5. Poul Anderson Discussion

[Philip Overby]

Number 5 from the "list" is Poul Anderson. Here's another sadly I haven't read, but have heard good things about. He's won seven Hugos and three Nebulas over the years. I remember seeing loads of his sci-fi books in Barnes and Nobles when I was younger, but never being much of a sci-fi guy, I didn't pick them up. I'm interested to hear about both his fantasy and sci-fi fiction.

Any thoughts on Poul Anderson?

 

[Steerpike]

Poul Anderson is excellent. Wrote some of the most interesting classic science fiction, both as novels and short stories. Love it.

 

[Philip Overby]

Any recommendations to start with? Either a novel or short story collection?

 

[Feo Takahari]

My Poul Anderson story:

I don't remember exactly how I got my hands on it (most likely, I got it from my grandfather's vast sci-fi collection), but there were quite a few stories in the anthology Mind to Mind that made me sit back and go "Wow!" The most amazing to me was Anderson's "Journey's End", the ending of which was both shocking and absolutely perfect. I was very young at that time, and my parents didn't allow me to check out library books that weren't specifically intended for children, but I made sure to remember Anderson's name for when I was old enough to seek him out.

A few years later, I went into the library, looked under A, and found a vast selection of his books. The one that kept being mentioned was Operation Chaos--as in, "By the author of Operation Chaos"--so I checked it out and set to reading. It was tripe.

It's not that the author didn't do anything new--this was a story from the '70s, after all. It's that the author didn't do anything at all. The characters were basic archetypes with no meaningful twists or even depth. The world was kitchen-sink fantasy, distinguished by the presence of modern technology, but with only brief and largely inconsequential insight into how those would interact. It simply didn't feel like the story had a reason to exist.

I've tried reading a couple of other Anderson stories, but none of them really spoke to me (though I understand some people really, really like The High Crusade.) I remember him whenever I start to get my hopes up about a new author.

(I hope you keep doing these, Phil. I thought of trying to do them when I thought you'd given up on them, but way too many of mine would end with "I didn't really like it" or "It wasn't really my thing." I feel like these threads need to be guided by someone more enthusiastic than me.)

 

[Steerpike]

Hmmmm. Good question, Phil. Can be hit or miss. I liked the Vault of Ages and Brain Wave. Both were written in the 50s, so that into account. There are some good stories in And the Gods laughed. The Boat of a Million Years was good. I'd have to look through my books to recommend more titles.

 

[Philip Overby]

@Feo: Yeah, I plan to keep doing them at least once a week. I was sick last week, so that's why I wasn't posting as much.

It's good to hear insight from various people about these authors, so positive or negative feedback is fine either way. These made a Top 100 list, so there must be something to their work. I wouldn't say that list was exhaustive or definitive by any means, but it gives us something to talk about.

@Steerpike: It seems like I'd be more interested in his short stories. So any collection would be cool.

 

[TWErvin2]

Two novels I read by Poul Anderson were Three Hearts and Three Lions and The Broken Sword. I even have recently obtained an audiobook version of The Broken Sword.

They're going to be a little different than fantasy today, not quite 'classic' but good reads.

 

[Ophiucha]

I adore Three Hearts and Three Lions, which was the first book of his I read. I have a fondness for older fantasy and science fiction, where you can see the origin of tropes that are now almost cliché. The troll that is in this story has been quite influential on all trolls to feature in fantasy since, for instance. I also like how, though it does play with the Arthurian myths, that this uses the French medieval mythology quite a bit. King Arthur and Merlin are interesting characters, but there was a lot of medieval mythology that is neglected in modern fantasy. /medieval studies major. There are a bunch of Cold War parallels, too, which is probably my favourite period of modern history. The writing style is a bit outdated, but it does have the luxury of being relatively free of Tolkien's influence, so it can be surprisingly refreshing in that regard.

I have also read The Broken Sword and Tau Zero. The former is more in line with the sorts of Conan the Barbarian types that were popular, or the later stories by Moorcock. Which isn't bad, but isn't quite as interesting to me. I do like the dedication to the Nordic elements, though. Tau Zero is a classic, but the characters are perhaps the weakest in this one of any of the books I've read. That is often the case when you start heading into hard science fiction, since the worldbuilding and mathematics often take over, but I felt that the story spent a lot of time on the characters, so it suffered to leave so many of them so flat.

 

[TWErvin2]

If you enjoyed the Nordic elements, Ophiucha, you might be interested I the Bloodsong Saga, recently re-released by C. Dean Andersson.