September 24, 2025 • 12 mins
In a distant future, Earth continues its orbit around the Sun, a forgotten speck in the galaxy, irrelevant to its trillions of descendants. Yet, for the few million who remain, life is a tapestry of simplicity and quiet joy. But when interstellar politics demands their departure from Earth, the story unfolds in unexpected ways. Join the legendary Poul Anderson as he delves into the significance of Earth to humanity, focusing on one mans poignant journey. (Summary by Phil Chenevert)
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Part two of the chapter ends by Paul Anderson. He
could have willed the vague regret out of his trained
nervous system, but he didn't want to. This was the
last time human eyes would ever look on Earth, and
somehow Juron felt that it should be more to him
than just another psychotechnic job. Hello, good sir, He turned
(00:25):
at the voice and forced his tired lips into a
friendly smile. Hello Julith, he said. It was a wise
policy to learn the names of the townspeople at least,
and she was a great great granddaughter of the speaker.
She was some thirteen or fourteen years old, a freckle
faced child with a shy smile and steady green eyes.
(00:49):
There was a certain awkward grace about her, and she
seemed more imaginative than most of her stolid race. She
curtsied quaintly for him, her bare foot reaching out under
the long smock which was baily female dress. Here are
you busy, good sir? She asked, Well, not too much,
(01:10):
said Joron. He was glad of a chance to talk.
It silenced his thoughts. What can I do for you,
I wondered? She hesitated, then breathlessly, I wondered if you
could give me a lift down to the beach for
only an hour or two. It's too far to walk
there before I have to go home, and I can't
(01:30):
borrow a car or even a horse. If it won't
be any trouble, sir, Hm, shouldn't you be at home now?
Isn't there milking or so on to do? Oh? I
don't live on a farm, good sir. My father is
a baker. Yes, yes, so he is. I should have remembered.
Jorin considered for an instant. There was enough to do
(01:53):
in town, and it wasn't fair for him to play
hooky while Zarek worked alone. Why do you want to
go to the beach, Julith, We'll be busy packing up,
she said, starting tomorrow. I guess this is my last
chance to see it. Jaron's mouth twisted a little, all right,
he said, I'll take you. You are very kind, good sir,
(02:16):
she said gravely. He didn't reply, but held out his arm,
and she clasped it with one hand while her other
arm gripped his waist. The generator inside his skull responded
to his will, reaching out and cloying itself to the
fabric of forces and energies, which was physical space. They
(02:37):
rose quietly and went so slowly seaward that he didn't
have to raise a windscreen. Will we be able to
fly like this when we get to the stars, she asked,
I'm afraid not, Julith, he said, you see, the people
of my civilization are born this way. Thousands of years ago,
(02:58):
men learned how to control the great basic forces of
the cosmos with only a small bit of energy. Finally,
they used artificial mutation. That is, they changed themselves slowly
over many generations, until their brains grew a new part
that could generate this controlling force. We can now even
(03:19):
fly between the stars by this power. But your people
don't have that brain, so we had to build spaceships
to take you away. I see, she said, your great
great great grandchildren can be like us if your people
want to be changed. Thus, he said, they didn't want
to change before. She answered, I don't think they'll do
(03:41):
it now, even in their new home. Her voice held
no bitterness. It was an acceptance. Privately, Jaron doubted it.
The psychic shock of this uprooting would be bound to
destroy the old traditions of the Terrans. It would not
take many centuries before where they were culturally assimilated by
(04:02):
galactic civilization. Assimilated nice euphemism, why not just say eaten?
They landed on the beach. It was broad and white,
running in dunes, from the thin, harsh, salt streaked grass
to the roar and tumble of the surf. The sun
(04:22):
was low over the watery horizon, filling the damp, blowing
air with gold. Jarren could almost look directly at its
huge disk. He sat down. The sand gritted tently under him,
and the wind rumpled his hair and filled his nostrils
with its sharp, wet smell. He picked up a conch
(04:44):
and turned it over in his fingers, wondering at the
intricate architecture of it. If you hold it to your ear,
said Julith, you can hear the sea. Her childish voice
was curiously tender around the rough syllables of Earth's language.
He nodded and obeyed her hint. It was only the
(05:04):
small pulse of blood within him. You heard the same
thing out in the great hollow silence of space. But
it did sing of restless immensities, wind and foam, and
the long waves marching under the moon. I have two
of them myself, said Julith. I want them so I
can always remember this beach, and my children and their
(05:28):
children will hold them to and hear our sea talking.
She folded his hands around the shell. You keep this
one for yourself, Thank you, he said, I will. The
combers rolled in, booming and sprouting against the land. The
Terrans call them the horses of God. A thin cloud
(05:49):
in the west was turning rose and gold. Are there
oceans on our new planet, asked Julith, Yes, he said.
It's the most earth like world we could that wasn't
already inhabited. You'll be happy there. But the trees and grasses,
the soil and the fruits thereof the beasts of the field,
and the birds of the air, and the fish of
(06:11):
the waters beneath farm, and color, smell and sound, taste
and texture. Everything is different, is alien. The difference is small, subtle,
but it is the abyss of two billion years of
separate evolution, and no other world can ever quite be Earth.
(06:35):
Judith looked straight at him with solemn eyes. Are you
folks afraid of Holdubians? She asked, Why no, He said,
of course not. Then why are you giving Earth to them.
It was a soft question, but it trembled just a little.
I thought all your people understood the reason. By now,
(06:57):
said Juran. The civilization of Man and his non human
allies has moved inward toward the great star clusters of
galactic center. This part of space means nothing to us anymore.
It's almost a desert. You haven't seen starlight till you've
(07:18):
seen by Sagittarius. Now. The Holduvians are another civilization. They're
not the least bit like us. They live on big,
poisonous worlds like Jupiter and Saturn. I think they would
seem like pretty nice monsters if they weren't so alien
to us that neither side can really understand the other.
(07:39):
They use the cosmic energies too, but in a different way,
and their way interferes with ours, just as ours interferes
with theirs. Different brains, you see. Anyway, it was decided
that the two civilizations would get along best by just
staying away from each other. If they divided up the
(07:59):
galaxy between them, there would be no interference. It would
be too far from one civilization to the other. The
Uldubians were really very nice about it. They were willing
to take the outer rim, even if there are fewer stars,
and let us have the center. So by the agreement,
we've got to have all men and men like beings
(08:22):
out of their territory before they come to settle in,
just as they'll move out of ours. Their colonists won't
be coming to Jupiter and Saturn for centuries yet. But
even so, we have to clear the Serious Sector now,
because there'll be a lot of work to do elsewhere. Fortunately,
there are only a few people living in this whole
(08:44):
part of space. The Serious Sector has been an isolated,
prim a quiet region since the first Empire fell fifty
thousand years ago. Julius's voice rose a little. But those
people are us, and the folks of Alpha Centauri and
Proxyon and Serious and oh hundreds of other stars. Yet
(09:07):
all of you together are only one tiny drop in
the quadrillions of the galaxy. Don't you see, Julith, you
have to move for the good of all of us. Yes,
she said, yes, I know all that. She got up,
shaking herself. Let's go swimming. Jaron smiled and shook his head. No,
(09:28):
I'll wait for you if you want to go. She
nodded and ran off down the beach, sheltering behind a
dune to put on a bathing suit. The Terrans had
a nudity taboo in spite of the mild intergalact climate.
Typical primitive irrationality. Jarren lay back, folding his arms behind
his head, and looked up at the darkening sky. The
(09:52):
evening star twinkled forth low and white on the dusk
blue horizon. Venus or was it murky? He wasn't sure.
He wished he knew more about the early history of
the Solar System, the first men to ride their thunderous
rockets out to die on unknown hell worlds, the first
clumsy steps toward the stars. He could look it up
(10:15):
in the archives of Corazuno, but he knew he never would.
Too much else to do, too much to remember. Probably
less than one percent of mankind's throngs even knew where
Earth was today, though for a while it had been
quite a tourist center, but that was perhaps thirty thousand
years ago. Because this world, out of all the billions,
(10:40):
has certain physical characteristics, he thought, my race has made
them into standards, our basic units of length and time
and acceleration, our comparisons by which we classify the swarming
planets of the galaxy, They all go back ultimately to Earth.
We bear them that unspoken memorial to our birthplace, within
(11:03):
our whole civilization, and we bear it forever. But has
she given us more than that? Are our own cells,
body and minds and dreams? Are they also the children
of Earth? Now he was thinking like Cormped, stubborn old Cormped,
who clung with such a blind strength to this land
(11:25):
simply because it was his. When you considered all the
races of this wonderfooted species, how many of them there were,
how many kinds of man between the stars, And yet
they all walked upright. They all had two eyes and
a nose between, and a mouth below. They were all
cells of that great and ancient culture which had begun
(11:49):
here eons past with the first hairy half man who
kindled a fire against night. If Earth had not had
darkness and cold and prowling beasts oxygen and cellulose in flint,
that culture might never have gestated. I'm getting unlogical, too, tarred,
(12:10):
nerves worn too thin, psychosomatic control slipping. Now Earth is
becoming some obscure mother symbol for me? Or has she
always been one for the whole race of us. A
seagull cried harshly overhead, and sword from view. The sunset
was smoldering away, and dusk rose like fog out of
(12:33):
the ground. Julip came running back to him, her face
indistinct in the gloom. She was breathing hard, and he
couldn't tell if the catch in her voice was laughter
or weeping. I'd better be getting home, she said, end
of Part two.
Part two of the chapter ends by Paul Anderson. He
could have willed the vague regret out of his trained
nervous system, but he didn't want to. This was the
last time human eyes would ever look on Earth, and
somehow Juron felt that it should be more to him
than just another psychotechnic job. Hello, good sir, He turned
(00:25):
at the voice and forced his tired lips into a
friendly smile. Hello Julith, he said. It was a wise
policy to learn the names of the townspeople at least,
and she was a great great granddaughter of the speaker.
She was some thirteen or fourteen years old, a freckle
faced child with a shy smile and steady green eyes.
(00:49):
There was a certain awkward grace about her, and she
seemed more imaginative than most of her stolid race. She
curtsied quaintly for him, her bare foot reaching out under
the long smock which was baily female dress. Here are
you busy, good sir? She asked, Well, not too much,
(01:10):
said Joron. He was glad of a chance to talk.
It silenced his thoughts. What can I do for you,
I wondered? She hesitated, then breathlessly, I wondered if you
could give me a lift down to the beach for
only an hour or two. It's too far to walk
there before I have to go home, and I can't
(01:30):
borrow a car or even a horse. If it won't
be any trouble, sir, Hm, shouldn't you be at home now?
Isn't there milking or so on to do? Oh? I
don't live on a farm, good sir. My father is
a baker. Yes, yes, so he is. I should have remembered.
Jorin considered for an instant. There was enough to do
(01:53):
in town, and it wasn't fair for him to play
hooky while Zarek worked alone. Why do you want to
go to the beach, Julith, We'll be busy packing up,
she said, starting tomorrow. I guess this is my last
chance to see it. Jaron's mouth twisted a little, all right,
he said, I'll take you. You are very kind, good sir,
(02:16):
she said gravely. He didn't reply, but held out his arm,
and she clasped it with one hand while her other
arm gripped his waist. The generator inside his skull responded
to his will, reaching out and cloying itself to the
fabric of forces and energies, which was physical space. They
(02:37):
rose quietly and went so slowly seaward that he didn't
have to raise a windscreen. Will we be able to
fly like this when we get to the stars, she asked,
I'm afraid not, Julith, he said, you see, the people
of my civilization are born this way. Thousands of years ago,
(02:58):
men learned how to control the great basic forces of
the cosmos with only a small bit of energy. Finally,
they used artificial mutation. That is, they changed themselves slowly
over many generations, until their brains grew a new part
that could generate this controlling force. We can now even
(03:19):
fly between the stars by this power. But your people
don't have that brain, so we had to build spaceships
to take you away. I see, she said, your great
great great grandchildren can be like us if your people
want to be changed. Thus, he said, they didn't want
to change before. She answered, I don't think they'll do
(03:41):
it now, even in their new home. Her voice held
no bitterness. It was an acceptance. Privately, Jaron doubted it.
The psychic shock of this uprooting would be bound to
destroy the old traditions of the Terrans. It would not
take many centuries before where they were culturally assimilated by
(04:02):
galactic civilization. Assimilated nice euphemism, why not just say eaten?
They landed on the beach. It was broad and white,
running in dunes, from the thin, harsh, salt streaked grass
to the roar and tumble of the surf. The sun
(04:22):
was low over the watery horizon, filling the damp, blowing
air with gold. Jarren could almost look directly at its
huge disk. He sat down. The sand gritted tently under him,
and the wind rumpled his hair and filled his nostrils
with its sharp, wet smell. He picked up a conch
(04:44):
and turned it over in his fingers, wondering at the
intricate architecture of it. If you hold it to your ear,
said Julith, you can hear the sea. Her childish voice
was curiously tender around the rough syllables of Earth's language.
He nodded and obeyed her hint. It was only the
(05:04):
small pulse of blood within him. You heard the same
thing out in the great hollow silence of space. But
it did sing of restless immensities, wind and foam, and
the long waves marching under the moon. I have two
of them myself, said Julith. I want them so I
can always remember this beach, and my children and their
(05:28):
children will hold them to and hear our sea talking.
She folded his hands around the shell. You keep this
one for yourself, Thank you, he said, I will. The
combers rolled in, booming and sprouting against the land. The
Terrans call them the horses of God. A thin cloud
(05:49):
in the west was turning rose and gold. Are there
oceans on our new planet, asked Julith, Yes, he said.
It's the most earth like world we could that wasn't
already inhabited. You'll be happy there. But the trees and grasses,
the soil and the fruits thereof the beasts of the field,
and the birds of the air, and the fish of
(06:11):
the waters beneath farm, and color, smell and sound, taste
and texture. Everything is different, is alien. The difference is small, subtle,
but it is the abyss of two billion years of
separate evolution, and no other world can ever quite be Earth.
(06:35):
Judith looked straight at him with solemn eyes. Are you
folks afraid of Holdubians? She asked, Why no, He said,
of course not. Then why are you giving Earth to them.
It was a soft question, but it trembled just a little.
I thought all your people understood the reason. By now,
(06:57):
said Juran. The civilization of Man and his non human
allies has moved inward toward the great star clusters of
galactic center. This part of space means nothing to us anymore.
It's almost a desert. You haven't seen starlight till you've
(07:18):
seen by Sagittarius. Now. The Holduvians are another civilization. They're
not the least bit like us. They live on big,
poisonous worlds like Jupiter and Saturn. I think they would
seem like pretty nice monsters if they weren't so alien
to us that neither side can really understand the other.
(07:39):
They use the cosmic energies too, but in a different way,
and their way interferes with ours, just as ours interferes
with theirs. Different brains, you see. Anyway, it was decided
that the two civilizations would get along best by just
staying away from each other. If they divided up the
(07:59):
galaxy between them, there would be no interference. It would
be too far from one civilization to the other. The
Uldubians were really very nice about it. They were willing
to take the outer rim, even if there are fewer stars,
and let us have the center. So by the agreement,
we've got to have all men and men like beings
(08:22):
out of their territory before they come to settle in,
just as they'll move out of ours. Their colonists won't
be coming to Jupiter and Saturn for centuries yet. But
even so, we have to clear the Serious Sector now,
because there'll be a lot of work to do elsewhere. Fortunately,
there are only a few people living in this whole
(08:44):
part of space. The Serious Sector has been an isolated,
prim a quiet region since the first Empire fell fifty
thousand years ago. Julius's voice rose a little. But those
people are us, and the folks of Alpha Centauri and
Proxyon and Serious and oh hundreds of other stars. Yet
(09:07):
all of you together are only one tiny drop in
the quadrillions of the galaxy. Don't you see, Julith, you
have to move for the good of all of us. Yes,
she said, yes, I know all that. She got up,
shaking herself. Let's go swimming. Jaron smiled and shook his head. No,
(09:28):
I'll wait for you if you want to go. She
nodded and ran off down the beach, sheltering behind a
dune to put on a bathing suit. The Terrans had
a nudity taboo in spite of the mild intergalact climate.
Typical primitive irrationality. Jarren lay back, folding his arms behind
his head, and looked up at the darkening sky. The
(09:52):
evening star twinkled forth low and white on the dusk
blue horizon. Venus or was it murky? He wasn't sure.
He wished he knew more about the early history of
the Solar System, the first men to ride their thunderous
rockets out to die on unknown hell worlds, the first
clumsy steps toward the stars. He could look it up
(10:15):
in the archives of Corazuno, but he knew he never would.
Too much else to do, too much to remember. Probably
less than one percent of mankind's throngs even knew where
Earth was today, though for a while it had been
quite a tourist center, but that was perhaps thirty thousand
years ago. Because this world, out of all the billions,
(10:40):
has certain physical characteristics, he thought, my race has made
them into standards, our basic units of length and time
and acceleration, our comparisons by which we classify the swarming
planets of the galaxy, They all go back ultimately to Earth.
We bear them that unspoken memorial to our birthplace, within
(11:03):
our whole civilization, and we bear it forever. But has
she given us more than that? Are our own cells,
body and minds and dreams? Are they also the children
of Earth? Now he was thinking like Cormped, stubborn old Cormped,
who clung with such a blind strength to this land
(11:25):
simply because it was his. When you considered all the
races of this wonderfooted species, how many of them there were,
how many kinds of man between the stars, And yet
they all walked upright. They all had two eyes and
a nose between, and a mouth below. They were all
cells of that great and ancient culture which had begun
(11:49):
here eons past with the first hairy half man who
kindled a fire against night. If Earth had not had
darkness and cold and prowling beasts oxygen and cellulose in flint,
that culture might never have gestated. I'm getting unlogical, too, tarred,
(12:10):
nerves worn too thin, psychosomatic control slipping. Now Earth is
becoming some obscure mother symbol for me? Or has she
always been one for the whole race of us. A
seagull cried harshly overhead, and sword from view. The sunset
was smoldering away, and dusk rose like fog out of
(12:33):
the ground. Julip came running back to him, her face
indistinct in the gloom. She was breathing hard, and he
couldn't tell if the catch in her voice was laughter
or weeping. I'd better be getting home, she said, end
of Part two.
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