"Then, in heaven's name," cried Tyburn. "What are you?"
Ian looked from his far distance down into Tyburn's eyes and the sadness rang as clear in his voice finally, as iron-shod heels on barren rock.
"I am a man of war," said Ian, softly.
With that, he turned and went on; and Tyburn saw him black against the winter-bright sky, looming over all the other departing passengers, on his way to board the spaceship.
Afterword
The Plume and the Sword
by Sandra Miesel
"Fantasy abandoned by reason produces impossible monsters; united with it, she is the mother of the arts and origin of marvels."
- Goya
In life even as in art, the harmony of opposites is Gordon R. Dickson's constant goal. This man who unifies opposing principles in his fiction unites within himself the most disparate extremes of frivolity and keenness - the plume and sword alike are his to wear.
In person, Dickson's fluffiness has always made the greatest impression on the greatest number of people. He is everyone's favorite conventioneer. (During his forty years in sf fandom, he has attended hundreds of conventions.) His image as the jolly party-goer, singing and playing the guitar until dawn, led Ben Bova to parody My Darling Clementine in Dickson's honor. The chorus concludes: "Science fiction is his hobby/ But his main job's having fun."
Dickson is a veteran trencherman, a mainstay of epic dinner parties, but he has also been known to spend more time selecting the wine than eating the meal. His bizarre preference for drinking milk, juice, coffee, beer, and Bloody Marys at the same breakfast has been cause for comment since his student days at the University of Minnesota thirty years ago. Lately, allergies (including - alas - a mild one to wine) and a desire for waistline trimness have tempered these habits somewhat, but Dickson's zest for living remains uncommonly brisk.
Yet such pleasures are the least components of his joie de vivre. Dickson has a capacity for wonder that will not be worn out. It has been claimed that no one else can say "golly" quite as joyfully as he does. (Dickson's habit of burbling along in innocent schoolboy exclamations once inspired some of his friends to stage a "Gordon R. Dickson Murfle-Alike Contest.")
Enthusiasm colors everything he does. He not only admires fine craftsmanship, he quizzes craftsmen on the tools, techniques, and attitudes that support their skills. (How many men would demand to see the wrong side of embroidered fabric?) He is always eager for new knowledge and fresh experiences. Recent endeavors include lessons in bagpipe-playing and in akido. Moreover, he encourages the same adventurousness in others. His friends have found themselves wielding knives, making lace, or writing novels for the first time at his urging.
Dickson describes himself as "a galloping optimist," unshakably certain that "man's future is onward and upward.'" Right must inevitably triumph. He admits that human beings may not be quite perfectible - "Perfectible is a little too good to be true - but improvable, tremendously improvable by their own strength."
Idealism gives him confidence in his own potential as well as that of his species. After watching his own Childe Cycle gradually move from rejection to acceptance, after observing fractious humans slowly struggle to build things together, Dickson concludes that creativity can overcome all obstacles. It is the only sure key to progress.
This same confidence in creativity makes him patient with other people, no matter how unpromising they may seem. He is among the most approachable of all sf professionals. For instance, few others would have taken the time to explain the elementary rules of prosody to an aspiring ballad writer and then been on hand afterwards to applaud her first acceptable efforts. Dickson's forbearance, skill, and above all, his respect for even the grubbiest amateur's dignity, have made him a superb mentor for young authors who are serious about their art. (Among the newer names in sf who have at times listened to him are Joe Haldeman, Robert Aspirin, and Lynn Abbey.) Dickson tends to down play his influence because he believes that "fine teaching comes as automatically as breathing" to experienced writers. Yet his inner nature is revealed by the positive effects he has on those around him. For the past three decades his encouragement of talent and his support of professionalism have worked like buds of yeast to leaven the sf field.
One thing Dickson will not endure patiently is a shoddy performance. His Victorian upbringing imbued him with high standards of excellence. He has a born aristocrat's awareness of his own prerogatives, even in trivial matters: woe to the careless waiter who serves Dickson's vichyssoise improperly chilled. But his special ire is reserved for time-wasters too lazy to develop their own talents. "Some people," he com plains, "like my advice so much, they frame it and hang it on the wall instead of using it." Fortunately such failures are rare. Most of those who beseech his advice or cry on his broad shoulders put the experience to good use.
Dickson's helpfulness arouses a corresponding help fulness in others. Whether he asks for a Puritan sermon text, an Italian menu, a sample of Gregorian chant, or medical data on battle wounds, someone will promptly provide it - fandom is a living data bank. So grateful is he for help, he attracts almost too much solicitude. At times the attentiveness of friends reduces Dickson to the status of a favorite teddy bear in danger of having all its fur petted off.
Dickson's admirers do react intensely. Women's tears over the fate of Ian Graeme in Soldier, Ask Not prodded him to re-examine the implications of his text and see a solution to the tragedy. Other fans want to elaborate the Cycle's background with or without the author's sanction. There was the lawyer who speculated on interstellar legal systems and the artist who tried to predict future art tastes. The most conspicuous example of this phenomenon is a non-profit organization known as the Dorsai Irregulars which provides security services at sf conventions, sometimes in costume. The author has licensed their use of the Dorsai name and insignia.
Dickson appreciates such vivid identification be cause he enjoys playing roles himself. The historical persona he designed to join the Society for Creative Anachronism is "Kenneth of Otterburn," a fourteenth-century border lord whose heraldic badge is the otter. This character is a bow to duality in general and to Dickson's own Anglo-Scottish heritage in particular. One earlier member of his family. Simon Fraser, the eleventh Lord Lovat, was beheaded in 1747 for supporting Bonnie Prince Charlie. The official Dickson crest is: "a hart couchant gardant proper; at tired, or within two branches of laurel leaves vert in orle," which is to say, a stag with gilded horns at rest on a field bordered with green laurel leaves. The family motto is "Cubo sed euro," "I lie down but I remain watchful."
More importantly, this SCA project, like so many of Dickson's activities, is a remote preparation for the Childe Cycle. The climax of Childe, the concluding volume of the series, will be modeled on the Battle of Otterburn fought between the English and the Scots in 1388. Furthermore, investigating the life of an imaginary medieval nobleman will also give the author special insights into the mind of the real Sir John Hawkwood, hero of the Cycle's planned opening volume.
Dickson is never content to do his research from books, even from primary sources. Whenever possible, he must visit sites and handle actual artifacts. For ex ample, he absorbs historical mana by fingering Plantagenet coins and reading gothic manuscripts. When reality is unattainable, he turns to replicas. His most ambitious plan yet is to commission the making of a complete suit of armor such as Hawkwood might have worn. (He rejects suggestions that experiments with fleas, lice, and dysentery might be equally instructive.) So far, he has acquired only the mailshirt, helmet, and a magnificent pair of armored gloves. But attired in a friend's full equippage, Dickson cut a marvelously gallant figure - six feet of russet-haired, blue-eyed knight with a bit of lace visible at his wrist to accent the steel and leather. "I feel as if I could walk through doors," he proclaimed, striding off down the motel corridor. Fortunately, no other guests disputed his passage.