought: might Ayeghen be even later than the Commonalty period in "Starfog," the last episode of the Technic History?

 

References to Sol City and a First Empire link "The Star Plunderer" to "The Chapter Ends" in Anderson's Psychotechnic History.

Introductions VI

Sometimes an introductory passage is clearly the opening section of a fictitious text and would have appeared as such in the original magazine publication of a short story or of an installment of a novel. Example: the passage attributed to the fictitious Francis L Minamoto at the beginning of section I of "The Saturn Game" by Poul Anderson. Minamoto re-appears at the beginnings of sections II, III and IV so it is then clear, if it was not already, that he is an integral part of the text.

It is equally obvious that the introductions and conclusion to the stories collected as The Earth Book Of Stormgate were specifically written for that edition where they add an extra layer and perspective, including even a new character, to the fiction. I think that the Introduction to the van Rijn collection, Trader To The Stars, and the Introductions to the individual stories in the Falkayn collection, The Trouble Twisters, are in the Earth Book category, not in the "Saturn Game" category. But, in any case, Anderson presents us with an intricate network of fictitious characters commenting on his fictitious texts:

Minamoto;
Le Matelot;
Vance Hall, commenting on Noah Arkwright;
Noah Arkwright;
Urwain the Wide-Faring, reminiscing about Noah Arkwright;
Hloch of the Stormgate Choth on Avalon;
Donvar Ayeghen, President of the Galactic Archaeological Society;
(Michael Karageorge);
a Didonian composite intelligence;
a Dennitzan.

Have I missed any? (Karageorge is bracketed because he is not a creation of Anderson but a joke, albeit a welcome one, by Baen Books Editor, Hank Davis.)

With one exception, these Andersonian commentators are closely involved with the periods on which they comment. The single exception is Ayeghen who writes a long time later but who was also created by Anderson a long time before most of the History was written. This is shown by some slightly discordant elements in what he, Ayeghen, writes.

Imagine if Anderson, using Ayeghen, had written some overall commentary on the Imperial period and the Long Night similar to Hloch's commentary on the League and the Troubles.

A Second EARTH BOOK?

At the mid-point of Baen Books' The Technic Civilization Saga, Volume III, Rise Of The Terran Empire, Hloch concludes The Earth Book Of Stormgate and Donvar Ayeghen, President of the Galactic Archaeological Society, introduces an account of the Founder of the Terran Empire. Ayeghen refers to Manuel's Empire as the First so he writes at least during a Second Empire if not later. Ayeghen might have compiled an Earth Book Of Galactic Archaeology to "span, illuminate and complete" the history of the Terran Empire as Hloch had done for the Polesotechnic League period. I imagine a commentary by Ayeghen introducing a film of The Game Of Empire. See the previous post. Eventually, human civilizations spread through several spiral arms of the galaxy so that a third Earth Book would no longer be comprehensive enough. By that time, civilizations have become "post-Technic" although not post-technological.

Historical Authenticity

 

At the mid-point of The Technic Civilization Saga, Volume III, Rise Of The Terran Empire -

"Rescue on Avalon" is:

about Jack Birnam;

narrated in the third person;

written by A.A. Craig in his Tales Of The Great Frontier;

introduced by Hloch in The Earth Book Of Stormgate -

 

"The Star Planderer" is:

about Manuel Argos;

narrated in the first person by John Henry Reeves;

written either by Reeves or by a historical novelist in a document entitled Reeves' Memoirs;

introduced by Donvar Ayeghen, President of the Galactic Archaeological Society.

When originally published, "Rescue on Avalon" was not accompanied by Hloch's introduction which is our only source of information about authorship whereas "The Star Plunderer" was always introduced by Ayeghen who also discusses authorship. Hloch assures us that, although Craig's account is fictionalized, it is substantially accurate. Ayeghen reminds us that, even if the Memoirs are historical fiction, their author lived through that period and tried to give a true picture of Argos.

These layers of interpretation generate the impression of reading an authentic history.

The Saga, Volume III

The Technic Civilization Saga, Volume III, Rise Of The Terran Empire, collects six works, only three falling before the Afterword to the Earth Book and only two of those from the Earth Book itself. "Wingless," about David Falkayn's grandson and set during the colonization of the Hesperian Islands on Avalon, is written by Judith Dalmady/Lundgren whereas "Rescue on Avalon," which features an ancestor of Christopher Holm/Arinnian and is set during the colonization of the Coronan continent, is written by A. A. Craig. These two short stories, concluding the Earth Book, are preceded by Mirkheim, the last van Rijn/Falkayn/trader team novel, which has no introduction.

Hloch's Afterword to the Earth Book is immediately followed by Donvar Ayeghen's Introduction to "The Star Plunderer." Hloch completes the story of the Polesotechnic League. Ayeghen is the President of a much later Galactic Archeological Society. "The Star Plunderer" is about Manuel Argos, the Founder of the Terran Empire, which Ayeghen calls the First Empire. Thus, we have now reached the major turning point of the Technic History. Hloch lives in the period of the Terran Empire but collects stories from pre-Imperial periods. As such, he is a transitional character.

Hloch And Ayeghen

"The Star Plunderer" was published in 1952 whereas The Earth Book Of Stormgate was published twenty-six years later in 1978 yet, at the mid-point of The Technic Civilization Saga, Volume III, Rise Of The Terran Empire, published in 2011, the Earth Book Afterword, fictitiously written by Hloch of the Stormgate Choth on Avalon in the Domain of Ythri, is immediately followed by the Introduction to an extract from the Memoirs of Rear Admiral John Henry Reeves, Imperial Solar Navy. This extract is known to us as "The Star Plunderer" and its Introduction is fictitiously written by Donvar Ayeghen, the President of the Galactic Archeological Society, thus thousands of years later than the Earth Book. Works written decades apart by Poul Anderson are fitted together into a complex but coherent history. Ayeghen introduces Reeves writing about Manuel Argos, Founder of the Terran Empire. Reeves' account, like some of the Earth Book narratives, might be a fiction within the fiction and we know that we have read something solid.

Chronological Order

In fictional chronological order, "The Star Plunderer," published in September, 1952, succeeds "Rescue on Avalon," published in 1973. Therefore, these two stories are presented to be read in this order in The Technic Civilization Saga, Volume III, Rise Of The Terran Empire, published in March, 2011. The Earth Book Of Stormgate, published in 1978, closes with "Rescue on Avalon" while The Long Night, published in 1983, opens with "The Star Plunderer." Thus, to this extent at least, The Long Night reads like a sequel to the Earth Book. Otherwise, of course, there are chronological gaps in both collections.

There are two kinds of fictional introductions. Whereas Donvar Ayeghen's fictional introduction to "The Star Plunderer" is simply the opening passage of this story as originally published, other Poul Anderson stories, collected in Trader To The Stars, The Trouble Twisters and The Earth Book Of Stormgate, acquired new fictional introductions and, in the case of the Earth Book, also a single fictional afterword only when collected. Nevertheless, all of these additional passages are reproduced in the Saga. Thus, in Volume III, the Earth Book afterword, fictitiously written long after the events of "The Star Plunderer," immediately precedes Ayeghen's fictional introduction fictitiously written an even longer time afterwards. Anderson gives us not only future history but also fictional historiography.

Spans, Illuminates And Completes...II

The previous post showed that The Earth Book Of Stormgate not only spanned and completed the Polesotechnic League period of Poul Anderson's History of Technic Civilization but also applied the perspective of the post-League novel, The People Of The Wind. Thus, there were:

two League collections, starring van Rijn and Falkayn respectively;

two League novels, each starring both;

one post-League novel, featuring a direct descendant of both;

the concluding League collection, including one more novel and presented from a post-League perspective.

However, the narrative was not yet complete:

one more pre-League story was written later;

two post-League stories preceded The People Of The Wind;

the History of Technic Civilization continued for many volumes after The People Of The Wind.

Fortunately, not only the six volumes and three separate stories already mentioned but also all subsequent volumes have been fully incorporated into Baen Books' The Technic Civilization Saga, seven omnibus volumes collecting the entire History in chronological order for the first time.

The eleven works collected in Vol I, The Van Rijn Method, comprise:

the one newer story;

seven of the twelve works that had been collected in The Earth Book;

two of the three works that had been collected as The Trouble Twiters;

one of the three works that had been collected as Trader To The Stars.

Further, the previously collected stories retain their fictitious introductions from the earlier collections:

seven by Hloch of the Stormgate Choth;

one by Vance Hall commenting on Noah Arkwright;

one by Noah Arkwright;

one by Le Matelot, beginning "'The world's great age begins anew...'"

The perspective expands. The Saga is like a bigger and better Earth Book.

The seven works collected in Vol II, David Falkayn: Star Trader, comprise:

the two remaining works that had been collected in Trader To The Stars;

the one remaining work that had been collected in The Trouble Twisters;

three more from The Earth Book;

the first of the two League novels, Satan's World.

The faithfully reproduced introductions are:

a passage from the first Trader story in Vol I;
Urwain the Wide-Faring's memories of Noah Arkwright;
a passage from Percy Shelley's "Hellas";
three more from Hloch.

(Who is this guy, Noah Arkwright? Don't ask.)

The six works collected in Vol III, Rise Of The Terran Empire, are:

the second League novel, Mirkheim;
the two remaining stories from The Earth Book;

the two post-League stories mentioned earlier;
The People Of The Wind.

The introductions are:

two more - plus one conclusion - by Hloch;

one from the much later perspective of Donvar Ayeghen, President of the Galactic Archaeological Society;

one by Ayeghen's contemporary, Michael Karageorge (this time scripted not by Poul Anderson but by Saga compiler, Hank Davis).

Thus, the expanded Earth Book extends from the second story in Vol I to the third story in Vol III and the History continues for another four and a half volumes
after that.

There is in addition a perspective from right outside the fictitious history because introductions by the author, where they exist, are also included. In his introduction to "The Night Face," in Vol VII, Flandry's Legacy, Anderson informs the reader that Nicholas van Rijn, David Falkayn, Christopher Holm, Dominic Flandry and other characters lived in the past of this story.

The inclusion of Holm may be a surprise. However, Christopher's/Arinnian's role is pivotal because he is a viewpoint character in The People Of The Wind and, fictitiously, one of the authors of The Earth Book Of Stormgate.

Perspectives And Legacies

Once when I was walking at some height in the Lake District, a sudden gap in the ridge to my left revealed a landscape, a lake in the landscape, an island in the lake, a wood on the island and individual trees in the wood. Similarly, from the perspective of the great historical height provided by Hloch and Donvar Ayeghen and with our already existing knowledge of the Technic History, we can look down at the details. Hloch's Earth Book completes the story of the Polesotechnic League which includes the biographies of Nicholas van Rijn and David Falkayn. The Imperial Age introduced by Ayeghen includes the biography of Dominic Flandry. However, these most important of individuals in the Technic History need not be named when the perspective is long enough.

Van Rijn's legacies include folk tales and a planet called Vanrijn in Flandry's time. Falkayn's legacies include the Merseian Roidhunate and the biracial civilization on Avalon in Flandry's time. Flandry's legacies include New Vixen, a colony from Vixen, and Kirkasanters, descendants of exiled Aenean rebels, in the Commonalty period. And that, unfortunately, brings us to the end of the Technic History.

Francis L. Minamoto

The chronologically earliest Technic History installment, "The Saturn Game," is divided into four numbered sections, section I signed by "Francis L. Minamoto," II-IV just by "Minamoto." Francis Minamoto of Apollo University, Leyburg, Luna, is not Hloch of Stormgate Choth or Donvar Ayeghen of the Galactic Archaeological Society and indeed knows nothing of such later scholars. However, coming to our attention as recently as February, 1981, Minamoto joins Hloch and Ayeghen among the ranks of Technic historiographers.

Page 1 of Volume I of The Technic Civilization Saga consists entirely of a single-paragraph extract from Minamoto's Death Under Saturn: A Dissenting View, published by Apollo University Communications in 2057.

Under Saturn? Under the Saturnian surface? No. It will turn out that this means on a Saturnian moon with Saturn in the sky but we do not know any of that while still reading p. 1. This page informs us only that the Chronos, presumably a spaceship bound for Saturn, has encountered  some kind of tragedy, described mysteriously:

"The Chronos crossed more than an abyss, it crossed a threshold of human experience."

-Poul Anderson, "The Saturn Game" IN Anderson, The Van Rijn Method (Riverdale, NY, 2009), pp. 1-73 AT I, p. 1.

 

Encountered aliens? No. This experiential threshold will turn out to be psychological. If you have not read "The Saturn Game," then appreciate the mystery. If you have read it, then remember what it was like to read this page for the first time.

Fictional Historiography

Complicated fictional historiography reaches a crescendo at the mid-point of The Technic Civilization Saga, Volume III, Rise Of The Terran Empire. First, Hloch of the Stormgate Choth on Avalon introduces Judith Dalmady/Lundgren's account of David Falkayn's grandson, Nathaniel. Next, Hloch introduces A.A. Craig's account of Jack Birnam who, incidentally, converses with an ancestor of Daniel and Christopher Holm. Then Hloch closes The Earth Book Of Stormgate whereupon Donvar Ayeghen, President of the Galactic Archaeological Society, introduces Rear Admiral John Henry Reeves' account of Manuel Argos, Founder of that Terran Empire that was later defended by Dominic Flandry. The texts incorporate successive layers of narrative. Whereas Ayeghen's introduction was part of the Manuel Argos story, "The Star Plunderer," when originally published, Hloch's introductions and afterword were newly composed when these and other stories were collected in the Earth Book. Because the Technic History was not planned as a whole, there is unfortunately no such complicated historiography for its Imperial and post-Imperial periods but it remains a richer future history series than any other.

More About Narrative Layers

John Henry Reeves is not only the viewpoint character but also the first person narrator of "The Star Plunderer." Thus, although this story is principally about Manuel Argos, we see Argos only as perceived by Reeves. Because of the scientific basis of sf, a matter that would have been just a personal drama in any other fiction is explained scientifically. The heroine breaks off her engagement to Reeves in favour of Argos:

"It was instinct... A strong and vital woman would pick the most suitable mate. She couldn't help herself. It was the race within her..."

-Poul Anderson, "The Star Plunderer" IN Anderson, Rise Of The Terran Empire (Riverdale, NY, March 2011), pp. 325-362 AT p. 362.

Sf is about genes as well as spaceships. Here the human race, united but now in conflict with other intelligent species, confronts the universe. Later, during the Imperial period, Philippe Rochefort thinks:

"Man is my race."

-Poul Anderson, The People Of The Wind IN Rise Of The Terran Empire, pp. 437-662 AT p. 487.

It is Donvar Ayeghen who informs us that "The Star Plunderer" is Chapter V of Reeves' Memoirs or at least of an originally unpublished document with that title that might be historical fiction. Ayeghen refers to the Terran Empire as the First Empire. Thus, he writes long after Dominic Flandry's lifetime. Readers might experience temporal vertigo.

Nat Falkayn is the viewpoint character although not the narrator of "Wingless." The story is a third person narrative. It is Hloch who informs us that Emil Dalmady's daughter wrote it for an Avalonian periodical, Morgana. Thus, this was not known by readers of the story on its original publication. The Technic History deepens as it develops.

History And Historiography

Poul Anderson's Technic History is dynamic because, in my perception at least, it keeps jumping back and forth between its two reading orders. After The Trouble Twisters, Part III, "The Trouble Twisters," the two parallel narratives are represented by "The Day of Burning," a trader team novella that does not mention van Rijn, and by "The Master Key," a novella in which van Rijn remains in his lounger in the Winged Cross in Chicago Integrate while solving a mystery on an extra-solar planet. After that, the two narratives of the trader team and of van Rijn merge in Satan's World, "Lodestar" and Mirkheim which brings us to the end of the Polesotechnic League section of the Technic History. But, of course, in the original reading order, we pass directly from The Trouble Twisters to Satan's World. The later collection, The Earth Book of Stormgate, performs a "Now it can be told" role by informing us, e.g., about Adzel's student days on Earth in "How To Be Ethnic In One Easy Lesson," what Falkayn did on Merseia in "Day of Burning" and how van Rijn came to Mirkheim in "Lodestar." That these stories, whether read in the Earth Book or in The Technic Civilization Saga, are introduced by Hloch, an Ythrian living centuries later on Falkayn's colony planet, Avalon, adds a deeper historical perspective. We read both future history and fictional historiography. At the midpoint of The Technic Civilization, Volume III, Rise of the Terran Empire, Hloch of Stormgate Choth signs off and is immediately followed by Donvar Ayeghen, President of the Galactic Archaeological Society. However, Ayeghen had introduced "The Star Plunderer" when it was originally published in Planet Stories whereas Hloch's introductions and afterword are an extra, extremely dense, narrative layer added in the Earth Book collection. The Technic History was not planned but grew like that.

Multiple Authors And Editors

The Technic Civilization Saga, Volume III, Rise of the Terran Empire, opens with Mirkheim and closes with The People of the Wind. Neither novel is introduced although their contents definitely locate them within Poul Anderson's Technic History. Between the two novels are four short stories, the first and second introduced by Hloch, Compiler of The Earth Book of Stormgate, the third and fourth by future scholars.

Hloch introduces one story written by Judith Dalmady/Lundgren for the periodical, Morgana, and a second by A.A. Craig in his Tales of the Great Frontier.

Donvar Ayeghen, President of the Galactic Archaeological Society, introduces an extract from the Memoirs of Rear Admiral John Henry Reeves, Imperial Solar Navy. Michael Karageorge, a contemporary of Ayeghen, introduces an anonymous document of dubious authenticity. (Behind Karageorge is not Poul Anderson but Hank Davis, Compiler of The Technic Civilization Saga!)

My only point here is that this is a very persuasive volume of future history with multiple authors, editors and perspectives. It could not possibly have been written as a unity but instead grew organically together with the rest of the Technic History. The fictional future historiography reaches its peak and pinnacle in this pivotal volume.