Exploring The Center Of The Cloud Universe

Copied from Poul Anderson Appreciation, 26 Nov 2014.

Jaccavrie identifies and approaches a star of a particular type;

Laure descends in his sled to the surface of an orbiting airless body while Jaccavrie hovers directly above;

Laure takes analytical readings and mineral samples and observes the larger bodies from a distance;

they repeat this procedure for different stellar types;

because of the radiation levels, he finds no life;

next, he plans to measure element distribution on the surface of a planet with an atmosphere even though the air will impede visual contact and the charged ionosphere will prevent radio contact;

spectra, spots, flares, prominences and coronas indicate surface turbulence on the stars in the Cloud Universe;

however, infalling matter continually changing their already unusual compositions makes their cores also violently variable;

a nova-like outburst from the sun "...might be akin to the Wolf-Rayet phenomenon..." (Flandry's Legacy, p. 781);

either the increased irradiation triggers a cyclone or the conductive dust transfers energy into a vortex or something else happens;

the sudden wind wrecks Laure's sled.

Flandry's Deductions About Nyanza

Copied from Poul Anderson Appreciation, 28 Nov 2014:

Dominic Flandry:

travels five parsecs from Brae to Nyanza in a high-speed flitter;

lands at a spaceport of grav-grid, field and buildings with forest to west and south, a small ancient city to the east and a cloudless sky above blue ocean to the north;

is flown to the resident's mansion in an aircar by the Portmaster;

from the air, sees steep narrow streets of native stone with many pedestrians but few vehicles and busy modern docks where -

- a majority of sailing ships implies a leisurely, aesthetic life-style;
but their hydrodynamic design implies appreciation of efficiency;
sea-water processors, factories and sea weed delivered to a plastics plant imply that most Nyanzans harvest the ocean and trade with this one island for industrial products and technology.

The widow of the murdered resident is an Ayres of Antarctica. Thus, that Terrestrial continent is occupied in the Imperial period. I seem to remember something about the urbanization of Antarctica in the Psychotechnic History? 

Details On Nyanza

Copied from Poul Anderson Appreciation, 29 July 2014:

(This is the 150th post this month so possibly the last until next month.)

I missed certain details on previous readings of "The Game of Glory" by Poul Anderson.

Marker lights were:

"...color-coded for depth so that all Jairnovaunt was one great jewelbox..."
-Poul Anderson, Captain Flandry: Defender Of The Terran Empire (New York, 2010), p. 326.

This is both neat and plausible: not only marker lights above tidally submerged buildings but also color-coding for depth and the visual impression that this would generate.

Air-locked buildings are alternately below or just above the ocean surface. At low tide, Nyanzans swim, guided by buoys, between buildings on rocks. At high tide, they swim down to, up from or between submerged buildings wearing aqualungs. Between cities and countries, they travel in sail boats and also have submarines. Thus, their entire lives are spent in, on, above or under water. We knew that but what does it imply about their deaths? When Dominic Flandry tells John Umbolu that his son, Tom, died in combat on another planet:

"'Drowning is the single decent death,' whispered the Nyanzan. 'My other children, all but Derek, had that much luck.'" (p. 325)

How many Nyanzans die by drowning? How many children has John Umbolu lost? A warrior culture would see death in combat as the best. Since drowning is the single greatest hazard to Nyanzans, they accept it and regard it as "...the single decent death..." We are not told whether they have their equivalent of Fiddler's Green or Aegir's Hall.

On Kirkasant

Copied from Poul Anderson Appreciation, 25 Nov 2014.

The Kirkasanter crew are of the Hoborkan clan and speak its tongue. Reyad is the need to search, to hunt, to find the new or to be alone in wild places. The crew are fifteen men and five women. Women are included because they are better at some jobs but every woman is accompanied by an older male relative!

Kirkasanters are instinctively, not culturally, motivated to have children and will not limit their population in any circumstances. With an initially small population in a hostile, radioactive environment, the race survived only by reproducing as much as possible, helped by mutations. The Hoborkans initially refuse to give cell samples for chromosome analysis because this would violate the body which is the citadel of the ego. This attitude hinders medicine but encourages dignity and self-reliance.

Graydal tells Laure that, on Kirkasant, they will:

watch the sunset in the Rainbow Desert, followed by the bright night with auroras;
see flying flocks rise from dawn mists over salt marshes;
stand on the battlements of Ey beneath the banners of knights who "'...rid the land of firearms...'" (Flandry's Legacy, p. 748);
watch dances welcoming the new year.

I am not sure what is meant by ridding the land of firearms - Graydal carries a gun - and, of course, I do not remember noticing this phrase before I started to summarize information about Kirkasant. Graydal also wears a uniform, a practice that has become obsolete in the Commonalty civilization.

Serieve II

Copied from Poul Anderson Appreciation, 25 Nov 2014:

In the region of space where the planet Serieve has been colonized, stars are an average of four parsecs apart whereas Sol and Proxima Centauri are about 4.24 light years apart. Since one parsec is about 3.26 light years, this is a big difference. In the Serievan region, stars are just over 13 light years apart.

The thin interstellar medium has not been greatly enriched by earlier stellar generations. Local systems, including that of Serieve's sun, are poor in heavy metals. Hence, the extraction of minerals from ocean currents in the arctic waters around Pelogard.

Laure, who feels young and awkward, just as Falkayn had been conscious of still being only a journeyman, is annoyed when Vandage patronizingly lectures him about:

"'The interstellar medium from which stars form...'" (Flandry's Legacy, p. 720) -

- but, of course, what is really happening here is that the author is ensuring that his readers understand the cosmological context. It is not possible to tell Laure that.

Imagine living not in the northern hemisphere of Earth but near the northern verge of another spiral arm with only the galactic halo beyond; also working in an office high in a tower of Pelogard with automated extractor plants visible down at the waterfront; and knowing that, beyond the nearby Dragon's Head Nebula where human beings are barely beginning to explore, lies the unknown.

Serieve

Copied from Poul Anderson Appreciation, 25 Nov 2014:

When human beings colonize a planet, they spread across its surface and therefore build low. When the planetary population has become considerably larger, then they:

build higher;
preserve wilderness areas;
discourage procreation;
encourage emigration.

At least, these generalizations apply to the civilization served by the Commonalty - although they seem to make sense for most interstellar colonists? (We were told earlier in Poul Anderson's History of Technic Civilization that the Gorzuni spread their dwellings underground, regarding the planet as a Mother.)

The narrator of Anderson's "Starfog" refers to "...our race..." and to "...our own culture..." and mentions something of what "We know..." about "...other branches of humanity..." (Flandry's Legacy, p. 718). Thus, this narrator is not able to give us an overview of the two or three spiral arms that have been humanly colonized. Maybe Donvar Ayeghen, President of the Galactic Archaeological Society, who commented on the much earlier Terran Empire, would have been able to do so.

Despite the usual practice of building low, the Serievan city, Pelograd, is on an island where minerals can be extracted from sea water and is therefore built high. From an office high in a tower, Laure looks down across metal, concrete, glass and plastic buildings linked by trafficways and freight cables to the automated extractor plants, warehouses, sky-docks and cargo craft at the waterfront.

Serieve is near the northern edge of the spiral arm and the galactic halo of thin dust and widely scattered ancient globular clusters. Do any explorers venture out into intergalactic space?

Trillia

Copied from Poul Anderson Appreciation, 13 Nov 2014:

In Lenidel, the principal nation on the planet Trillia, most cities are spread through a large forest and park. The city of Annanna has two million busy inhabitants, with perhaps three aircraft visible at once. Pedestrians and cyclists proceed along The Pathway Of The Beautiful Blossoms And The Bridge That Arches Like A Note Of Music.

Number 1337 on The Pathway Of The Beautiful Blossoms And The Bridge That Arches Like A Note Of Music has, over an otherwise doorless entrance, spicy-smelling, sunlight-trapping flowering vines. The interior has a wooden floor, stools and an intricately faceted rock crystal. The occupant, Witweet, reads poetry and addresses a visitor with endearments, offering Lapsang Souchong and sweet cakes. There is occasional trade with the Polesotechnic League and the Trillians, like the Merseians, have bought tea. Trillians can sell arts and crafts but, lacking the means to buy modern technology, are developing it themselves. I do not think that Trillia will need to join the Supermetals Company.

Around number 1337 are colorful flowers, red tree trunks, bright fluttering wings and the distant sound of The Waterfall That Rings Like Glass Bells. An armed Terran whose vocalizer transforms his speech into song knows that to omit honorifics and circumlocutions without apology is to issue a deadly insult.

Avalon appears in three short stories and one novel whereas Trillia is mentioned and described in just this single short story, "A Little Knowledge." Nevertheless, it is yet another colorful alien environment imagined in detail by Poul Anderson.