Saturday, September 10, 2016

The Burning Bridge, Poul William Anderson

"The Burning Bridge" (1960) is the second of five available Poul William Anderson (1926-2001) ebooks available at feedbooks.com. It is a good short story and I recommend reading it.

This is the story of a long voyage from Earth to a planet called Rustum. The passengers are mostly frozen in a deep sleep due to the longevity of the voyage. The deep sleep allows for fewer fights over cabin fever. The crew take shifts so that some are able to take care of the ship and her needs while others sleep. They are political dissidents who are given the chance to live on another planet.

Earth is inferred as a dirty used up planet ravaged by war and humanity (fairly accurate description for this century as well). Rustum has been visited previously, and is described as being a kind of clean slate. The air is fresh. There are new opportunities there for the colony.

A message from earth, however, creates a conundrum for the protagonist, who is also the captain on duty. The message is that the ships are free to return to earth. The 'education decree' is the legislation that they are trying to escape. It sounds much like some kind of forced propaganda: perhaps similar to something big brother would do in George Orwell's brilliant novel, 1984, when finding people that thought outside of what was required.

Women and men are segregated during the voyage. Even married couples are not allowed to be wakened at the same time. When they have a video conference, the women must wear a veil (sounds Muslim to me) so as to not make the men horny. The men do not have a similar requirement. It is an ongoing cultural phenomena that is funny (as in sour milk, not ha-ha) to see in science fiction. Today, there are female students who have a different dress code than the boys. They cannot show a part of a bra or too much thigh in case it distracts the boys and causes problems. I suppose in the future this problem will not be solved, either. The hypocrisy remains in tact.

Another rather sexist point that is made in the story comes from the female he consults with over the conundrum of either continuing onto Rustum or returning to earth. Teresa says of how women think, and their place in making such a critical decision about their future:

"Few of them (the women) really wanted to come (to Rustum) in the first place. They did so only because their men insisted. Women are much too practical to care about a philosophy, or a frontier, or anything except their families."

The ship is close to a no return point where it would take as long to stop and turn around to return to earth as it would to continue on to Rustum. In fact, there would be little difference in time to simply go to Rustum, decide collectively who would stay or go. However, it is reasoned that they are decades away from being able to reach earth, and that changes may take place in that interim which would make everyone want to go back to Rustum. However, there is not enough fuel to change their minds again, and there might not be another chance at the voyage should governments on earth decide not to resend the ships.

Therefore, after much deliberation, Coffin decides that they are better off to go to Rustum regardless of the political situation on earth. However, he fears a mutiny should he try to force the issue. He decides to make a fake message designed to make everyone decide to continue onto Rustum. He makes a message sound like they are being compelled to return to earth, which of course would have the opposite effect. In his effort to create this tape, an officer catches him. They fight, and he forces the man into 'the vat' where he can sleep until the end of the voyage.

It's an interesting story and worth reading. Reading these science fiction stories certainly gives me an interesting view into how women were (and arguably still are) treated and perceived. I wonder if any stories out of the Golden Age of science fiction viewed women as equals or perceived a future where women would be treated as such.

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