They Shall Have Stars
Cities In Flight, Volume One
James Blish
And death shall have no dominion
Dead men naked they shall be one
With the man in the wind and the west moon;
When their bones are picked clean and the clean bones gone,
They shall have stars at elbow and foot...
DYLAN THOMAS
"...While Vegan civilization was undergoing this peculiar decline in influence, while at the height of its political and military power, the culture which was eventually to replace it was beginning 'to unfold. The reader should bear in mind that at that time nobody had ever heard of the Earth, and the planet's sun, Sol, was known only as an undistinguished type G0 star in the Draco sector. It is possible although highly unlikely that Vega knew that the Earth had developed space flight some time before the events we have just reviewed here. It was, however, only local interplanetary flight; up to this period, Earth had taken no part in Galactic history. It was inevitable, however, that Earth should make the two crucial discoveries which would bring it on to that starry stage. We may be very sure that Vega, had she known that Earth was to be her successor, would have exerted all of her enormous might to prevent it. That Vega failed to do so is evidence enough that she had no real idea of what was happening on Earth at this time
ACREFFMONALES: The Milky Way:
Contents
Contents
Five Cultural Portraits
BOOK ONE
PRELUDE: Washington
CHAPTER ONE New York
CHAPTER TWO: Jupiter V
CHAPTER THREE: New York
CHAPTER FOUR: Jupiter V
BOOK TWO
INTERMEZZO: Washington
CHAPTER FIVE: New York
CHAPTER SIX: Jupiter V
CHAPTER SEVEN: New York
CHAPTER EIGHT: Jupiter V
BOOK THREE
ENTRACTE: Washington
CHAPTER NINE: New York
CHAPTER TEN: Jupiter V
CHAPTER ELEVEN: Jupiter V
Five Cultural Portraits
BOOK ONE
PRELUDE: Washington
We do not believe any group of men adequate enough or wise enough to operate without scrutiny or without criticism. We know that the only way to avoid error is to detect it, that the only way to detect it is to be free to inquire. We know that in secrecy error undetected will.' flourish and subvert.
J. ROBERT OPPENHEIMER
Thin shadows flickered on the walls to his left and right, just inside the edges of his vision, like shapes stepping quickly back into invisible doorways. Despite his bonedeep weariness, they made him nervous, almost made him wish that Dr. Corsi would put out the fire. Nevertheless, he remained staring into the leaping orange 1ight, feeling the heat tightening his cheeks and the skin around his eyes, and soaking into his chest.
Corsi stirred a little beside him, but Senator Wagoner's own weight on the sofa seemed to have been increasing ever since he had first sat down. He felt drained, lethargic, as old and heavy as a stone despite his forty-eight years; it had been a bad day in a long succession of bad days. Good days in Washington were the ones you slept through.