Hope of Earth

by Piers Anthony

  “Apparently they just went away,” Flo said as they all picked brands from the fire. “That is all we need to know.”

  Minne nodded. That was the proper answer.

  Thus humanity survived both the diseases and the crazed remnants of the population. Isolation and special cooperation were the keys to such success. In time, with the greatly diminished prospects that such a limited, widespread population provided, the major diseases died out, and the world was safe for human re-colonization. This was the hope of Earth, Perhaps this time it would be done with more care for the future.

  AUTHOR’S NOTE

  THEORETICALLY, THE AUTHOR IS GOD of his creation, having everything in his story exactly the way he wants it. But in practice it often works out otherwise. It wasn’t just complications of scheduling, which caused the writing of this novel to stretch out a year beyond my original completion date. It wasn’t the fact that I started it on the Sprint word processor in DOS, and finished it on Microsoft Word 7 in Windows 95, with aspects of my formatting changing accordingly. The material itself developed its own will. This volume has a number of examples. Like the preceding two volumes, Isle of Woman and Shame of Man, this one samples the whole of human history and geography, from Australopithecus of five million years ago to Modern mankind of the recent future. As with the prior volumes, I had a number of definite notions to explore. As before, much of the work of research was done by my researcher Alan Riggs, whose own first story was published in the interim in Tales from the Great Turtle, and with the help of the library of the University of South Florida, which freely lent us arcane references. But several of my favorites turned out quite differently than anticipated.

  I worked out special character traits for each major character, especially their curses: Sam was afraid he would marry an ugly woman, Flo would lose what was most precious to her, Ned was doomed to be betrayed, Jes would be unmasked, Bry would have misfortune, and Lin would be disfigured. But it was hard to follow though; the story line preferred to follow its own complications. Oh, those curses did manifest, but after a time they faded out or were resolved. After that I focused more on the story lines rather than trying to hold my characters to particular molds. So you might say I stopped trying to be God, and yielded to the imperatives of the novel.

  The names were a separate challenge. I needed to keep the names the same or very similar throughout the novel, so that readers would know the basic identities, but names that will do for a cave man andáis mate, such as Ugh and Oola, don’t work as well for contemporary times. In the first novel, I gave my main characters descriptive names, like Blaze and Ember, and stayed with them throughout. In the second novel, I started with simple sounds, like Hu and An, and embellished them as human society became more sophisticated. This time I used simple modern names, ignoring seeming anachronism. Of the three approaches, I think the first works best, so for the next novel I may try descriptive names again. I learn from each novel. The time passing for the main characters varies too. The first novel covered three generations, the second one generation, and this novel covered about half a generation. I think the second approach works best: one year between chapters. It gets complicated when several years pass in a single chapter, as is the case in Chapters 10 and 15, but I still had the other characters age only six months per chapter, overall. This is apart from the way the characters are illustrating global history spanning millions of years, and a simple fixed personal rate per chapter seems best.

  Normally I try to space out the regions and times of the settings, so that the story Une constantly traverses the globe and doesn’t stay long in any particular time or place. But early man was mostly in Africa, so the first settings cluster there. This time the middle settings tended to cluster around Europe, and sometimes it was not possible to space them out without losing the variety of experience I was also trying for. For example, Chapters 14 and 15 were both in western Asia, set only forty years apart. One related to the terrible bubonic plague, and the other to a special event in Mongol history; who would have thought they overlapped in space/time? But they did, so I played it through as it was. Chapters 17 and 18 both occur in France, though almost 300 years apart; I wanted the minuet and the Maginot Line, and could not escape France, though I tried.

  I was going to show how ancient the making of cloth must be. But there is no record of truly primitive cloth; I believe it existed, but without proof, my case is weak. So I had to hedge. However, after I completed the novel, evidence of 27,000 year old weaving at a site in the Czech Republic was published in Discover magazine, and its evident sophistication suggested that it had developed a long time before that. So I think my thesis is on the way to being documented. I was going to show my character Sam always doing construction, on roads, walls, buildings, fortifications, and the like, but so much of the novel is before any real building was done that I had to find other employments for him. By the time there was real building, the complications of scheduling other characters prevented me from having Sam as the protagonist. So while things did not fall apart, they did get somewhat muddled in terms of my original notions. I could manipulate history only so far, to fit the needs of my characters.

  More and more evidence has been appearing to indicate that mankind came to the western hemisphere long before the traditional date of 12,000 years ago. In the prior novels, I deemed the evidence insufficient, but this time I scheduled a major chapter showing how it could have been. But after I wrote that chapter, more evidence appeared on the other side, invalidating some of my basis. The early stone arrow and spear points—that it was thought only man’s hand could have chipped—turn out to have been chipped by falling off a cliff onto a particular surface. The chipping may indeed date from 35,000 years ago, but required no hand of man. So were there really people in the Americas 33,000 years ago? There could have been, but I fear there were not.

  For Chapter 8 I had something really special in mind: the Sphinx. I got a video that indicated that the Sphinx in Egypt was actually far older than the pyramids. The reasoning was that the Sphinx showed patterns of weathering that had to have been caused by water erosion. How could that be, in the dry desert? Well, 10,000 years ago the Sahara was a good deal wetter than it is today; in fact there were several major rivers through it. So the Sphinx must have been made back then. The video was persuasive, so I had my researcher, Alan, view it. But he was a real spoilsport, unconvinced. He pointed out reasons that it wasn’t so. The problem with Alan is that he’s usually right; he has messed up any number of my bright notions, so that I have had to stick with reality. Since this series is history, not fantasy, regardless what the publisher may put on the cover, that’s just as well. So my setting of the carving of the Sphinx 10,000 years ago, with all that implied for the true nature of early Egyptian history, had to be ditched. Ned was going to be a designer, getting that great figure right. Wona was going to be attracted to him because of that importance. What was there left to write about, in that region then, with the Sphinx gone? Well, as it turned out, there were artistic works of mankind dating from the Sahara region at that time. So it was a much less dramatic setting, but historical, as it seems the early Sphinx was not.

  Next the Ice Man, in Chapter 9. Ah, the Ice Man! I tracked him from his discovery in the mountain glacier, knowing I would write about him, waiting eagerly for the book about him to be published, reading articles about him. And he came through nicely. He was named Otzi in Europe, so I went along with that. Ongoing research required me to substantially revise the chapter, after the first draft; I was unable to have the story line I first tried, because it wouldn’t have made sense in terms of what was known of the times. Again, history was pushing me around. After I finished the revised story, more was discovered and published, starting to invalidate some of the bases of my setting. Too bad; I can’t endlessly rewrite as interpretations change. I worked from the best available evidence and theory at the time. Later indications suggest that he was not a mere shepherd, perhaps instead being
a metal-smith, but the final verdict is not yet in. So did he have a nice daughter named Snow? Who can say? He was surely a family man of some kind, and could have been as I portray him. I couldn’t spare him his fate, but at least I could save his daughter.

  In each of the GEODYSSEY novels I have tried to have significant chapters at the one-quarter, one-half, and three-quarter marks, with the major one in the center. Thus Catal Huyuk in the first one, one of the world’s earliest cities, likely origin of the later Sumerian culture of Mesopotamia. Thus the Philistines from the Greek culture in the second one, giving the primitive wandering Hebrews a hand up toward civilization and receiving no gratitude in return. And the Greeks themselves in this volume. I resisted getting into the standard classical cultures, because of my aversion to the ignorant standard view of civilization, wherein it starts with Egypt, flowers in Greece, and was spread by Rome and then lost before being revived by modern western Europe. What of Asia, Africa, early America? There was a hell of a lot more going on in the world than the standard texts knew of, and I have tried to show it in these volumes. But though classical history was by no means all there was, neither was it insignificant. So, reluctantly, I have come to it in this volume, and discovered lo! it is interesting too. But what dragged me into it was not my sense of fairness, but rather my fascination with the trireme or trieres, the triple-decker rowing ships. When I was in school, they didn’t know how these were managed. Now they have figured it out, though no actual vessel has been recovered. There were even four-and five-decker ships. So could a tomboy girl have found work on a trieres? Who can say she did not, in that position of pipeman, that required a sense of beat and music rather than heavy muscle? Especially when the ship is captained by Ittai, a good seafarer from the prior volume, and guarded by Kettle, a simple but honest former slave from the first volume? And so, from my childhood curiosity about a three-tiered ship came the longest story of the first three volumes, a 48,000 word short novel in itself, featuring travel, battle, conscience, work, plague, challenge, and love. I made my fortune on funny fantasy, but this historical adventure is closer to my heart. Even so, there was more to be known than I could compass. Everything from the nature of threshing grain to weaving tapestry. So I slid by some things without going into much detail, keeping the story moving. It is too easy to get lost in the marvelous detail, and lose the living animation of the cultures which is my main purpose. And naturally, after I had carefully structured and written the chapter, my researcher discovered that I had an error in the sequencing; the Spartan siege and the onset of the plague came not in the fall, as I originally had it, but in the spring. So I had to make significant adjustments, hoping that my narrative still made sense.

  Chapter 11, with Petra, I wanted to show in the prior volume. But I already had too many settings around the Mediterranean Sea, so substituted a Japanese setting. So Petra is in this volume—which is even more concentrated on the Eurasian theater. I had to juggle chapters to make it fit, even so, which made my ongoing family relations tricky. But what a grand vision Petra turned out to be, with its temples carved into the faces of cliffs. I couldn’t show all of them, because some had not yet been constructed at the time of this setting, but it was still impressive. I had expected it to follow the British Boudica, but the dates didn’t quite mesh. I had no idea that it would overlap the Biblical King Herod, or how intriguing that intrigue would be. The fact is, anywhere in history is fascinating; it has just to be sampled, and the glory and skullduggery appear. What a louse Herod is! He gets into the sack with his niece, and decides to kill his wife, not to mention that business with the plattered head of a critic named John, and execution by torture of a mystic named Jesus.

  And Queen Boudica, in Chapter 12, spelled as our research indicates is authentic. I had read about her decades ago, but was reminded of it by an ad for silver coins dating from that period. So I did what I love: I got into the actual guts of it, and learned what had actually happened. The supposedly civilized Romans acted with stunning barbarism, publicly stripping and flogging the queen and raping her young daughters. Exactly how young is not known, but they could have been children. Rome was lucky not to have lost Britain as a result of that caper. But if there was anything the Romans could do well, it was fight battles; they had discipline like none seen before. So they kept Britain. But what was I to do with Wildflower, the queen’s younger daughter? She disappeared, nameless, in history, after her awful experience. So I rescued her, and she became a worthy continuing character following in the steps of the Ice Man’s daughter. I hadn’t seen that coming.

  Chapter 13 was a surprise. I wanted to explore the matter of the word “slave” deriving from “Slav.” It turned out to be an uncertain connection, and difficult to illustrate Actively. But my researcher discovered the Kingdom of Samo, unlisted in most references, and since my lead character for that chapter was Sam, I couldn’t resist. So once again the novel went in a different direction, and perhaps not a consequential one. Yet I wonder: could there have been a Sam? It is also tempting to conjecture that the word “avarice,” meaning extreme greed, derives from “Avar,” the people who raided Europe for its booty. Of course the Avars were only doing what every conqueror does, including especially the Europeans when they invaded the rest of the world. Reputation sometimes depends on whose ox is gored.

  Then the Mongols. I have been fascinated with them since college. In fact, since high school, when I discovered Coleridge’s poem “Kubla Khan” and was entranced. Conventional history largely ignores them, except when they threatened Europe, but they were a major factor in Asian history. They were the ultimate conservatives: they solved the crime and welfare problems the old-fashioned way, by slaughtering anyone who was into mischief or who would not or could not work. It was said that after the Mongol conquest, a beautiful virgin could travel alone with a bag of gold from Asia to Europe without being molested. That may have been an exaggeration, but suggests the way of it. Those in the path of the Mongols learned fear in a hurry, or they died. But I, being of liberal bent, would not have cared to live in that society. I study it from afar. I remembered an episode from a book I read in 1970, of a prince who just couldn’t hold on to his territory, until about the third or fourth time after Tamerlane rescued him, he turned suddenly competent. What could account for that? In that quarter-century curiosity of mine was the genesis of a 32,000 word novella, wherein Wildflower finally gets her man. I found that the later Mongols were just as shifty and treacherous as anyone else in history. So was there an aphrodisiac herb of the type Sahara described? That is doubtful. My earlier researches in the Arabian Nights tales acquainted me with the rich folklore of the Moslem region, and the hyperbole used. For example, there was the fabulous “bhang,” a sleep-inducing narcotic, a strong dose of which was said to be such that if an elephant merely sniffed it, the creature would sleep from year to year. In that spirit I conjecture a love potion whose potency would be mainly in the belief folk had of its nature.

  Meanwhile there was the Great Chinese Wall. I sent Alan into that research, expecting to have a setting around 221 B.C. He returned with a verdict similar to that on the Sphinx: no can do. There was no such unified wall. What? But all of history says—but all of history was wrong. Again. It did not impede the Mongol conquest of China, because it wasn’t there. Most of that wall was built in the Ming dynasty, in the sixteenth century, after the Mongols had been expelled from China, the setting for my Chapter 16. There is not now, and never was, a unified three thousand mile long stone wall. Only disconnected local walls, most of which were of packed earth rather than stone. So I learned what did not entirely please me, and now you know it too. Is it true that the Chinese Wall is the only man-made artifact that shows from space? No—because it isn’t there, and if it were there, it would be too thin to be seen from such a distance. Another illusion of history bites the dust.

  Chapter 17 derives from a cute little melody I heard on the radio that started a chain of thought: Suppose there is
a meeting of enemies, the men just about ready to fight, the women afraid the truce will come apart before it starts, with great mutual harm. Then a child brings a scribbled bit of music, and the musician plays it, and the women start dancing and hauling the men in, and instead of battle there is harmony after all. Because of that new little dance, the minuet. I remembered the minuet from the time I was hauled in to see a first-grade presentation in which my daughter Cheryl participated. You know the type; you have to watch and applaud so as to support your child and the school, no matter how amateurish the production is. But when my daughter’s class performed, it was the minuet, in period costume, and I was entranced; it was the most darling thing I had seen in years, and Cheryl was just perfect. Those stately, mannered steps and turns—my boredom was transformed to wonder and delight. So, close to twenty years later, I told Alan, “Find me that setting.” We had too much of Europe, and not enough of the New World, in this volume, so he looked in America—and couldn’t find it. America of those days was rough frontier country; there were no fancy balls with costumed women, and certainly not with armed men present. So we had to go back to Europe, to the court of King Louis XIV, one of those foppish settings I have avoided all my life. And lo, Louis turned out to be much more interesting than I had thought, and a master of the dance and great supporter of the arts. Later in life he was to become spoiled by power, but this was his beginning, and he was a remarkably apt and appealing figure. So I couldn’t have my original notion, again, but found one perhaps as worthy. So what was the cute little tune that had set me off? It turned out to be from the movie The Piano, a creature of quite a different nature.

  Chapter 18, about the Maginot Line of France, had a similarly devious derivation. In the 1980s I asked my literary agent of the time, Kirby McCauley, what genres were hot, and he said High Fantasy and World War II. Well, my fantasy might better be called low, and why should I want to mess with World War II? After all, I was there, and my family barely got out of Europe in time, after my father was arrested without cause by the fascist government of Spain at the time Hitler met with Franco; Poland and France had fallen, and England was seemingly next. We came across on the last regular passenger boat, the Excalibur, on the same trip that the one-time king of England, Edward VIII, took, in 1940, and I had my sixth birthday on that ship, with a cake made of sawdust because supplies were short. What interest did I have in World War II? Right; the question brought the answer, and in due course I wrote my World War II novel Volt But one of the things” I had planned to explore therein got squeezed out, by processes similar to those described here, so I had no section featuring the Maginot Line. So I decided to show it here. Which put me right back into France. Again.