"One thing is certain..."

"Oh, come with old Khayyam and leave the Wise
"To talk; one thing is certain, that Life flies;
"One thing is certain, and the Rest is Lies;
"The flower that once has blown forever dies."
-copied from here.

Ok. Ferune quoted the Rubaiyat here so now the blog is quoting it and this gives us yet another link to Neil Gaiman. Volume One of Gaiman's Black Orchid is entitled "One Thing Is Certain." See here.

Although Khayyam says, "Leave the wise...," I think that he sounds wise. Fitzgerald's translation of the Rubaiyat reminds me of Flecker's poetry.

In haste, between family activities.

Descartes

Looks supercilious?

We have discussed philosophers, including Descartes. See Philosophy And SF here. However, I am at a loss for the meaning of the following passage. Joelle the holothete thinks:

"I dare not admit Descartes (as a maker of symbols which have no more scientific meaning left in them than does the Day of Judgment) was wrong."
-Poul Anderson, The Avatar, XXXIII, p. 286.

Joelle did make at least one earlier reference to Descartes. Maybe, if I find and reread that, then it will shed some light on this? Although I am immersed in the text, it remains a vast unknown realm.

Looking for the earlier Descartes reference, I am reminded that the linker, Eric, quotes from the Rubaiyat (scroll down):

"Why, if the Soul can fling the Dust aside..." (XXIII, p. 203)

I should have referred to that earlier. We might some time pull together all the Rubaiyat quotations and references.

The Throne Of Saturn

Up from Earth’s Centre through the Seventh Gate
I rose, and on the Throne of Saturn sate,
And many Knots unravel’d by the Road;
But not the Master-Knot of Human Fate.
-copied from here.

Marginally sfnal because of the reference to Saturn. Nominally linked to Poul Anderson's "The Saturn Game."

Does the poem refer to the planet or the god? There was a time before that distinction had been made. But I think that maybe in this case the name "Saturn" is an addition by the translator, Fitzgerald, rather than part of the Persian original?

It has been fascinating in recent posts to detour into the Rubaiyat and into a speculative time travel scenario but it is nearly time to rejoin Poul Anderson's The People Of The Wind where we left the Terran Imperial Space Navy attacking the planet Avalon.

Ferune Of Mistwood

In a recent post, I remarked that Ferune of Mistwood, an Ythrian, read Terran classics in three languages and that he quoted from both the Bible and the Rubaiyat. I said then that we would like to hear more from Ferune and we do hear a little more. Having returned from the battle in space dying of radiation poisoning, he is to be succeeded as First Marchwarden by his colleague, Daniel Holm, and as Wyvan of Mistwood by a fellow Ythrian.

When Holm blames himself for his friend's death, Ferune gives us another splendid example of "bird talk":

"'Come off that perch, Daniel Holm.'"
-Poul Anderson, Rise Of The Terran Empire (New York, 2011), p. 2011.

- then continues as an uncompromising Ythrian:

"'If I thought you really blame yourself, I would not have left you in office - probably not alive; anyone that stupid would be dangerous. You were executing my plan, and bloody-gut well it worked too, kh'hung?'" (ibid.)

He says that he would have cried Oherran. This is characteristic of him - whereas Holm's response is not in character for the new First Marchwarden:

"Holm knelt and laid his head on [Ferune's] keelbone." (ibid.)

Ferune enfolds and kisses Holm and says:

"'I flew higher because of you...If war allows, honor us by coming to my rite. Fair winds forever.'" (ibid.)

When Ferune is dead, we hear from him one more time because Holm quotes him. The President of the Parliament of Man, favoring accommodation with the Terran Empire, says that "'...the winds of change are blowing.'" (p. 567) Holm replies:

"'I understand that's a mighty old phrase...Ferune had one still older that he liked to quote. How'd it go? "- their finest hour -"'" (ibid.)

So Holm quotes Ferune quoting Churchill - who, by the way, makes it into the Old Phoenix, as does Nicholas van Rijn.

Lastly, we should quote the new Wyvan as he addresses the dead Ferune in the words of the New Faith:

"'High flew your spirit on many winds...'" (p. 559)

(More "bird" language.)

"'...but downward upon you at last came winging God the Hunter. You met Him in pride, you fought Him well, from you He has honor.'" (ibid.)

(For an Ythrian of the New Faith, this is the best possible death, requiring no hereafter to complete or redeem it.)

"'Go hence now, that which the talons left, be water and leaves, arise in the wind; and spirit be always remembered.'" (ibid.)

(What had been Ferune returns to the environment. The spirit which flew high and will be always remembered was the person who is gone, not a separate entity continuing after the death of the body.)

"His sons tilted the litter. The body fell, and after it the torches." (ibid.)

Ferune's widow leads the sky dance.

The Greath Khruath

The People Of The Wind, XI.

The Great Khruath meets electronically. Liaw presides from outside David Falkayn's house on First Island in the Hesperian Sea. Two million individuals are connected, including those elected at regional meetings and those who have expressed a wish to speak. Inside the house, staff filter questions and comments. Chosen speakers must wait.

Arinnian, chief of the West Coronan guard, reports that cooperation with the North Oronesians is being extended through the rest of the archipelago and that the next step will be to extend south and east until an integrated command for the Brendan's, Fiery and Shielding Islands protects the entire Coronan perimeter. Poul Anderson's texts might provide enough information for someone to draw a map. Speaking for his father, the First Marchwarden, Arinnian points out that the Equatorian continent is protected only by "'...some projector and missile launching sites.'" (p. 563) In fact, Ythri had insisted on isolating Eqatoria because its centaurs have started to use pieces of stone and bone as tools. Knowing that this continent is uninhabited by Avalonians, the Terrans might invade there. This is an important plot point.

After six hours, 83% vote to continue resistance. Arinnian had called for more part-time volunteers and Eyath offers to be his assistant. Knowledge and skills can be electro-crammed. We know, although she does not yet, that her fiancee, Vodan, was killed by friendly fire when the planet-based Avalonian defense network struck the Terran fleet.

Matthew Vickery, Preident of The Parliament of Man, predicts to Daniel Holm that the Parliament will vote for emergency powers and virtual suspension of civilian government. Holm quotes Ferune quoting Churchill. The Bible, the Rubaiyat and Churchill are the three Terran works quoted by Ferune. Arinnian, who has translated from Planha into Anglic, would be able to quote Ythrian works.

O Moon Of My Delight

Ferune is one scholar of Terran literature and not just the Bible. Seeing Morgana coming around the dark side of Avalon, he quotes:

"'O moon of my delight that knows no wane -'" (Rise Of The Terran Empire, p. 526) (See here)

Ah, Moon of my Delight who know’st no wane,
The Moon of Heav’n is rising once again:
How oft hereafter rising shall she look
Through this same Garden after me — in vain!
-copied from here.

The Moon will look for "me" in vain either because I am dead or because my old self has ended. The Moon who know'st no wane is the Absolute or Eternal.

We read the Rubaiyat in English translation. I imagine that Ferune has read it in Anglic translation rather than in the original Persian?

Timelines And Titles

I want to write something about the relationship between alternative history fiction and "real history" fiction but find that I have already done so. See Fictional Timelines.

A title serves the useful purpose of labeling a literary work. They might just have been numbered, e.g., "Poul Anderson's Novels, No. 1" etc. An earlier convention was just to name a work after its opening phrase which thus became a title.

Do we think about the meaning of a title?

Does Plato's Republic describe a republic?
Is Dante's Comedy a comedy?
Who is CS Lewis' The Great Divorce between? (Heaven and Hell.)
The orbit in Poul Anderson's Orbit Unlimited is a mere twenty light years.
Why A Circus Of Hells?
Why Theater Of Spies?
Should a future translation of the Rubaiyat be entitled Quatrains?
Stieg Larsson's Man Som Hatar Kvinnor ("Men Who Hate Women") was translated as The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo.

Usually we just use the title to refer to the book and do not think about what it means.

Sultan After Sultan

Think, in this batter’d Caravanserai
Whose Doorways are alternate Night and Day,
How Sultan after Sultan with his Pomp
Abode his Hour or two and went his way.
-copied from here.

(We might get through the entire Rubaiyat eventually.)

Nights and days are squares on a chequer-board or doorways.

Poul Anderson shows us the Roman Empire, the Terran Empire, in fact several Terran Emperors, then a time when it is said:

"'...the League, the troubles, the Empire, its fall, the Long Night...every such thing - behind us. In space and time alike.'" (Flandry's Legacy, p. 722)

In space: Old Earth is "...in the spiral arm behind this one..." (p. 713) In time: Anglic is an ancient language. (p. 715)

How better to show that Sultan after Sultan abides his hour, then goes his way, than by writing a future history series with several installments set in an Imperial period and other installments set centuries or millennia later? Despite the title of this omnibus volume, the name of the Imperialist Flandry is not mentioned in any of the post-Imperial installments. Descendants of one group of his enemies are discovered but their original name is not remembered either.

"Abode his hour or two and went his way."

I want to check some details about Ythri but maybe not at this time of night, having just returned from a friend's seventieth birthday party.

"Beside Me Singing"

See "Would God I Were..."

We have copied from the Rubaiyat before. I am now typing above the stanza that I have copied in this post because, having copied it, the laptop will not let me type below it. A Maths teacher at school told us that the "Thou beside me..." was not a person but some kind of mathematical table.

"Beside me singing in the wilderness."

A BOOK of Verses underneath the Bough,
A Jug of Wine, a Loaf of Bread—and Thou
Beside me singing in the Wilderness—
O, Wilderness were Paradise enow!		-copied from here.

Quotations

Ferune read three Terran languages and quoted the Bible, the Rubaiyat and a Winston Churchill speech:

"'"...their finest hour..."'" (Rise Of The Terran Empire, p. 567)

These quotations are probably in Anglic translation rather than in Hebrew, Persian or English - or, as van Rijn calls it, Old Anglic! Did Ferune quote any Shakespeare? How much Shakespeare is quoted in Poul Anderson's works? Here is one example. Merau Varagan compares the exile planet to:

"'That undiscovered country from whose bourn No traveler returns.'"
-Poul Anderson, The Shield Of Time (New York, 1991), p. 43.

This is Hamlet's description of death and provided a title for a Star Trek film. Shakespearean influence is all-pervasive.

New York After The Change

Poul Anderson, Brain Wave (London, 1977).

New York is protected from missile attack by a force field.

The prophet of the Third Ba'al has been captured.

Gang war between Portmen and Dynapsychists has been suppressed.

 
At night, the city is dark with few vehicles or pedestrians.

A cafe interior is illuminated by a blue twilight generated by a new principle of fluorescence.

Tables are arranged in a spiral minimizing the distance from dining room to kitchen.

A wheeled machine extends a slate and stylus for orders, then serves food.

There is still a food shortage and little meat.

Previously famous musicians play in the orchestra.

There are some new musical instruments, no conductor and a new form of music.

Customers are from different social groups, now equal, starting afresh.

Corinth now thinks that the Rubaiyat is childish!

Corinth's and Helga's communication is mainly non-verbal, shown in brackets.

This description conveys both that the general level of intelligence has increased and that there was a time of troubles but it has passed. The novel has moved from the present day (at the time of publication) into a future that is different from any of Poul Anderson's other fictitious futures. Not the world but its inhabitants have changed.