Talk:Paratime series

Sources

Copying my comment from Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Kalvan series, here are sources about the Paratime series:

1. Hellekson, Karen (2001). The Alternate History: Refiguring Historical Time. Kent, Ohio: Kent State University Press. pp. 52–61. ISBN 0-87338-683-3. Retrieved 2023-07-22 – via Internet Archive.

   The book notes: "H. Beam Piper's Paratime sequence of stories is collected in Lord Kalvan of Otherwhen (1965) and Paratime (1981), both of which are made up of short stories or novelettes originally published in science fiction magazines from the late 1940s until 1965 (Piper killed himself in 1964). ... In "Time Crime," the Paratime Police investigate a cross-belt Paratime slave trade, fixing the home time line of the slaves by close hypnotic questioning of the captured slaves, ferreting out which slaves came from a world where a woman killed herself and which came from a world where she was captured alive. ... The stories in Paratime do not focus on any one alternate world but explore a number of them; my favorite is "Last Enemy," which takes place in the Akor-Neb civilization, a Second Level civilization in which reincarnation is a fact. ... Piper's Paratime works, like Poul Anderson's Time Patrol works discussed in chapter 7, create worlds policed by a force charged with protecting its own identity and keeping that identity secret. The culture that created the Paratime Police exploits the alternate time lines it can reach, treating these other worlds as endless sources of raw materials and other resources while upholding strict codes that do not allow anyone to reveal the secret to others. ... Piper discusses the simultaneity of the people inhabiting the worlds only briefly; in "Police Operation," a guard examines Verkan Vall's blood under a microscope to make sure he is the right Verkan Vall. ..."

2. Fletcher, Marilyn P.; Thorson, James L., eds. (1989). Reader's Guide to Twentieth-century Science Fiction. Chicago: American Library Association. p. 461. ISBN 0-8389-0504-8. Retrieved 2023-07-22 – via Internet Archive.

   The book notes: "The Paratime series has for its settings some parallel time-line to Earth in which a civilization is based on Mars. The Martians are descendants of terran colonists who have had to survive after a nuclear war destroys Earth. The survivors discover the "Ghaldron-Hesthor Transposition Field" which facilitates travel between parallel time lines (hence the name para-time, or paratime). This leaves a lot of room for playing "what if" history, in which Piper shows himself to be an expert, recombining historical events and coming up with new and fascinating variations of what might have happened if.... Whether a story is part of the Paratime or Future History series, Piper's plots rely on the self-sufficient human."

3. Barron, Neil; Barton, Tom; Burst, Daniel S.; Hudak, Melissa; Meredith, D. R.; Ramsdell, Kristin; Schantz, Tom; Schantz, Enid (2002). What Do I Read Next?, 2000: A Reader's Guide to Current Genre Fiction, Volume 2. Detroit, Michigan: Gale. p. 813. ISBN 0-7876-3392-5. ISSN 1052-2212. Retrieved 2023-07-22 – via Internet Archive.

   The book notes: "Summary: All of the stories in Piper's Paratime series lare collected in this omnibus volume. The Paratime Police travel through time to prevent anyone from changing the course of history. Generally they find discrepancies and have to act to restore the original time track. The stories were originally published between 1948 and the 1960s."

4. Rogers, Alva (1964). A Requiem for Astounding. Advent:Publishers. pp. 163–164. ISBN 0-911682-08-2. Retrieved 2023-07-22 – via Internet Archive.

   The book notes on pages 163–164: "H. Beam Piper, in the July issue, began his popular Paratime series with a novelette, "Police Operation." ... "Police Operation," and the other stories in the series had to do with a highly organized and complex police force operating in paratime, across probable time lines. The primary purpose of the paratime police is to police the multidinous probable time lines at all levels in an effort to keep them separated and unknowing of each other and if, as occasionally happens, something or someone from one time line appears in another the Paratime Police show up to take care of the problem as quietly as possible, and to take corrective action to restore reasonable normality and to provide an acceptable explanation of the event."

   The book notes on page 164: "The Paratime Police stories were entertaining tales not intended to be taken too seriously which provided one possible answer to such Fortean mysteries as unexplained disappearances, strange visitations, apparent violations of natural physical laws, etc. Piper admittedly got his idea for the Paratime Police from Charles Fort: "...there may be something in the nature of an occult police force, which operates to divert human suspicions, and to supply explanations that are good enough for whatever, somewhat in the nature of minds, human beings have-or that, if there be occult mischief makers and occult ravagers, they may be of a world also of other beings that are acting to check them, and to divert suspicions from themselves, because they, too, may be exploiting life upon this earth, but in ways more subtle, and in orderly, or organized fashion." (Charles Fort: Lo!)"

5. Espley, John L. (Summer 1980). "H. Beam Pipier: An Annotated Biography". Extrapolation: 172, 175–177. Retrieved 2023-07-22 – via Internet Archive.

   The article notes on page 172: "The majority of Piper's stories are represented in the Paratime Police series and one Future History series. The Paratime Police stories have the theme of parallel worlds. Piper used this theme to answer some of the unexplained phenomena described by Charles Fort. The Future History stories are the description of the rise, fall, and rise again of galactic civilization. Using this background, Piper wrote some of his most memorable stories and books."

   The book notes on pages 175–176: ""Last Enemy." Astounding, August 1950, pp. 5-60. The last enemy is death. A Paratime Police story in which Verkan Vall has to rescue a scientist investigating reincarnation. Since reincarnation is a proven fact, death holds no fears and assassination is an honorary profession. ... "Police Operation." Astounding, July 1948, pp. 8-35. The first of the Paratime Police stories. There is a large amount of explanation about the Paratime theory with a minor plot concerning Verkan Vall hunting for an extraterrestrial animal in an alternate world where it is unknown. ... "Temple Trouble." Astounding, April 1951, pp. 6-34. A Paratime Police story in which the exploitation of the alternate world is controlled through the organized religions. The plot is concerned with conflicts created by the decline of the Paratime-supported religion."

   The book notes on page 177: ""Time Crime." Astounding, February and March 1955, pp. 8-49, 85-131. A serial concerning the Paratime Police discovering the existence of a large criminal organization of their own First Probability Level people. 1053"

6. Foote, Bud (2003). "Escape into Paratime: H. Beam Piper's Alternated Pennsylvanias". In Slusser, George; Barricelli, Jean-Pierre (eds.). Genre at the Crossroads: The Challenge of Fantasy. Riverside, California: Xenos Books. p. 172. ISBN 1-879378-48-5. Retrieved 2023-07-22.

   The book notes: "In the very next year, however, Piper began work on a concept of multiple presents which was totally to dwarf the modest trilineal system of "Time and Time Again." Though he was to work at the paratime concept through four short stories and a novel fixed up out of three others' over a period of sixteen years, the scheme seems pretty thoroughly developed in 1948 in the first paratime story, "Police Operation." Some 75,000 to 100,000 years ago, Piper's scenario has it, the Martians, having exhausted their planet with overpopulation and over-industrialization, colonized Earth, which was occupied by no life higher than ape-men. All the possible results of this colonization have come to pass, on one level of probability or anther; and all these levels of probability, the number of which Piper fixes at 10^100,000, are equally real."

7. del Rey, Lester (1979). The World of Science Fiction, 1926–1976: The History of a Sub-Culture. New York: Ballantine Books. pp. 112, 172, 324. ISBN 0-345-25452-X. Retrieved 2023-07-22.

   The book notes on page 112: "In July, H. Beam Piper began a series of stories with "Police Operation," based on an assumption that time not only goes forward and backward but also sidewise; beside our world are an infinity of other worlds in which events have not proceeded quite the same. Those nearby are almost identical, but those farther away differ greatly. One world has learned to traverse through this "paratime" and to exploit other worlds and cultures. But in doing so, the rulers must police all the worlds and prevent any accidental discovery of the secret by others. This permitted Piper to use almost any setting or culture for his background without step- ping out of his basic situation, and the stories were usually excellent."

   The book notes on page 172: "And in August, H. Beam Piper had a Paratime story, "Last Enemy," in which a world gains positive proof that any man can be reincarnated. It is one of Piper's best stories."

   The book notes on page 324: "Paratime: H. Beam Piper's universe in which time extends not only forward and backward, but crosswise, with many earths lying side by side, like pages in a book. Each earth differs slightly from the others; thus a panorama of histories is available for exploiting by those who can travel through paratime."

8. Thesing, William B. (1981). "H. Beam Piper". In Cowart, David; Wymer, Thomas L. (eds.). Dictionary of Literary Biography. Volume 8: Twentieth-century American Science-fiction Writers. Ann Arbor, Michigan: Gale. pp. 70–71. ISBN 0-8103-0918-1. Retrieved 2023-07-22 – via Internet Archive.

   The book notes: "In about half of these short stories Piper develops the "paratime" concept with special emphasis placed on the necessity of policing across alternate worlds. Piper's paratime idea is based on the imaginative conception that there are at any given instant (not in the future or in the past) lateral time dimensions-worlds of alternate probability parallel to our own. Although there could conceivably be an infinity of such worlds, in his stories Piper posits the existence of five, which he calls Time Levels. Lateral time-travelers, then, make corresponding shifts in time. "Police Operation" (1948) alternates between descriptions of an adventurous hunt for an elusive monster and explanations of the various levels of time-travel. In "Time Crime" (1955) the paratime police search out criminals who attempt to meddle with the timetracks. Alternate historical outcomes during the Napoleonic Wars are the focus of "He Walked Around the Horses" (1948). The two stories "Gunpowder God" (1964) and "Down Styphon!" (1965) were expanded to form Lord Kalvan of Otherwhen (1965)."

Cunard (talk) 23:43, 22 July 2023 (UTC)

Thanks for sources, but the following two sentences are quite wrong: The Paratime Police travel through time to prevent anyone from changing the course of history. Generally they find discrepancies and have to act to restore the original time track. -- That source should not be cited on the article or used to influence the content of the article. AnonMoos (talk) 22:51, 24 July 2023 (UTC)

I've added the Hellekson, Fletcher, and Rogers sources to a new Analysis section. I think Hellekson has a lot more that could be referenced. I started small so as not to give UNDUE weight to one critic, but there's a lot of good secondary analysis in that source. —siroχo 01:18, 6 August 2023 (UTC)

Merge from Kalvan series

Per sources above and Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Kalvan series, I am not seeing sources that suggest Kalvan series has a stand alone notability (WP:SIGCOV-meeting treatment) sepaate from the Paratime series. I recommend discussing both in one article. Technically, a merge can be done, but the problem is that both articles consit of 99% plot summary; frankly, WP:TNT and start anew might be good, although we might risk loosing valuable content from talk page (Cunard's sources) which have much more encyclopedic value than the plot summaries we have right now. _{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here} 06:38, 6 August 2023 (UTC)

I'll take a look at Kalvan series sometime soon. This article was relatively easy to bootstrap some referencing from sources with sigcov, given Cunard's work. While the other one may be tighter I think it's worth a try, given the sense I got in the AFD that readers seemed to think of them as distinct enough to merit separate articles. If I don't get to it today, I should be able to tomorrow. —siroχo 06:52, 6 August 2023 (UTC)

If you can save both, great. Let me know when you'd like to hear from me if you think you are done, I'll be happy to re-review this. _{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here} 07:16, 6 August 2023 (UTC)

Not done, of course, but I've added a reception section to Kalvan series. I think even if we stripped it to the bones with just a paragraph or two of plot summary, we could write a solid start-class article about the series. Also, becoming a little more familiar with the material, I do understand the hesitance in merging them, on the part of people who were already familiar. The series are conceptually very different, indeed, despite one growing out of the other, and the change in authorship after the first book of this series does seem to have been meaningful. —siroχo 09:28, 8 August 2023 (UTC)

Hmmm, so far what I see suggests reviews of books, but not of the series. I'll wait for you to finish your work. I'll also encourage you to copypaste any relevant content to articles about the books, which currently look very bad (ex. Siege of Tarr-Hostigos) and others. IMHO the cited review of Don D'Ammassa, for example, helps to suggest notability of that book, but does little for the series itself. _{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here} 09:39, 8 August 2023 (UTC)

For Kalvan, the feel of most of the coverage is that each book is an installment in the series (for example in Silver, 5/6 paragraphs have coverage related to the series, only one is entirely dedicated to the book). If the question is SIGCOV for GNG, Major, SFE, and Silver is an ideal WP:THREE to demonstrate GNG for the series, in my opinion. If the question is what's best for Wikipedia, I think separate articles with appropriately generous mentions of one another is probably the right way to go.

I can dig a bit more out of the three sources I mentioned for the reception section, sometime.

I will indeed try to add the sourcing into the individual book articles if nobody gets to it first. —siroχo 10:09, 8 August 2023 (UTC)

Closing, given the article improvement, stale discussion and no support for the merge. Klbrain (talk) 23:02, 1 December 2023 (UTC)