Noblesse Oblige

August 25, 2026 / Rick Ellrod / Leave a comment

Introduction

One of the advantages of introducing my wife Geraldine to Lois McMaster Bujold’s Vorkosigan saga – as well as her Sharing Knife series (both in audiobook form) – has been the opportunity to think further about everything these stories bring up. Revisiting these favorite fictional haunts may be particularly illuminating when we do it in an alternate format, with an audio narrator contributing to our perception of the story along with the text. It’s often said that authors should read their own writings aloud, because we catch different things that way than by simply reading them in print; and the same may be true of another author’s works.

One of the continuing themes of the Vorkosigan series is the role of personal connections in government. Our principal protagonist, Miles Vorkosigan, is the son of a Count in the Barrayaran interplanetary empire, limited in extent (three planets) but headed by an Emperor. In a quasi-feudal setup of this sort, even one that’s gradually developing in a more democratic direction as on Barrayar, aristocrats have certain privileges, and the Emperor has quite extensive powers. The system is held together by essentially personal relationships. The Counts have their authority through oaths to the Emperor, and some members of their households, such as “armsmen,” swear similar individual oaths to the Counts.

Cutting Through the Red Tape

At one point in Miles’s rather irregular career, Emperor Gregor appoints him an “Imperial Auditor.” These Auditors are the Emperor’s elite troubleshooters: their activities reach far beyond financial audits, although Bujold does trace the term back to financial roles (and indeed tells us that the “Counts” were originally the Emperor’s accountants, deputized to ensure taxes were properly paid). At the time of the stories, an Imperial Auditor speaks with the Emperor’s Voice and thus has almost unlimited authority – although one summary notes that “most subjects endowed with their superior’s Voice tended to be circumspect about its power.”

Miles’s actions bear this out. He doesn’t use his Auditorial authority for his own benefit; he uses it to carry out necessary investigations and organize the empire’s officials and staff for necessary actions. The overriding delegated authority of the Emperor allows things to move faster than normal bureaucratic procedures would allow.

In addition, Miles uses his authority to override the usual procedures in the name of mercy or decency. In a notable example, one Madame Radovas, the widow of a scientist who had just resigned from government service, asks whether she will receive the normal survivor’s benefits. The rules say that she isn’t eligible, since her late husband had resigned before his death. Miles, however, makes an exception. “Gregor does not approve of widows being left destitute. Trust me on this one. Vorsoisson, go ahead and run the benefits through for her anyway.” Komarr (1998), (ch. 6, pp. 117-118)

Our sympathies are all with Miles in this case. Even though Madame Radovas actually turns out to be one of the bad guys eventually, the reader enjoys the way Miles has cut through the red tape to achieve a more merciful result than the regular rules would allow. He’s using his peculiar power for a good purpose.

An even more dramatic example occurs in the following volume. In one of my favorite scenes, the Emperor himself intervenes at the request of a young boy, who (with his mother) is trying to resist being taken away and placed under the care of a well-meaning but misguided relative. The law might arguably be on the relative’s side, at least for the moment, but Emperor Gregor can suspend this transfer of custody until things work themselves out. We are delighted by the consternation and embarrassment of the misguided relatives because we, the readers, have the privileged position of knowing that Gregor is in fact making things right. (A Civil Campaign (1999), ch. 18-19, pp. 462, 476)

Most of us get a kick out of seeing some sympathetic character bypass the rules to get the right thing done, whether it’s the “maverick cop who doesn’t play by the rules” (as my children learned to recite the cliché) or the super-hero who operates outside the usual constraints. But this only works because we agree with the end result. If the characters with special privileges or abilities were using them to make things worse, our reaction would be exactly the opposite: outrage that someone was bending the rules for personal gain or for evil ends.

The Obligations of Power

The old French expression noblesse oblige (literally, “nobility obliges”) captures an idea that has been in play throughout human history: as the Wikipedia page puts it, “nobility extends beyond mere entitlement, requiring people who hold such status to fulfill social responsibilities.”

Even in the traditional feudal system, obligations actually run both ways: lords have obligations to their vassals, reciprocating the vassals’ obligations to their lord. We see this in the Vorkosigan saga: for example, early in the series Miles takes a man’s oath as an armsman to protect the man in question, rather than to reduce him to servitude. (The Warrior’s Apprentice (1986), ch. 5)

But noblesse oblige extends beyond this. It carries the sense that the more powerful are especially required to use their powers rightly, even dutifully. It stands in opposition to the notion that might makes right – that it’s okay to do whatever you can get away with or force others to accept.

The concept ties in with the Biblical notion that the purpose of a ruler is to serve, not to dominate (Matt. 20:25-28). Or, as it’s put in another quasi-feudal science fiction setting, David Weber’s Dahak series: the protagonist’s children are to gain “[t]he knowledge that power is a responsibility. The belief that who they are and what they do is as important as what they’re born to. A tradition of – well, of service.” (Heirs of Empire (1996), ch. 5, p. 60)

With great power comes great responsibility

This formulation reminds us that the concept isn’t limited to an aristocracy. It applies to anyone with power of any sort. The modern version (for us commoners) is the tagline we associate today with Spider-Man: “with great power comes great responsibility.” Or, in more traditional language: “Much will be required of the person entrusted with much.” (Luke 12:48)

Virtue and Power

We trust someone to cut across the rules, then, when we’re confident they will do the right thing. For an aristocrat, we want them to have that sense of noblesse oblige. If we’re going to have aristocrats, we need virtuous aristocrats.

The Bujold examples above work because we trust Miles and his circle to do the right things with their power. This isn’t a given. Even on Barrayar, those in charge haven’t always been virtuous. “Mad Emperor Yuri,” a generation earlier, is frequently cited in the stories. And Gregor’s father, Prince Serg, is shown in the early stories as a sadist willing to violate the rules on treatment of prisoners for his own enjoyment. Even Emperor Ezar Vorbarra, who overthrew Yuri, behaves high-handedly (for example, inserting an experimental memory chip in a lieutenant more or less to see what would happen). The admirable practice of governance currently in effect is quite recent.

History, as well as fiction, teach us that aristocrats are likely to abuse their privileges. It may take exceptional people to turn that natural tendency in the right direction. In the Vorkosigan history, the relatively benign situation we encounter in most of the series owes a great deal to the positive influence of Miles’s parents, Aral and Cordelia Vorkosigan. In particular, Aral was the regent for Emperor Gregor during his formative years. But we can also see such influence, direct or indirect, on others, such as Ivan Vorpatril and Simon Illyan. (If I’m drowning you in obscure references to a series you haven’t yet read, please accept my apologies – then go ahead and read the stories, they’re worth it.)

To take the case of a different interstellar empire, Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle’s The Mote in God’s Eye (1974) gives us starship captain Rod Blaine, who is frequently annoyed by his irreverent sailing master Kevin Renner. Like Miles, Rod is dedicated to doing the right thing. Renner is happy to indulge in digs at the Empire’s aristocracy, but when push comes to shove, he admits that even he depends on the governing class to be the kind of people who can be trusted: “Hell, Captain, it’s because of guys like you that I can accept the aristocracy—” (ch. 40, p. 341)

Of course, it’s easier to ensure this in fiction than in real life. An author can arrange for good people to be in charge, people who understand their responsibilities. In actual practice, it’s harder to distinguish the responsible from the irresponsible, or to prevent the latter from gaining power. We can choose whether to write a utopia, a dystopia, or something in between; but more is needed to stave off the real-life drift toward dystopia.

Virtue and Wisdom

Even the best of intentions are not enough. Rules, even those we stigmatize as “red tape,” are generally made for a reason; thus ignoring them will often lead to unfortunate consequences. It takes unusual perceptiveness and wisdom to recognize the exceptional cases when the rules should be ignored. We trust Miles not only because he’s a good man, but also because he’s incredibly smart – which is why we enjoy watching him get himself into untenable situations and then frantically improvise his way out of them.

What is true of an aristocracy – hereditary leaders – is more broadly true of any leaders. We need them to be people of both good will and good judgment. Thus, for example, an article last year by Fareed Zakaria notes the need, in a non-aristocratic society, for “expanding access to education and networks so that mobility is real, while cultivating leaders who can see beyond their class and credentials. The problem is not that elites exist but that they have grown detached.” (emphasis added) We want anyone with power to have learned Spidey’s lesson about acting responsibly.

The themes we’re investigating here thus converge with those of some earlier posts. They generalize the concept of “the Good King” and further articulate the notion of the rule of law. As the latter post pointed out, we need good people as well as sound laws. “Good men can make poor laws workable; poor men will wreak havoc with good laws” (James M. Landis, 1960; see this article at 432 & n.107).

The lead character in a Harry Turtledove novel used to ask herself when in difficulties: what would Miles Vorkosigan do? If we are in a position to exercise any power or authority, we can certainly imitate Miles in one respect – in cultivating a sense of noblesse oblige. Any of us may be called upon to be a leader at times; we should be prepared to be the right kind of leader.

The Great Reread: Hobart Floyt & Alacrity Fitzhugh

May 14, 2025 / Rick Ellrod / 2 Comments

Too Many Books

Picture of old man on ladder in large library

Can one have too many books? I want to say no. (See the illustration, which hangs on our front hall next to the library.) On the other hand, it’s become difficult to fit my accumulated collection comfortably into any reasonable home—and doubly so when you add in my wife’s lifelong collection as well—even without the eight or ten boxes of books I sold off to the fabulous Wonder Books in Frederick in an attempt to thin out the collection. And nonfiction is another story. (Well, the stories are in the fiction section; but you see what I mean.)

This is so even though I’ve tried to exercise restraint by buying only those books I’ll want to read over again. I prefer to try out a new book by getting it from the library, and, after reading, to decide whether this is a “keeper” that I always want to have available. The rare exceptions are new books that I already know I’ll want to own, generally in a series. While Lois McMaster Bujold’s Vorkosigan saga was still coming out, for instance, I’d grab those off the bookstore shelves at once, sight unseen. (Though I admit I do have only an electronic copy of Gentleman Jole and the Red Queen—but that’s another discussion.)

Aside from considerations of space, it occurred to me some years ago that the “read again” rationale necessarily diminishes over time. Given my likely lifespan, how many times am I likely to reread any given volume? That number is constantly decreasing. This makes me a little cautious about buying new books—as opposed to using the library. One of the great perks of my current job is that there’s a county library branch right on the first floor of our building. I can put a book on hold and nip down while at the office to pick it up. Same thing to return it. A wonderful arrangement . . . at least until I retire . . .

The other motivation I’ve had for accumulating books has been a vague notion that they serve as a kind of reference library. In writing posts like these, it’s convenient to be able to grab a favorite book to check on some point or to make a citation precise. For years, I kept around an old paperback copy of Neil Jones’s The Planet of the Double Sun (1931, paperback edition 1967), merely as an example of a really crummy old-time SF yarn. It finally occurred to me that there was no particular purpose in having it—rereading it would be too boring to be worth any use I might make of the mention—and I ditched, er, released my copy to find a new home with some historian of SF. Haven’t missed it since.

The Great Reread

In the process of going over my packed-and-unpacked-and-reshelved books (two moves in the last two and a half years!), I’ve sometimes found it hard to recall what some of the stories were actually like. Or I feel as if I’d like to read a book once more before I consign it to the outermost depths. So I find myself rereading a lot of old material. Some of it holds up pretty well. Others, I wonder what I saw in the tale in the first place. The rereads end up being a combination of final trial—do I want to keep this book?—and fond farewell.

Of course I continue to read new stories too: new good books are coming out all the time. But it’s rather enjoyable to revisit some old friends as part of a balanced bookish diet.

And sometimes the old stuff may be worthy of comment. So I’m going to include the occasional post here from the Great Reread. The inspiration comes from Jo Walton’s brilliant series of essays, “What Makes This Book So Great,” originally hosted, I believe, at Tor and published in a 2014 collection. (There seems to be a list of links here; Walton’s own comments on rereading are here.) I’m not spotlighting what are necessarily the greatest books—but there may be interesting things to say even about the non-great or non-classic tomes I find cluttering my shelves.

Since these books tend to be fairly well aged, I don’t think it’s necessary to issue spoiler alerts in each case. The comments all have spoilers.

Brian Daley’s Peripatetic Heroes

I first ran across Brian Daley (1947-1996) in his 1977 novel The Doomfarers of Coramonde, which has the irresistible premise that a sorcerer in a fantasy land summons magical assistance from another world—and it turns out to be an armored personnel carrier, with crew, from the war in Vietnam. The fish-out-of-water contrast was delightful and the action first-rate. I was primed to look for more good fun a few years later when Daley published Requiem for a Ruler of Worlds (1985), the first in a trilogy of adventures featuring the mismatched buddies Hobart Floyt and Alacrity Fitzhugh.

They’re still good fun. The heroes are both likable and relatable—dashing and mercurial Alacrity, a knockabout itinerant spacer with “friends in low places” across the starlanes, and staid Hobart, a minor bureaucrat from a congested backwater Earth. Alacrity has some personal issues to get over, mostly in the third volume, but Hobart develops most, rising to the occasion as he travels into space to obtain a bequest inexplicably left to him by an interstellar magnate. The worldbuilding is brilliant: planet after exotic planet, oddball character after still odder character. The sheer variety and colorfulness of Daley’s cosmos is pleasing.

The Floyt-Fitzhugh saga falls into the category of the “picaresque” tale. Originally I misunderstood that term to mean the same thing as simply “picturesque,” and the story certainly is that. When I actually looked up the word, many years ago, I realized it had a more specific meaning: “Characteristic of a genre of Spanish satiric novel dealing with the adventures of a roguish hero,” as Wiktionary puts it. That fits our heroes pretty well—Alacrity from the start, Hobart learning fast. They’re lovable rogues, often on the wrong side of the law (or at least local customs), with hearts of about 12-carat gold. Even in the last scene of the series, they’re off again to who knows where, one jump ahead of pursuit.

And thereby hang my possibly idiosyncratic reservations about the story. The plot of the first book is very good; there’s a clear goal and climax. In the second and third books, not quite so much. Alacrity and Hobart achieve some interesting results, but they themselves don’t actually stop to absorb or enjoy them. Our Heroes are always on to the next thing. Daley gives each of them a pretty good romance subplot, but these never quite resolve, since the MCs are always leaving their girlfriends behind—even at the end of the third book, Fall of the White Ship Avatar. I was left wondering, do these two ever get to settle down and enjoy the fruits of their labors?

This is a standard issue with wandering, picaresque heroes, particularly those who star in open-ended series. Daley even lampshades this aspect by including a whimsical journalist in the story who features Floyt and Fitzhugh in a series of utterly melodramatic “penny dreadfuls,” to Our Heroes’ perpetual embarrassment and annoyance. Daley seems to want to place them in the company of series heroes whose adventures never really end. James Bond is never going to stop secret-agenting; he just gets re-cast with increasingly younger actors. At the end of Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, just when we might expect Indy to retire and be replaced by his son, Indy snatches back his rolling fedora at the last moment. The ending of The Incredibles or Spider-Man 2 show the characters resolving their personal character arcs, but nonetheless leaping into the next adventure.

One wonders if these perpetual adventurers ever retire, even as they inevitably age. We’ve pondered this previously in considering the “professional hero.” There has been the occasional hero who explicitly retires and passes on the mantle to a successor. There’s a neat little story in Kurt Busiek’s Astro City showing how superhero Jack-in-the-Box is training his successor. And Captain America eventually retires in the MCU, though the ‘line of succession’ is rather fraught.

Personally, I like to see the main characters settle down at some point, if only to enjoy a well-earned respite from perpetual danger and damage. They can continue to have interesting adventures later on; “happily ever after” need not be a static condition. Consider, for example, the somewhat atypical honeymoon of Miles and Ekaterin Vorkosigan in Diplomatic Immunity. But it’s satisfying to see beloved characters enjoying some degree of stability.

On the other hand, there’s also a certain appeal to the hero who’s eternally “out there,” a legendary figure, always at their peak and unabatedly themselves. In a way I don’t want to see Nero Wolfe or James Bond retire. So I do rather appreciate the perpetual motion of Floyt and Fitzhugh, despite the lack of resolution. To resolve, or not to resolve? That is the question—but either answer may be acceptable. I’ll be keeping the Daley books on my overstuffed shelves.

The Good King (reprise)

October 20, 2024October 20, 2024 / Rick Ellrod / Leave a comment

Watching The Lord of the Rings movies again recently, to share the experience with my wife, brought to mind this post from eight years ago. Here it is again, with minor updates.

I began to wonder some years back about the curious preference for monarchy in futuristic settings. In the world at large, monarchies have been retreating in favor of republics and democracies, at least in theory, since 1776. Why are SF writers so fond of equipping future societies with kings, emperors, and aristocracies?

Star Kingdoms

We can pass lightly over the old-time, pulp-type stories where royal rule is merely part of the local color: Burroughs’ A Princess of Mars (1912), Edmond Hamilton’s The Star Kings (1949), E.E. Smith’s The Skylark of Space (1928) with its Osnomian royal families. Here, like flashing swords and exotic costumes, monarchy is simply part of a deliberately anachronistic setting. Similarly in high fantasy, where aristocracy comes naturally in the typical pseudo-medieval milieu.

But we see royal or aristocratic governments in more modern stories too. Asimov’s Foundation stories are centered around a Galactic Empire. (See also the more recent Apple+ series of the same name.) Since that series was based on Gibbons’ The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, an Empire was inevitable. Similarly in Star Wars, which draws heavily on Asimov. Jerry Pournelle’s CoDominium future history has a First and a Second “Empire of Man.” David Weber’s heroine Honor Harrington serves the “Star Kingdom of Manticore” (later “Star Empire”), modeled closely on England around 1810. Lois McMaster Bujold’s Vorkosigan Saga contains a number of polities with different forms of government, but many of the stories focus on Barrayar, which has an Emperor. Anne McCaffrey’s popular Pern series has no monarch, but has two parallel aristocracies (the feudal Holders and the meritocratic dragonriders). It got to the point where I began to feel a decided preference for avoiding monarchical or imperial governments in SF storytelling.

The Lure of Kingship

There’s something that attracts us in royalty—or we wouldn’t see so much of it. I encountered this puzzlement directly. As a kid reading The Lord of the Rings, I was as moved as anyone by the return of the true King. I asked myself why. If I don’t even approve of kingship in theory, why am I cheering for Aragorn?

The reasons we’re drawn to monarchy seem to include—

Kings are colorful. (So are princesses.)
Stability
Personal loyalty
Individual agency

The first point is obvious, but the others are worth examining.

Stability

It’s been pointed out that even in a constitutional government, a monarch provides a symbolic continuity that may help to hold a nation together. British prime ministers may come and go, but the King, or Queen, is always there. This gives some plausibility to the idea of a future society’s returning to monarchy.

Something like this stabilizing function is behind commoner Kevin Renner’s half-embarrassed harangue to Captain Rod Blaine, future Marquis of Crucis, in Niven & Pournelle’s The Mote in God’s Eye: “maybe back home we’re not so thick on Imperialism as you are in the Capital, but part of that’s because we trust you aristocrats to run the show. We do our part, and we expect you characters with all the privileges to do yours!” (ch. 40)

Unfortunately, relying on the noblesse oblige of the aristocrats doesn’t always work out well. It depends on who they are. For every Imperial Britain, there’s a North Korea. When the hereditary succession breaks down, you get a War of the Roses or Game of Thrones.

Too much depends on getting the right monarch. By the law of averages, it doesn’t take long before you get a bad ruler, whether by inheritance or by “right of conquest”—and you’re up the well-known creek.

Personal Loyalty

Personal loyalty appeals to us more strongly than loyalty to an institution. One can pledge allegiance to a state—but even the American Pledge of Allegiance starts with a symbol: the flag, and then “the Republic for which it stands.” Loyalty to an individual moves us more easily.

This kind of loyalty doesn’t have to be to a monarch. Niven & Pournelle’s Oath of Fealty explores how loyalty among, and to, a trusted group of managers can form a stronger bond than the mere institutional connections of a typical modern bureaucracy. One can be faithful to family (the root of the hereditary element in kingship), to friends, or even an institution or a people. But it’s easiest with an individual. This loyalty is the basis for the stability factor above.

Individual Agency

The vast machinery of modern government sometimes seems to operate entirely in the abstract, without real people involved. “Moscow said today . . .”

In fact it’s always people who are acting. But it’s easier to visualize this when you have a single person to focus on. “When Grant advanced toward Richmond . . .” In the extreme case, we have the ruler who claims to embody the state in his own person: “L’état, c’est moi” (attributed to Louis XIV, the “Sun King” of France).

In a fascinating 2008 essay, Jo Walton quotes Bujold on political themes in SF: “In fact, if romances are fantasies of love, and mysteries are fantasies of justice, I would now describe much SF as fantasies of political agency.” A science fiction character is frequently involved in effecting a revolution, facing down a potential dictator, or establishing a new order—exercising autonomous power. Walton links this notion of political agency to the fact that SF illustrates change: “SF is the literature of changing the world.” The world-changers can be outsiders, or they can be the rulers themselves—as in a number of the examples above.

It’s not surprising that we’re attracted to characters who act outside the normal rules. We (especially Americans, perhaps) are fond of the idea that good people can act in ways that are untrammeled by the usual conventions. I’ve already mentioned Robin Hood. And the whole concept of the superhero—the uniquely powerful vigilante who can be relied on to act for the good—is powered by this attraction.

But this idealization of individual initiative is also dangerous. Too much depends on getting the right hero—or the right monarch. It can only work if the independent agent is seriously and reliably good: virtuous, in the classical sense of virtue as a well-directed “habit” or fixed character trait. Even then, we may be reluctant to give any hero unlimited power. Too much is at stake if it goes wrong.

The Rule of Law

Our admiration for the powerful ruler is always in tension with our dedication to the rule of law: “a government of laws, not of men,” in the well-known phrase attributed to John Adams. We can see this as far back as Aristotle: “law should rule rather than any single one of the citizens. And following this same line of reasoning . . . even if it is better that certain persons rule, these persons should be appointed as guardians of the laws and as their servants.” (Politics book III, ch. 16, 1287a)

No human being can be trusted with absolute authority. This is the kernel of truth in the aphorism that “power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely.” But we can’t get along without entrusting some power to someone. When we do, it had better be someone who’s as trustworthy as possible.

The Ideal of the Good King

Thus the true king must be a virtuous person—a person of real excellence. This is the ideal of an Aragorn or a King Arthur, whose return we’re moved to applaud (even against our better judgment). It should be obvious that the same principles apply to the good queen—or emperor, empress, princess, prince, president, prime minister: the leader we follow. But I’ll continue using “king” for simplicity’s sake.

What virtues do we look for in a good monarch—aside from the obvious ones of justice, wisdom, courage, self-control?

If the ruler or rulers are going to be “servants of the laws,” they require humility. A king who serves the law can’t claim to be its master. Arrogance and hubris are fatal flaws in a ruler. For example, we should always beware of the leader who claims he can do everything himself and is unable to work with others.

The good king is also selfless—seeking the common good of the people, not his own. Self-aggrandizement is another fatal flaw.

In effect, what we’re looking for is a ruler who doesn’t want to rule: a king who believes in the sovereignty and the excellence of common people.

It’s significant that Aragorn, our model of the good king, is introduced in LotR as “Strider,” a scruffy stranger smoking in a corner of a common inn. Even when he’s crowned in victory, he remembers to exalt the humble. The movie has him tell the four hobbits, “You kneel to no one.” Tolkien’s text is more ceremonious: “And then to Sam’s surprise and utter confusion he bowed his knee before them; and taking them by the hand . . . he led them to the throne, and setting them upon it, he turned . . . and spoke, so that his voice rang over all the host, crying: ‘Praise them with great praise!’” (Book VI, ch. 4, p. 232)

We see the same essential humility and selflessness in other admirable leaders, kings or not: Taran in the Chronicles of Prydain, and the revolutionary princess in Lloyd Alexander’s Westmark trilogy; Niven & Pournelle’s Rod Blaine; Jack Ryan in Tom Clancy’s novels; “Dev” Logan, head of Omnitopia Inc. in Diane Duane’s Omnitopia Dawn—the unpretentious opposite of the “imperial CEO.” America was fortunate enough to have such an example in the pivotal position of first President, George Washington.

The Alternative

At the other end of the spectrum, the most dangerous person to trust is an unprincipled and unscrupulous autocrat—someone convinced of his personal superiority and infallibility. Giving power to an individual who has no interest in serving the common good, but only in self-aggrandizement, puts a nation in subjection to a Putin, a Mussolini, a Kim Jong-un.

The antithesis of the good king is the tyrant, who, however innocently he may start out, figures in our stories mainly as the oppressor to be overthrown. It’s much better, if possible, to intercept such a potentially ruinous ruler before the tyranny comes into effect: Senator Palpatine before he becomes Emperor, Nehemiah Scudder before he wins his first election. Allowing the tyrant to gain power may make for good stories, but it generates very bad politics.

If we must have strong leaders, then in real life as well as in stories, character is key—and hubris is deadly.

Happily Ever After

July 5, 2020 / Rick Ellrod / 9 Comments

Six weeks ago I complained about the lack of happily-ever-after romances in the Star Wars series. It occurred to me that it would be useful to take a look at what exactly makes for a “happy ever after” ending (“HEA” in genre romance code). What do we really mean by that, anyway?

The Thrill of the Chase

“All the world loves a lover.” We enjoy seeing stories about people falling in love, whether it’s with someone they’ve just met or by discovering someone who was always “right before my eyes.” (Unless, of course, we’re too cynical to give any credence to so vulgar and sentimental an idea; in which case it’s the trope we love to hate.) I’d call it the courtship phase of a relationship, if that term weren’t so archaic. But “courtship” does express in a useful way the stage I’m referring to, when the lovers-to-be are maneuvering around each other, trying to figure each other out, and (almost invariably, in fiction) overcoming initial obstacles to their mutual attraction.

“Forever Mine” by welshdragon at DeviantArt

It’s not hard to see why this is. The courtship phase includes a lot of fun stuff. We get to see the thrill of discovery, the novelty, the tentative reaching-out and missing connections, the achievement of initially establishing a base of trust and affection. There’s uncertainty and thus suspense in those first contacts. The process reminds me of the “handshaking” by which communications systems establish a protocol for exchange of information (anybody remember that windy ‘modem connecting’ sound on a dial-up connection?).

And this process is both tricky and essential. The relationship can’t move forward until the common foundation is established. I’ve quoted Lois McMaster Bujold before:

The question a romance plot must pose, and answer (showing one’s work!) is not “Do these two people get together?” but rather “Can I trust you?” Which is most certainly not a trivial problem, in art or in life. (Response to a reader question on Goodreads (10/30/2017).)

And the relationship does have to move forward. Courtship is only a prelude. It inherently looks forward to something else: a life together. (Even to “forever,” but that’s another subject.) We feel something is missing in a case like that of Romeo and Juliet, where circumstances cheat the lovers of that opportunity.

Falling in love is fun to watch. But if that’s all a character is interested in, we get the self-centered thrill addict who keeps wanting to have the same experience over and over again—as if they wanted to relive high school graduation repeatedly, Groundhog Day-style. We can’t fall in love indefinitely; eventually we have to land somewhere. Whether the story ends with a wedding or just a commitment, there has to be a conclusion.

Yet the conclusion itself is only the kickoff for the real relationship—the HEA. “Each happy ending’s a brand new beginning.”

What It Isn’t

“Happily ever after” doesn’t mean the initial thrill of falling in love lasts forever. That simply isn’t possible; human emotions can’t remain at that fever pitch. At some point, the “dizzy dancing way you feel” is going to ebb. If we expect to feel the same way always, as I’ve just noted, we’re setting ourselves up for disappointment and unnecessary disillusion. On the other hand, that thrill can always reappear from time to time. Wise couples will take steps to encourage and renew that early glamour throughout their marriage.

Nor does HEA mean freedom from all troubles. We can put this aside momentarily to celebrate a wedding, visualizing only a life of unimpeded bliss; but real lives invariably encounter problems and difficulties. We may even want to remind ourselves of this on the occasion of union itself. When I ran across Emily Hearn’s wedding video online, I was struck by the fact that the first piece of music set to the video was Andrew Peterson’s “Dancing in the Minefields”: “And it was harder than we dreamed / But I believe that’s what the promise is for.”

Even the vision of a couple facing adversity staunchly side by side isn’t always going to be valid. We’re told that even healthy couples have their arguments and disagreements. Indeed, a couple that never disagrees may be harboring unresolved issues under the surface.

It seems to me that all these flaws or troubles can still be accommodated in the “happily ever after” archetype. Couples can recover from adversity; it can make them stronger. Even crises in a lifelong love affair can be healed or overcome. It’s the overall trend or direction, and the overall tenor of the romance, that leads us to call it “happy.” Of course, when we wish someone happiness forever, we hope that their troubles will be relatively few and their recoveries maximally joyous. But a life together need not be perfect to be “happy.”

What It Is

If the ever-after need not be perpetual bliss to count as HEA, what is it made up of? I am hardly so wise as to prescribe sure-fire ingredients for a happy marriage. But if we think about what we’d expect to see in a story that depicted a happy couple, we can point to a few things.

Carly Simon singing The Stuff That Dreams Are Made Of at Martha's Vineyard

Carly Simon sings “The Stuff That Dreams Are Made Of”

If it’s going to compete with the initial falling in love, being in love has to gain in depth and resonance what it loses in surface intensity and thrill. It’s “the slow and steady fire.”

What can a couple that’s been together a while do that lovers who’ve just met can’t? Consider the cumulative pleasures and joys of two people who know each other well and have learned how to please and help each other. If they continue faithful to each other and to their union, their mutual trust will grow and deepen. And the more they trust each other, the more each can express their individual strengths (and admit their individual weaknesses).

Since loving someone doesn’t consist only in having a feeling about them, but in enacting love for them, we can learn to love someone better through experience and attentive learning. I may start by giving you a gift I would like—but eventually I learn how to give you the gift you would like. Meanwhile, the sharing of memories and experiences, families, running jokes, can enrich and strengthen the bond.

All these things are compatible with the imperfections and difficulties noted above. They make up what we’d expect to see, down the road, in a story that goes beyond the courtship—a happy-ever-after.

How We Tell the Story

Because the HEA lacks the surface glitter of the falling-in-love story, we see far fewer stories depicting it. But for purposes of example and illumination, it’s very useful to see depictions of ongoing marriages.

Such mature romances can crop up in odd places. For example, in a series that goes on beyond the resolution of initial relationships, or perhaps longer than the author expected, we may see the original lovers ‘age out’ of the focus, but still have the chance to watch them practice the art of love.

Exhibit A is Bujold’s Vorkosigan saga. The first two books in the main sequence, Shards of Honor and Barrayar, deal with Aral Vorkosigan and Cordelia Naismith, whose son, Miles, is the principal character in most of the stories. So we see Cordelia and Aral fall in love—but then we see them continue through a whole series of other tales as both parents and political prime movers on Miles’ homeworld of Barrayar. We get to see them working together in common causes, both personal and cosmic. We see their continuing affection and evident harmony. Each is so distinctive a personality that we never think of either Aral or Cordelia as merely an extension of the other; rather, they provide an ongoing example of the kind of relationship we wanted to see in their initial stories—and to which Miles aspires for himself, having that example always before him.

Anne McCaffrey’s Dragonriders of Pern give us another example. In the first book (as published, not chronologically), Dragonflight, we see the rocky road of the strong-willed main characters, Lessa and F’lar, to love. Both of them are so stubborn and willful that it’s hard to picture them in a peaceful marriage. And indeed, on Pern, nothing is ever entirely peaceful for long. But as more couples come and go through the long series of sequels, F’lar and Lessa remain onstage a good bit of the time. Neither is ever tamed, though they both mellow a bit. The scrappy young Lessa becomes a little steadier and more mature as she gets older and has a child, but she still retains the original fire.

I frequently refer to the classic Lensman series, but I don’t think I’ve mentioned that the final novel, Children of the Lens, shows us the lovers whose activities dominated the three middle books, Kim Kinnison and Clarissa MacDougall, as middle-aged parents a generation later. The story is so action-oriented that we don’t get to see much of the family in peace, but what we do see gives us the satisfaction of knowing that Kim and Cris have lived a happy life together (and will continue to do so). And since the surclimax (if I may invent a word for a secondary climax occurring after the main one) involves Clarissa’s use of the power of their mutual love to retrieve Kim from an otherwise unsolvable trap, it’s clear that the romantic connection consummated at the wedding in the previous volume (twenty years earlier) has not lost its fire.

Andrew Greeley wrote a whole series of novels in which the romance is generally about falling in love. But in his O’Malley family saga, in which the titles all refer to seasons (of life), he continues the story of one such couple from the post-WWII era right through their “Golden Years.” The young lovers of A Midwinter’s Tale have to grapple with some pretty serious psychological issues themselves, as well as family drama, over the course of years. But the “crazy O’Malleys” emerge stronger from their troubles as they go on, giving us a picture of people who are always becoming more themselves as they adjust to changing circumstances.

There is a subgenre of family sagas—the kinds of long-running, multicharacter stories that always make me think of TV mini-series—and some of these also give us extended looks at maturing romances. In some such stories, the conflicts arise from the dysfunctionality of the family itself; Mazo de la Roche’s Jalna novels are a case in point. But in others, we can see a couple holding strong. I recently reread R.F. Delderfield’s God Is An Englishman, the first book of his “Swann saga.” His central couple, Adam and Henrietta, grow in significant ways over the course of the story. Their love waxes and wanes, but after it wanes, it always comes back. I’d count that as a HEA.

The novella I’m just finishing up, Time Signature, takes place in the Deerbourne Inn common setting created by the Wild Rose Press. This gave me the chance to show how a secondary couple who were engaged in Amber Daulton’s Lyrical Embrace was getting along, a little later. While their appearance is brief, I enjoyed the opportunity to represent a growing post-courtship romance, even in its early years.

Real Life

For purposes of inspiration and example, of course it’s even more helpful to be acquainted with real-life successful relationships. My parents, for instance, lived long and happy lives, and despite religious and political differences, they always remained in harmony. Though they argued about many subjects, they never, so far as I know, quarreled. While their lives could not be said to be untroubled (after all, I was one of their children), I’d say they qualified as a happy-ever-after. I’m privileged to know a number of other couples whose romances have flourished over many years, on whom I’d be glad to bestow the accolade of HEA.

The accumulation of such real and fictional examples gives us the wherewithal to refute those who scoff at the happily-ever-after ending. None of the characters of our favorite romances will have perfect later lives unmarred by any suffering or any down times in their love affairs. But if we’re willing to accept that solid happiness can be consistent with life’s inevitable troubles, we can look forward with hope to a satisfactory ending for those couples who approach their lives with both realism and love.

The Select Society of Protectors

September 1, 2019September 3, 2019 / Rick Ellrod / 4 Comments

Sorry about the delay between posts—I’ve been under the weather lately.

I was recently reading a new “Sharing Knife” story by Lois McMaster Bujold, and it suddenly occurred to me that the relationship of Bujold’s Lakewalkers to Farmers is exactly that of Anne McCaffrey’s Dragonriders to Holders.

But let me back up a bit.

The Sharing Knife

The world of Bujold’s Sharing Knife series is a difficult and dangerous one. Most people live in a basically agrarian culture, a sort of cross between the traditional medieval fantasy world and the Wild West. They fear the enigmatic “Lakewalkers,” men and women who wander about the countryside in “patrol” groups and are rumored to have magical powers. The Lakewalkers claim to be searching for what ordinary people call “blight bogles,” but some consider these to be a mere myth.

They’re not a myth, of course. In reality the Lakewalkers, who have the ability to use a kind of magic they call “groundwork” (an extremely interesting and well-developed idea in itself), are constantly on the watch to destroy “malices” as they arise. These malices are truly nasty beings that can mentally enthrall normal humans and mutate animals into humanoid minions. If the Lakewalkers weren’t killing them off (via the grim “sharing knife” methd of the title), the malices would overrun the whole world.

Many Lakewalkers tend to look down on the people they are defending, whom they refer to generally as “farmers.” Much of the interest of the story has to do with the prickly relationship between these two interdependent groups, explored through the romance between a farm girl, Fawn, and a Lakewalker patroller, Dag.

The Dragonriders of Pern

As I mentioned in an earlier post, Anne McCaffrey’s Dragonriders of Pern is a science fiction series that reads like fantasy. The planet Pern is protected by men and women riding flying dragons. The dragons breathe fire to destroy an alien organic “Thread” that falls from the sky and, if allowed to spread, would multiply to consume the planet. To qualify as a full-fledged dragonrider, one must have the potential for a certain kind of telepathy that allows rider and dragon to bond at the dragons’ birth.

One of the things that makes the Pern stories sound like fantasy is the quasi-medieval political structure. A “Lord Holder” resembles a feudal monarch ruling over a sizable population of farmer/serfs, crafters, and minor nobility. But here the dragonriders form a separate hierarchy. The riders’ internal pecking order is a combination of aristocracy and meritocracy: the rider of the senior gold (female) dragon is a kind of queen; the rider whose bronze dragon mates with the gold becomes leader of the entire group that constitutes a Weyr; and those who lack the telepathic talent are servitors (at the lowest level, “drudges”).

While the depiction of Pernese society mellowed a good bit over the course of the series—both holders and riders were pretty high-handed and violent at the beginning, less so later—one consistent theme is the uneasy relationship between the dragonriders and the common folk. Everyone knows (though they may forget in the generations between periodic Thread attacks) that the riders are essential to preserve the planet: “Worlds are lost or worlds are saved / From those dangers dragon-braved.” But the holders often resent the taxes imposed to support the Weyrs and the “searches” in which the dragonriders carry off likely young people to see if they can “impress” a dragon. Managing this tension consumes a good deal of the main characters’ time in the early books.

The Protectors and the Protected

Now I can make clear the analogy I noticed. In each case we have a relatively small society of people set apart from ordinary folks, in a good cause: they are dedicated to protecting the larger population. The select group of protectors are genuine heroes who possess special talents that fit them for the role. But the protectors are not stainless; they can abuse their powers. And the grateful population they defend aren’t always grateful; they may resent the special powers and privileges of the defenders, even aside from the possible abuse of those advantages.

It seems to be a fruitful trope for storytelling.

Rangers and Protectors

We can find a similar structure, though not so dominant, back in The Lord of the Rings. You’ll recall that Strider—Aragorn—is one of a mysterious group of wanderers who travel the countryside, the Dúnedain or Rangers. They are regarded with suspicion by the ordinary folks in Bree; Barliman Butterbur the innkeeper warns Frodo about the suspicious-looking stranger sitting in the corner. Yet all the time the Rangers are patrolling the borders of the peaceful lands of Bree and the Shire, fending off possible threats. Aragorn says at the Council of Elrond:

‘Strider’ I am to one fat man who lives within a day’s march of foes that would freeze his heart, or lay his little town in ruin, if he were not guarded ceaselessly. Yet we would not have it otherwise. If simple folk are free from care and fear, simple they will be, and we must be secret to keep them so. (Fellowship of the Ring, II.2, p. 261)

Aragorn’s fond, if slightly aggrieved, remark brings out a difference. Pern’s dragonriders are a public society of defenders; everyone knows of their special role. But Tolkien’s Dúnedain, like the Lakewalkers in Bujold’s more recent fantasy, play a less public role. They are set apart, but because their heroism is unrecognized, they are objects more of suspicion than of admiration.

Pak protector – illustration courtesy of Christopher Bretz (bretz@bretz.ca)

For a more science-fictional take, consider Larry Niven’s Protectors, which figure in the novel Protector (naturally) and in the Ringworld stories. Niven imagines that humanity is descended from a species called the Pak, which matures through three life stages: child, breeder, and protector. The transition from the not-very-bright breeder stage to the highly intelligent and formidable protector stage is triggered by eating a root the characters call “tree-of-life.” When a Pak colony arrived on Earth ages ago, however, the soil lacked a chemical necessary for the tree-of-life root to function. The “breeders” could not change into protectors; instead, they evolved on their own into modern-day humans. Niven’s intriguing conceit is what we see as symptoms of old age actually represent the incomplete transition to the gaunt, tough, hairless protector stage.

Niven depicts the protectors as genetically compelled to protect the members of their own family or clan—the ones who “smell right.” A functioning Pak colony wouldn’t be as much like a human society as on Pern or Middle-Earth or Bujold’s imaginary world: it would consist of carefree, barely-sentient breeders watched over by creatures ruthlessly dedicated to their preservation. Think of it as an extreme case of the separation of defenders from defended.

Counter-Examples

On the other hand, a number of stories depict defenders who are much more thoroughly integrated into their broader societies.

Young Wizards

In Diane Duane’s Young Wizards series, youngsters with the potential for wizardry are called, not by receiving a letter from Hogwarts, but in more obscure ways—for example, running across a library book called So You Want To Be A Wizard. There are more wizards around than one might think, because on our planet they don’t advertise their powers: young wizards still go to school, grown-up wizards might be writers or sell advertising. (And not all of them are human; there are some very entertaining books about feline wizards.) But all of them are dedicated to the preservation and fostering of Life, by way of the Wizard’s Oath each must take. In this setup, there’s no resentment of the society of protectors because no one knows they exist; and abuse of wizardly powers is almost unheard-of, since violating the Oath tends to result in forgetting that wizardry even exists.

Kim Kinnison, Gray Lensman

By contrast, the elite corps of Lensmen in E.E. Smith’s famous series are publicly known and highly respected. They play the role of galactic policemen and secret agents, with particular attention to the mysterious pirates and drug-runners called “Boskone.” Like the Young Wizards, the Lensmen are (conveniently) incorruptible, being screened at the outset by the equally mysterious but benevolent Arisians. (This whole business of incorruptibility is something we need to examine more closely on another occasion.) But they don’t mind mixing in ordinary society—Gray Lensman includes a scene set at a formal ball—although their grave responsibilities often make them feel set apart in their lonely dedication.

Superheroes, as a class, may occupy the same position. They live as part of the general public, though their identities are usually secret. They tend to act as individuals rather than as a whole society, though they do come in small groups (and may occasionally take part in mega-battles that engage the whole range of heroes). But the modern superhero does show the ambivalence that often characterizes the select defender (Mr. Incredible’s remark that he sometimes wishes the world would just stay saved for a while). And some graphic novels take up the question of what it’s like for the ordinary person to live in a world full of superheroes—notably Kurt Busiek’s thoughtful Marvels (1994).

Narrative Tensions

The select society of protectors is a fine place for heroes. But it’s also dangerous. What if the protectors aren’t incorruptible, and turn bad? What if they become contemptuous of the people they protect, and come to think of themselves as better than the “rabble”? In many of the scenarios above, it takes special talents to qualify as one of the defenders. How likely is it that those who see themselves as specially qualified will end up thinking of themselves as superior? These questions form fertile ground for various plotlines.

The notion of the select (if not superior) set of defenders may even be seen as applying to a military organization, whose purpose is to protect the general public. “Citizen soldiers,” or draftees, may see themselves as primarily part of the overall society, temporarily detailed to do their civic duty; but a professional military, which can form its own tightly-knit society with its families and dependents, may be more easily tempted to think of itself as a group apart, with its own loyalties and camaraderie. In fiction, the entire genre of military SF borders the trope we’re examining here. In real life, the American military, at least, seems to have avoided that trap; we have not yet seen anything like a military coup.

Everyone Is a Tuvela

It’s interesting to contemplate the opposite trope: the citizen soldier model taken to its limit.

In James Schmitz’s 1968 novel The Demon Breed, a biochemist named Nile Etland on the human colony world Nandy-Cline discovers that independent researcher Ticos Cay has been captured by cruel and formidable aliens called the Parahuans. Ticos has played on the Parahuans’ own near-superstitious fears to convince them that Nile is a Tuvela, a member of a secret society of superhumans that are the real rulers of human civilization. All Nile has to do is convince the invaders that she is, in fact, a superior being it would be death to tangle with. And, with the help of Ticos, two mutant otters, and her own encyclopedic knowledge of the unique biology of Nandy-Cline, she does a marvelous job of pulling the wool over the Parahuans’ eyes and sending them fleeing back to their own worlds.

But there are no Tuvelas. Nile is a brilliantly resourceful and competent woman, but she’s not superhuman. Neither is Ticos, nor any of the other inhabitants who are involved at the end in dispersing the Parahuans. They’re simply ordinary humans. And there is no secret organization. Rather, Schmitz’s hypothesis is that a significant fraction of ordinary people (Ticos calls them “antipredators”) can take on that defensive role when extraordinary circumstances require them to do so. As one character remarks, the Parahuans would have run into “Tuvela” behavior no matter where they sought to attack.

The title The Demon Breed doesn’t refer to the Parahuans. It refers, from the unfortunate Parahuans’ point of view, to the uncannily resilient humans. Like the sturdy hobbits of the Shire, human beings are capable of rising to the occasion. At the end of the story, when the local Nandy-Cline military forces have mobilized to make sure the fleeing Parahuans don’t escape, Nile reflects: “The human demon was awake and snarling on Nandy-Cline” (ch. 9).

The select society of defenders is a potent storytelling trope; but so is the distributed resourcefulness of the ordinary person. And both may be useful to keep in mind as we act where we are needed.

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