Customer Reviews

Past Times

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This book is another collection of short stories by Poul Anderson, all but one (that being an engaging essay in praise of history as a subject for study) involving time travel in some form. Unlike the "Time Patrol" stories, however, the time travelers in "Past Times" are not connected by any overarching duty, and their time machines are of many different kinds. They (the travelers, that is) have a collection of motives, none of which are to save the world and humanity. One traveler, in fact, tours the whole of cosmic history in an extraordinarily roundabout attempt to get back to where he started. The Danellians, or something like them, do make one appearance in the last story, my favorite. A few jaunts into prehistory are made, one including a fight with a rather disappointingly dim-witted T-rex. We learn that Leonardo da Vinci invented a lot more than anyone knew, and even managed to build it! The misuse of a time machine (the Time Patrol would have had a fit) leads to a kind of time-hopping gang so eclectic that it becomes rather humorous. The idea of some kind of time intertia, which allows people to go into the future easily but not back into the past, is intriguing. I liked this book. Some stories were better than others, but none were duds, and some made me wish they had been developed into books. Recommended for people who enjoy the mere words, as well as the story. Be careful: with some stories (especially "The Nest"), I had to go back and read the first page or so over again once I'd figured out what was going on.