Dragonwriter (3 page)

Only, during the span of many novels, they come to discover a core truth: that things could be better.

That once upon a time they
were
better.

That their civilization fell, long ago, from a height so great that people once voyaged between stars, cured disease, led unconstrained lives, pondered secrets of the universe . . . and even
made dragons.

Moreover—and here is what distinguishes the characters of an Anne McCaffrey novel from those who live in similar situations penned by other authors—
as soon as they realize how much they've lost, they start wanting to get all of those things back.

By the third Dragonriders novel, where they find cryptic remnants from the interstellar times—and as more relics and clues are uncovered in later books—Anne's characters know that there's a different way. People don't have to live in grimy ignorance and violence, even lightened by clever medieval arts. It will be a long climb back, but they itch to get their hands on flush toilets, movable type, computers, and democracy. And one thing is certain—they are going to quit being feudal, just as soon as they can.

Perhaps when they become starfarers once again, they will remember fondly the lore that stitched them together during the long Dark Age. They may keep singing the songs, and even doff their hats to the scion of a lordly family or the current dragonmaster . . . so long as they have helped bring the renaissance and truly merit honor. Oh, but if those high and mighty ones get in the way? Try to obstruct?

I pity the fools.

Oh, sure. Feudalism tugs at something deep within us. Those images of lords and secretive mages and so on resonate in our hearts because we're all descended from the harems of guys who managed to pull off that trick of grabbing for themselves a pinnacle of inherited power. Why else would we, the heirs of enlightenment heroes, like Franklin and Lincoln and Edison, who finally ended the 6,000-year feudal hell, run off to fantasy flicks filled with bickering kings and elves and wizards and masters of arcane arts? We all have magic crystals on our tables that let us peer at distant lands, sift through all the world's knowledge, and converse with folk all around the globe. But how much more romantic to imagine that only a dozen demigods and mages had
palantírs,
instead of five billion peasant citizens!

No, there is clearly something deeply appealing about those old ways, the symbols and terrors and pastoral pleasures and songs. Anne McCaffrey certainly made good use of those resonating themes, and more power to her!

But Anne's notion of the
time flow of wisdom
was always aimed forward, rooted in a love and gratitude and belief in progress, in our ability to raise better generations, in a hope that more wondrous days will come.

She was a
science fiction author
—one of the best. And I'm proud to say she was my friend.

DAVID BRIN is a scientist, tech speaker/consultant, and author. His new novel about our survival in the near future is
Existence.
A film by Kevin Costner was based on
The Postman.
His sixteen novels, including
New York Times
bestsellers and Hugo Award winners, have been translated into more than twenty languages.
Earth
foreshadowed global warming, cyberwarfare, and the World Wide Web. David appears frequently on shows such as
Nova, The Universe,
and
Life After People,
speaking about science and future trends. His non-fiction book
The Transparent Society: Will Technology Make Us Choose Between Freedom and Privacy?
won the Freedom of Speech Award of the American Library Association.

R
ead this,” Mum said, thrusting
Carpe Diem
into my hands. Son or not, when Anne McCaffrey thrusts a book into your hands, you read it. Later that night, she was roused by the sound of me rustling through her bookshelves looking for more!

Mum totally loved the Liaden universe. Sharon Lee and Steve Miller are an amazing writing team and, as you'll see, very important to Anne McCaffrey.

WE TREASURE TWO
photographs of Anne McCaffrey, here in the Lee and Miller household. Both of them show Anne enjoying herself immensely, posing with authority and just a little bit of 'tude.

The first photo was taken by Steve, in 1978, when Anne was Guest of Honor at BaltiCon 12. She has one arm casually slung around the domed head of a familiar 'bot, cigarette in one hand, drink in the other. Her head is up, her expression mischievous, and she's wearing a very fannish sweatshirt, or a long-sleeved T-shirt, that puts forth these cosmic questions:

       
Why is man on this planet?

       
Why is space infinite?

       
Why are we doomed?

       
Why are you reading this stupid shirt?

In 1978, Sharon Lee and Steve Miller were not yet a team, though it happened that they both did, in very different capacities, attend BaltiCon 12.

Steve was a member of the concom (a fannish word for “convention committee”) and as such had contributed to the decision to bring Anne to BaltiCon as the Guest of Honor. He was also a full-time freelancer, writing fiction, music, and book reviews while stringing for a couple of local Baltimore-area newspapers. He was on the premises at the Hunt Valley Inn early, and as the only member of the press to ask for the honor, Anne granted him an interview and a photo op.

It was during the interview that Steve snapped the photo described previously; it was used in the
Unicorn Times,
the local Baltimore arts paper, as the lead photo for his story about BaltiCon.

After the interview, Steve and Anne toured the convention venue before it filled up, and before the rest of the concom arrived, since she had arrived the night before from Ireland.

The two hit it off, the way lubricated by the large number of “remember me to Annie!” exhortations Steve delivered from mutual fannish and professional acquaintances. They also found themselves at one regarding the benefits of workshops in writer development, Steve being a Clarion West survivor.

Since Steve's first and second pro stories for
Amazing
had just been published, Anne dispensed advice on good markets and avoidable markets and urged him to join SFWA—the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America—instantly. She also went on at length about how important art was to writers, something she greatly appreciated since Michael Whelan's cover art for
The White Dragon
was making waves and bringing increased attention to the book's upcoming release.

Now, science fiction conventions don't just happen, appearing at a hotel some Friday afternoon and evaporating at Sunday midnight. They are the effort of a particular science fiction community, such as the Baltimore Science Fiction Society, and they are run from opening ceremonies to the dead dog party (and for many months of planning before) by volunteers from the community.

As with all large undertakings, there are sometimes . . . glitches. When a glitch is discovered, members of the community step up to fix whatever's gone wrong.

And so, on the morning of the Friday afternoon on which BaltiCon 12 was to begin, it was discovered that a whole file box full of name tags for the preregistered attendees had not yet been typed. (In 1978, we still did these things by typewriter and by hand.) Friday morning is always a frantic pre-con time, with a lot of last-minute tasks and setup to attend to—and the badges shouldn't have been one of those “last-minute” things.

There was, on discovery of this lapse, a rather . . . energetic discussion in Ops (a fannish word for “operations office”) regarding how the name tags were to be made ready in time to open the registration table at four. The discussion was so energetic, in fact, that no one noticed that the Guest of Honor had entered the room and had heard the whole kerfuffle.

“I can,” she said, using all the lung power of a trained singer, “type, you know.”

There was a period of silence while people caught their breaths and waited for their ears to stop ringing. Then came a gentle objection from the con chair: Surely, they couldn't ask their Guest of Honor to do gofer work.

“I'm bored,” was Anne's answer. “Give me something to do.”

And so it was, when Sharon arrived at the convention that Friday evening, Anne McCaffrey was sitting behind the registration desk, happily typing the name tags for the on-site registrants, to many of those across the table just another energetic fan making them welcome at the con.

As Guest of Honor, Anne was, of course, the first and most honored member of the convention, a role she took to with serious playfulness, enjoying the panels and serious side of things, and taking an obvious and more than somewhat fannish delight in the art show and the hucksters room, and later at the numerous evening parties as well. She did this the entire weekend, tirelessly dealing as both pro and fan, with sharp interest in all aspects of her community.