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A new hardcover edition of the 1971 novel by Sylvia Louise Engdahl was
published in March, 2003 by Walker & Company (ISBN 0-8027-8848-3). The jacket
and interior vignettes are by Jody Hewgill. A paperback edition was
published by Firebird Books in February 2005 (ISBN 0-14-240293-1).
This edition has been revised to update its statements about the Critical Stage, the stage of evolution at which a species is ready to begin expanding into space. It is much more timely and convincing than the original 1971 edition, although the action of the story hasn't been changed--so old copies should be discarded. If you have read the book, please read the detailed FAQ about it! |
This novel is not intended for readers below teenage. Although it is also about Elana, it's a completely separate story that's quite different from the first book about her, Enchantress from the Stars. | |
Times Literary Supplement |
Commonweal |
Publisher's Weekly |
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See more excerpts from reviews of the book (With links to full reviews if they are online)  Order paperback from amazon.com (or add reader review) If you choose to buy a used copy, be sure it is the updated edition | ||
Elana, having completed her training as an agent of the Anthropological
Service, is sent to a world whose people may soon destroy their
civilization. Since not enough is understood about the situation to justify
any interference with their evolution, the Service has no power to act; its
agents must go as helpless observers, posing as natives, in the hope of
gaining knowledge that may help to save other worlds. This passive role
proves intolerable to the young, inexperienced agent assigned to the same
city as Elana, a city under totalitarian rule. After falling in love with a
local girl who has become Elana's closest friend, he identifies too
completely with the natives and unwittingly endangers the entire world by a
well-meant but ill-advised attempt to intervene. Forced to assume
responsibility for undoing the damage, Elana finds that only she--at great
cost--can prevent an immediate war of annihilation.
A short excerpt from the book
The Director went on, "Once again something unusual has come up, something of unquestioned significance. So I'm going to contradict nearly everything I just said and offer you an assignment that will probably finish the job of ruining you for anything routine and tame."
I let out a sigh of relief, and the anticipatory tingle I felt wasn't at all unpleasant. He was saying, "I'm recruiting every agent who can halfway qualify, because it may involve the most important anthropological discovery of our era. No, don't smile yet," he put in quickly. "Not till you hear more about it. It won't be an enjoyable assignment; if you accept, you'll be plunged up to your neck in something very distressing."
"If I accept?"
"This particular mission calls for volunteers," he said quietly.
There was no need for him to spell out the implications; while all field jobs are risky, some involve more risk than an agent is ordered to assume. But his strategy, of course, had been effective. Not that I was pushed into accepting; if there had been the slightest question about this being a job I would want, the offer wouldn't have been made. Moreover, I could have turned it down. I don't go along with the notion that people aren't responsible for their own choices, or that they are somehow not "free" because something has affected the odds. The Director's suggestion of routine work as the only available alternative was entirely sincere; he was not threatening me. And though he may have used shrewd psychology to hook me, he went on to give me full warning.
"Elana," he said seriously, "the mission isn't an easy one. As I told you, you'll be sent in as an observer. The situation to be observed is, to say the least, explosive; that in itself entails hazards. But there's something worse: You will be only an observer, and you won't like what you see."
He had become very grave and, I felt, heavyhearted. We hadn't communicated silently, for we didn't know each other well enough to do so without need; yet since emotion heightens telepathic sensitivity, I grasped more than had been expressed in verbal form. "The Younglings you'll deal with are in danger," he said. "Once before you visited a world that was endangered--to save it. This world we have no power to save. Do you realize what that means?"
I was beginning to, and it wasn't a happy realization. When you're in contact with Younglings, you begin to identify with them, care about them. Younglings are people. You feel just as strongly about them as if they were your own race; if you're not a person who can do that, you are not selected to be a field agent. But it's painful. You are vulnerable to all kinds of hurts.
"It means that there are just three ways it can end," he told me gently. "The danger may not materialize; in that case your personal peril, which will be great, will be all you have to worry about. On the other hand, these people may be wiped out, and if so"--he paused, his eyes meeting mine, then forged ahead--"you will either share their fate or stand by, helplessly, and watch it happen."
"Watch it happen? Will it be sudden?"
"They are on the verge of a nuclear war, Elana."
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
"We'll try to stop it, won't we?" I protested when he told me that we had no power to save Toris. "The war, I mean--we certainly won't just wait!"
"You know better, Elana," the Director said regretfully. "Besides, I told you that this job would not involve intervention."
I hesitated, mustering my self-control, judging all the angles as I had been taught to do. "I suppose you're going to tell me," I said finally, "that it would be interference in their internal affairs. But surely, if it's a choice between that and letting their whole civilization be wiped out--"
"Elana," he reminded me, "the hands-off policy isn't arbitrary; it's for the Younglings' protection. In following it, we put their best interests first, as we are bound by the Oath to do."
Hotly I retorted, "And it would be in their best interests to let them blow up their planet while we sit back and take notes? Is that what you're saying?"
He was equally forceful, "I will be blunt. Yes, I'm saying exactly that. Think, Elana! You suggest that we should stop their war. We can't stop it. We don't know how. We don't even know whether it's going to materialize; and if it doesn't, any tampering on our part would simply make matters worse."
It was true enough, I realized, that finding a way to help would be easier said than done. We couldn't stop the war by force; though the Federation has powers far superior to anything possessed by Younglings, one thing we do know is that the use of force does more harm than good. We also know that we can't reveal ourselves to Younglings without doing irreparable damage to the civilization involved. In the rare cases where we intervene, it is through a ruse of some kind, and that's not always feasible.
"We ought to at least make an attempt," I persisted. "I know why meddling is forbidden: Younglings advance only through solving their own problems, and their development is thrown out of kilter if we try to solve any of their problems for them. But isn't that pretty meaningless if they don't survive long enough to go on developing?"
"Of course. And the policy allows for that; it permits us to step in if we're sure that nothing else can prevent extinction of the Youngling race. That isn't the case here. Many worlds--most, in fact--manage to avert nuclear war on their own, and interference might very well reduce this one's chances."
"Yet some don't. Maybe nothing else can prevent these people's extinction! Suppose we saw an opportunity to act safely, to do something that wouldn't involve force or disclosure--would we break policy?"
"Don't torture yourself over a question that won't arise," he said gently. Leaning forward, he looked straight into my eyes. "It's not an easy one to grapple with; don't think that I haven't had sleepless nights over it myself. But on this mission you are not going to face such a choice."
That seemed like evading the issue. I didn't reply aloud, but silently I challenged him: How can you be sure? Am I to pretend not to see it if it comes?
If you did, you wouldn't be worth much as an agent.
I turned away from him, fixing my gaze on the bright arch of windows and, beyond, the towers of the city, seen through the sun-filter as shadowy, abstract shapes. Why, I thought privately, do we get ourselves into these things? When we could live here, here where everything is clean and comfortable and safe, and "nuclear war" is a reality known only to the ancients?
"There will be no conflict with policy," the Director assured me. "In order to figure out any sort of action, we'd have to know the key--the factor that keeps some worlds from diverting their energies into the normal channel instead of into destructive ones--and if we knew that, we'd also know whether intervention was justified. But we don't have that key. We don't understand the dynamics of the Critical Stage; that's precisely what we hope to learn from the mission."
"Critical Stage?" I said slowly. It was the first time the term had come up in our discussion, so I had to think back over several years of study to place it. "Isn't that the period just before a people begins to colonize space? When they've reached the point where they can move beyond their home planet, only they haven't quite taken the plunge?"
The Director nodded. "Do you remember what's 'critical' about it?"
"Well, if they're at the point where they have the technology to attempt space travel, they also have the technology to destroy their world, either by depletion of its resources or through a war of annihilation--and every case that has ever been recorded shows that a people will do one or the other, but not both."
"That's right. They've got to develop that technology, and the preparation for war helps do it. Which is all right, as long as it doesn't go beyond preparation. The natural outlet of the effort is the colonization of space, which all peoples must achieve in order to become mature."
"And establishing off-world colonies prevents all-out war itself from occurring?"
"Yes, if there's an ongoing commitment to the effort. That's the turning point. Once they're putting all their energy into it, they're out of danger." He sighed and added grimly, "The people of the world to which you're going haven't so much as orbited a satellite."
"I didn't know that there were any Younglings in Critical Stage--now, I mean. The cases I studied were all past history."
"The planet Toris," he explained, "was discovered only a short while ago. If we had found it sooner, we would have seen the crisis approaching; we would have had teams in there for years. As it is, we've got to work fast. We don't know how much time we have left."
I shivered. Implicit in that last remark was a warning that we would use
all the time there was. If it ran out unexpectedly, there might be no rescue
for the observers.
Read FAQ about the story
Sylvia Engdahl's Home Page: www.sylviaengdahl.com