Problems

 Testing:

I had better give notice here that, since "Blogger" changed, I have been having problems with posting. Currently, if I click to create a new post on any of my other blogs, the screen changes to allow me to create a post on this, the Poul Anderson Appreciation, blog, not on the blog where I want to post. If this situation persists, then I will not, for example, be able to transfer articles to the Poul Anderson: Contributor Articles blog. I have, of course, gone onto a "Help" page and tried to communicate the problem but am not sure whether my message has been sent and, in any case, based on past experience, do not expect any reply. I am taking this opportunity to inform blog readers that there are problems just in case the problems get worse and I become unable to post here as well. I will switch the lap top off for a while and switch back on again later for what that is worth.

Two Spies In Green Hats

"...he took off his hat, a narrow-brimmed, dark-green English felt hat..."

-Stieg Larsson, The Girl Who Kicked The Hornet's Nest (London, 2007), CHAPTER 5, p. 195.

 

Thus, two fictional spies wear a green hat, one in THRUSH, the other in Swedish Internal Security.

 

Did Larsson have this UNCLE film in mind?

Chandos, Mansel And Others

Nine novels by Dornford Yates are narrated by Richard Chandos and seven of them also feature Jonathan Mansel.

Gale Warning, narrated by John Bagot, features both Chandos and Mansel.

Shoal Water, narrated by Jeremy Solon, features Mansel.

Three other thrillers by Yates, She Painted Her Face, Safe Custody and Storm Music, feature neither Chandos nor Mansel but are connected in other ways

Mansel is in the Berry Books and elsewhere as "Jonah."

Three Heroes

Historical: John Sanders' Nicholas Pym, like a 17th century James Bond.

Contemporary (at the time of writing): Ian Fleming's James Bond.

Futuristic: Poul Anderson's Dominic Flandry, like an interstellar James Bond, although the first Flandry story predates the first Bond novel.

The order of the creation of these characters is the reverse of their fictional chronological order.

A meeting of buccaneers on Tortuga, attended by Pym, parallels Goldfinger's "Hoods' Congress," attended by Bond. The Mafia and SMERSH are represented at the Hoods' Congress. Real historical buccaneers attend the meeting in Tortuga. In both cases, a man is murdered leaving the meeting.

In such series, a heroine is usually a single-volume character to be disposed of between volumes. See The Structure Of A Series: Ian Fleming. (Scroll down to the section on "Heroines.")

In the Pym series:

the heroine of Volume I has died in childbirth before the beginning of Volume II;

despite her association with Pym, the heroine of Volume II remains a Royalist and Pym shoots her when she tries to assassinate Cromwell;

if I remember right, Pym meets someone at the end of Volume III whom he marries in Volume IV;

Volume V, which I have not read, is a flashback to a time earlier in Pym's career so we already know that its heroine, if any, will not be around later.

Equality In The Bible And Dornford Yates

A character asks why the Bible does not command equality. Because there was a smaller surplus of wealth when it was written. Also, the Bible contains many barbaric laws which we rightly ignore.

Socialists know that their doctrine is unnatural, therefore wrong? No, sir, they disagree with you about it, which is a different matter.

Books That Exist Within Dornford Yates' Universe

The History Of The Pleydell Family by Vandy Pleydell.
White Ladies, the history of the Pleydells' ancestral home.
Berry Pleydell's Memoirs.
the "Dornford Yates" books, written by Boy Pleydell.

Thus, three Pleydells are authors. White Ladies may be written by a government appointee since the house has been handed over to the nation.

We have the "Dornford Yates" books but not the other volumes.

Since the Epilogue to the tenth and last Berry Book is a letter written by one of the servants, we at last learn the first name of Jonah's servant, Carson.

Berry And Co.

My copy of Berry And Co. by Dornford Yates, which looks like this:

not like various other editions (see here):

was printed without a publication date;
begins with a dedicatory letter dated November, 1920;
was given as a present at Christmas, 1929;
does not have the Pleydell family tree;
contradicts that tree in its text. (See Other Cousins.)