The Audience Chamber Of Castle Afon

Copied from Poul Anderson Appreciation, 17 September 2016:

Centuries apart, both David Falkayn and Max Abrams stand in the audience chamber of Castle Afon in Ardaig on Merseia. Falkayn is Nicholas van Rijn's protege and Abrams is Dominic Flandry's mentor.

Falkayn sees:

a high, gaunt, echoing chamber of unhuman proportions;
woven tapestries on stone walls;
windows arched at top and bottom;
battle banners hanging from rafters;
a hearth with a fire big enough to roast an elephant;
armored, demon-masked troopers lining the hall, bearing curved swords, barbed pikes and guns;
the Hand of the Vach Dathyr in orange robes and horned miter.

Abrams sees:

long, flagged floor;
high walls;
narrow windows arched at top and bottom;
sawtoothed vaulting;
proportions wrong by Terran criteria but not here;
demonic mask helmets on suits of armor;
faded tapestries;
rustling battle banners;
unhuman symbology;
a dragon carved in black wood;
the black-robed Hand of the Vach Ynvory lifting a spear and crashing it down in salute.

Some of us might remember James Blish's Jack Loftus in the audience room of the Hegemon of Malis (here).

Distance And Giganticism

Copied from Poul Anderson Appreciation, 1 September 2016:

In this post, we compare and contrast an adult fantasy novel with a juvenile sf novel:

Poul Anderson, Three Hearts And Three Lions (London, 1977);
James Blish, Mission To The Heart Stars (London, 1980).

(When referring to CS Lewis, we found an accidental "Lion" theme in the titles. With Blish, there is an accidental "Heart" theme.)

Distance
Anderson's Holger Carlsen has been transported from our Earth or one like it to a mythological Earth where a demon says that:

"'...ye are from far away, so far that a man might travel till Judgment Day and not reach your home.'" (Three Hearts..., Chapter Two, p. 22)

- and, after arriving in that distant world, Holger must make a long journey by horseback into Faerie.

Blish's Jack Loftus and his companions take well over two years at faster than light speeds to reach the galactic Heart Stars. Thus, Jack travels not only to the galactic center but also into adulthood: a rite of passage story.

Giganticism
Invited to dinner, Holger enters:

"...a chamber so huge he could scarcely see the end or the ceiling." (Three Hearts..., Chapter Seven, p. 45)

They dance in an even larger chamber.

The Heart Stars confederation is called the Hegemony of Malis. When Jack enters the Hegemon's audience room:

he compares it to the Hall of the Mountain King;
it is of stone and artificially lit;
its ceiling cannot be seen;
Jack feels that there might be clouds beneath the ceiling;
it is like the universe's biggest cathedral although not cathedral-like in atmosphere;
many unidentifiable machines, all dissimilar, are spaced along its walls;
the place is uncluttered, austere and built to last, away from earthquake zones;
the Hegemon is over eight feet tall, blocky, powerful, granite-colored, facially resembling an Easter Island statue and wearing an undecorated black tunic with bare arms and legs;
although Earth has made an alliance with the immortal Star Dwellers, who are capable of collapsing galaxies, the Hegemon's machines predict that the Dwellers will not intervene if the Hegemony forcibly annexes Earth;
he so orders.

In The Hall Of The Mountain-King, Whether On Earth Or On Merseia

Copied from Poul Anderson Appreciation, 28 June 2916:

The hall of troll-king Illrede:

in a mountain cave;
vast;
hewn out of rock;
stolen gems and tapestries on the walls;
expensive goblets and cloths on ebony and ivory tables;
fires burning down the length;
rich garments on troll lords and ladies;
elf, dwarf and goblin thralls carrying trenchers of human, Faerie and animal meat and cups of southern wine;
snarling music;
smoky air;
ruddy light;
guards, "...moveless as heathen idols...," (The Broken Sword, p. 64) with glinting spears;
gobbling, guzzling, quarrelling trolls;
a thunderous din;
quiet lords in carven seats;
Illrede, fat and wrinkled, with long green tendrils for a beard and wearing a gold crown.

Colorful, barbaric and vividly imagined. Since trolls are large, green, humanoid and hostile, comparisons with Poul Anderson's alien Merseians are inevitable. In the audience chamber of Castle Afon:

"The mask helmets on suits of armor grinned like demons. The pattern of faded tapestries and rustling battle banners held no human symbology. For this was Old Wilwidh, before the machine came to impose universal sameness. It was the well-spring of Merseia. You had to see a place like this if you would understand, in your bones, that Merseains would never be kin to you." (Young Flandry, p. 141)

Haven

Haven is the second moon of Cat's Eye, which is a gas giant of 1.3 Jovian masses and the fourth planet in the system of the G2 star, Byers. Radiation from Cat's Eye, not from Byers, makes Haven marginally habitable.

Haven:

is tidally locked but on the Mercurian, not the Lunar, model;

is smaller than Earth with a thinner atmosphere;

has -

great seismic activity because of its proximity to Cat's Eye,
high rocky mountains,
deep valleys,
one almost comfortable valley, Shangri-La, near the equator,
terrestroid biochemistries but dangerous native organisms,
been inhospitable to seeded Terrestrial organisms;

was created by Jerry Pournelle but Poul Anderson wrote one story set there.

Aeneas

Copied from Poul Anderson Appreciation, 6 Mar 2016:

The text of this post is copied from here.

..a complicated colonial society. Seven centuries earlier, scientists wanting to study the unusual natives of the planet Dido which is unsuitable for human habitation colonized another planet in the same system, Aeneas, where they established a University that attracts human and non-human students from other systems. Survival in the sparse Aenean environment required cultivation of large land areas with both native and imported plants and animals. Horses and green six-legged stathas were imported as transport animals. During the Troubles, “Landfolk” relationships became semi-feudal and the University incorporated military training into its curriculum. Near the main University campus is a statue of Brian McCormac who cast out nonhuman invaders.

Later immigrants seeking a refuge or a new start are excluded from the tri-cameral legislature by a property qualification for the franchise but form subcultures: tinerans, Riverfolk, Orcans and highlanders. Orcans guard ruins left by space-traveling “Ancients.” “Lucks,” small pets kept in Tinerans’ caravans, are telepathic parasites left by the Ancients. Most Townfolk, belonging to ancient guilds, identify with scientists and squires. However, industrialization in the urban area known as the Web has produced manufacturers, merchants and managers whose interests are closer to those of the Empire which forcibly annexed Aeneas after the Troubles and re-occupied it after Hugh McCormac’s rebellion. Chunderban Desai, High Commissioner of the Virgilian system, consults Thane of the University and Jowett of the Web about McCormac’s Landfolk nephew who will inherit tri-cameral Speakership but meanwhile attacks Imperial troops, then hides among tinerans before traveling with Riverfolk to meet the new Orcan prophet.

I summarize Aenean society in order to convey the richness of detail in Anderson’s fictitious planets.

Imhotep

Copied from Poul Anderson Appreciation, 7 Feb '15.

Diana Crowfeather is "...everybody's friend..." (Flandry's Legacy, p. 196) just as Kim is "'...The Friend of all the World...'" (Kim, p. 6).

The city of Olga's Landing on the planet Imhotep in the Patrician System began as an exploration base. Guns in the tower of St Barbara provided defense against stampeding ice bull herds and later against human beings during the Troubles but now the disarmed tower, sunseeker vine clambering up its crumbling yellow stone, stands in the middle of a market square in the old quarter.

From the tower, Diana sees the new sector with industries, hotels, apartments, the Institute and the Pyramid housing Imperial offices but she prefers the old quarter with its:

"...brawling, polyglot, multiracial population, much of it transient, drifting in and out on the tides of space." (ibid.)

Imhotep seems as real as Kipling's India.

At Mirkheim And Its Sun

Copied from Poul Anderson Appreciation, 13 Jan '15:

What sun? It exploded. Yes. However, a nova or supernova always leaves a remnant. Mirkheim is the remnant, the blasted core, of a companion planet too large to have been entirely vaporized or disintegrated by the stellar explosion. Similarly, the supernova itself left a remnant, imperceptibly shrinking towards black hole status. Thus, two unusual heavenly bodies still orbit in close proximity. Coya Conyon says that they had originated as a double stellar system, not as a star with a planetary system.

The stellar remnant is six Solar masses compressed into one Terrestrial volume. Therefore, it "...has stupendous gravitational power..." (David Falkayn: Star Trader, p. 676) which warps space so that "...the laws of nature take on an eerie aspect." (ibid.) Anderson does not elaborate although readers of popular science and science fiction have learned that spatial distortions affect time and matter in counter-intuitive ways described by Einstein, not by Newton or by common sense. (Common sense generalizes our experience on a macroscopic scale but at sub-relativistic velocities.)

Secondly, the fantastically rapid spin of a dwarf star also "...generates relativistic forces, describable only if you have determined the precise quantities involved." (ibid.) Thirdly (I think that this is a separate point), pulsations usually found only inside atomic nuclei stretch across interplanetary distances. Fourthly, as with any star, there is radiation although this is comparatively easy to guard against, dim visible light but lurid gamma and X-rays.

The Ythrian spaceship, Dewfall, chartered by Nicholas van Rijn, finds the sun - so small as to be undetectable except within a few parsecs but van Rijn had known where to look. Maximum photoamplification reveals a white spark but makes other stars painfully brilliant. Expensive equipment installed by van Rijn detects the light-bending due to a sub-stellar object between forty and fifty astronomical units from the star. To establish its position, they need a long baseline which would take weeks at sublight speeds. However, Dewfall's engines are well-tuned enough to use hyperdrive even this deep in a gravity well.

As Dewfall approaches Mirkheim, three Supermetals warships move to intercept and block escape. The Ythrian ship's approach has been observed. Relative speeds and distances are such that one ship can engage until the others arrive. They intend to detain crew and passengers but will fire if Dewfall attempts to escape. Having come prepared, van Rijn takes charge and accelerates on negagrav back towards the sun. No enemy missiles can accelerate fast enough "...to get past defensive fire..." (p. 675) Dewfall goes hyper, though not at full speed, and reverts to normal state when nearly at the sun but still continues toward, then around, it. Prior computations ordered by van Rijn and readings taken by Coya as they approached the sun are in the data banks. Now Coya inserts current data that enable van Rijn and Hirharouk to steer. Commodore Nadi of Supermetals can neither pursue nor predict where his enemy will emerge.

The Ythrian beats his wings while the man kneels in prayer. They must cope with a meteoroid swarm and a plasma cloud but:

"They won past reef and riptide..." (p. 677)

I have found it rewarding to summarize other battles in space. See here and here.