Wednesday 30 July 2014

The Time Machine And The Time Patrol III

In HG Wells' The Time Machine, published in 1895, The Time Traveler demonstrates time traveling by sending a model time machine into the past or future. In Poul Anderson's "Time Patrol," published in 1955, Manson Everard sends a message capsule from New York, 1954, to London, 1894, and receives a typewritten reply a few minutes later.

The dates and the similarity between the model time machine and the message capsule are subliminal parallels between the two works. My advice to anyone who wants to know what science fiction is about is: read Wells, then Anderson.

Everard had contacted the London office about an indication of time travel in a famous literary work. His message had arrived before similar ones from 1923 and 1960 and Patrolman Mainwethering expects to receive many more. It is curious to think that Patrol offices must communicate by letters or notes in message capsules. They have no inter-temporal equivalent of telephone or radio.

The last Time Patrol story was published in 1995.

5 comments:

Jim Baerg said...

Or send some super advanced equivalent of a flash drive in those message capsules.

paulshackley2017@gmail.com said...

An example of how technology has advanced since "Time Patrol" was written.

Sean M. Brooks said...

Kaor, Jim and Paul!

Or it might be a rule in the Time Patrol for agents not to communicate with each other with technology so advanced in a particular milieu that that it looks suspicious if any of the locals of that period stumbles across it.

Ad astra! Sean

Jim Baerg said...

Something unreadable by the locals would probably be best, so the content of the message doesn't give the locals some clues about the existence of time travel or something equally bizarre.
Writing on paper, but in a language totally different from the local language would probably be best from that POV, though in some societies anything 'foreign' would arouse suspicion.

Sean M. Brooks said...

Kaor, Jim!

I agree. So, it made sense for Agents Everard and Mainwethering to communicate with each other by letters. But maybe they should have used Temporal instead of English?

Ad astra! Sean