Saturday 10 March 2018

Ultradrive And Hyperdrive

At last, after the Young Flandry Trilogy and its two non-Flandry sequels, we come to the revised text of the first ever published Dominic Flandry story:

Unrevised -

"Captain Flandry opened his eyes and saw a metal ceiling. Simultaneously, he grew aware of the hum and quiver which meant he was aboard a spaceship running on ultradive."
-Poul Anderson, "Tiger by the Tail" IN Anderson, Agent Of The Terran Empire (London, 1977), pp. 7-36 AT p. 9.

Revised -

"When Captain Flandry opened his eyes, he saw metal. At the same time came awareness of a thrum and quiver, almost subliminally faint but not to be mistaken for anything else in the universe. He was aboard a spacecraft running on hyperdrive."
-Poul Anderson, "Tiger by the Tail" IN Anderson, Captain Flandry: Defender Of The Terran Empire (Riverdale, NY, 2010), pp. 241-276 AT p. 241.

The unrevised versions of this and several other Technic History installments should be collected as The Alternative Technic History.

Catawrayannis is mentioned in the original text and was elaborated in the third Young Flandry novel. See Catawrayannis.

The unrevised "Tiger by the Tail" refers to:

"...the Terrestrial Empire and the half-dozen other civilized states in the known Galaxy..." (Agent..., p. 10)

The revised text refers to "...the Terran Empire..." and "...other starfaring civilizations, Ythrian and Merseian and the rest." (Captain Flandry..., p. 243)

There is more but I am being interrupted. 

3 comments:

Sean M. Brooks said...

Kaor, Paul!

I'm interested to realize your copy of the unrevised "Tiger By The Tail" came from a London, 1977 reprint of AGENT OF THE TERRAN EMPIRE. Possibly by Ace Books? It was beginning with Gregg Press' printing of the revised text in 1978 or '79 that the second version became canonical.

The first version of "Tiger By The Tail" is definitely sword and blaster SF, albeit well done pulp science fictdion. In the second text we see Anderson thinking thru the implications of what he had previously written and how things like barbarians with star ships COULD happen.

Sean

paulshackley2017@gmail.com said...

Sean,
Coronet Books. See image.
Paul.

Sean M. Brooks said...

Kaor, Paul!

Aha! I keep thinking of the 1965 CHILTON Books edition of AGENT OF THE TERRAN EMPIRE when it came to the original texts of the Flandry stories.

Sean