Weaver (Stephen Baxter)
Encyclopedia
Weaver is an alternate history and science fiction
work authored by Stephen Baxter
. It is the fourth and final novel in his Time's Tapestry
quartet, which deals with psionic broadcast of history-altering content within trans-temporal lucid dreams.
) in 1940, shortly after a more devastating version of Dunkirk resulted in a shortage of British Army
soldiers. However, due to Winston Churchill
's lobbying of President Franklin Roosevelt and his Congress, there is some US military assistance provided. As with France
during the First World War, there is only partial occupation of southeastern England
, and a Nazi "Protectorate of Albion" (similar to Vichy France
) is established. The Nazis occupy a band of territory that stretches from Portsmouth
in the southwest, including communities like Tunbridge Wells, Horsham
, Hastings
, Pevensey
, Dover
, Folkestone
and Gravesend
. They establish a puppet regime in Canterbury
led by renegade English Nazi collaborator
Lord Haw Haw, and while London
remains unoccupied, the adjacent occupation results in the evacuation of senior governmental personnel, politicians, George VI and his royal family to elsewhere in Northern England
.
Baxter traces the effects of the occupation on several protagonists. Ben Kamen is Jewish, gay
and a latent telepath, while Mary Wooler, and her son Gary, and daughter-in-law Hilda, work on covert projects for the British Army
, endeaviouring to discover how to dislodge the Nazi presence from the "Protectorate of Albion" in the southeast. Ernst Keiser, a relatively kindly officer, lodges with a rural family, whose female members, Irma and Viv, collaborate intentionally with the military, while Alfie is made to serve in a forced labour unit later in the war.
As in "our" timeline, Hitler still launches Operation Barbarossa
against the Soviet Union
, but there are other divergences, as the Japanese Empire has sufficient manpower to invade Australia
in this timeline as well, although no other details are forthcoming.
Ben's identity is discovered, but he is spared from the ravages of an expanded version of the Holocaust due to his latent telepathic abilities. Julia Fiveash, another English Nazi collaborator
, is involved in the Ahnenerbe
, an SS occult
warfare division. In 1943, the tide of war has turned, and the British and US armed forces launch "Operation Walrus" to recover the territory of the former "Protectorate." However, they stumble on Ahnenerbe plans to use Kamen to alter the course of history so that either William the Conquerer lost the Battle of Hastings
to Harold II
in 1066, or Christopher Columbus
turned east, reviving Crusader
hostility against the Islamic world during the sixteen century, instead of his discovery of the Americas
. In the ensuing battle, Fiveash kills Gary, and Mary is able to prevent any further historical change through influencing Kamen's choice of telepathic transmissions. However, the novel ends with Kamen once more entering a dream state, and hints that our timeline is the result of his broadcasting a telepathic message to one of Hitler's advisors at the time of the Dunkirk Evacuation.
General Heinz Guderian himself (from his book Panzer Leader (1952), Derek Robinson's Invasion 1940 (2005), and Martin Marix Evans' Invasion! Operation Sea Lion 1940 (2005).
He used Heather Pringle
's work on Nazi pseudoscience, The Master Plan: Himmler's Scholars and the Holocaust (2006), Julia Gardner's Wartime Britain 1939-1945
(2004) and Richard Vinen's account of Vichy France
, The Unfree French (2006) for details of everyday life under Nazi occupation and British relative wartime rationing stringencies.
He took references from Kurt Gödel
's theories about time
and parallel universes
as well as his dialogue with the work of Albert Einstein
.
Finally, he incorporated John William Dunne
's concepts about metaphysical "time travel" through dream
s. There are also references to fledgeling "calculating engines" (computers), whose actual construction began in Manchester
in 1934.
Science fiction
Science fiction is a genre of fiction dealing with imaginary but more or less plausible content such as future settings, futuristic science and technology, space travel, aliens, and paranormal abilities...
work authored by Stephen Baxter
Stephen Baxter
Stephen Baxter is a prolific British hard science fiction author. He has degrees in mathematics and engineering.- Writing style :...
. It is the fourth and final novel in his Time's Tapestry
Time's Tapestry
Time's Tapestry is a four-volume alternate history and science fiction series by British author Stephen Baxter. The four novels are Emperor, Conqueror, Navigator, and Weaver....
quartet, which deals with psionic broadcast of history-altering content within trans-temporal lucid dreams.
Synopsis
In this timeline, Hitler decided to launch Operation Sea Lion (a projected Nazi invasion of Great BritainGreat Britain
Great Britain or Britain is an island situated to the northwest of Continental Europe. It is the ninth largest island in the world, and the largest European island, as well as the largest of the British Isles...
) in 1940, shortly after a more devastating version of Dunkirk resulted in a shortage of British Army
British Army
The British Army is the land warfare branch of Her Majesty's Armed Forces in the United Kingdom. It came into being with the unification of the Kingdom of England and Scotland into the Kingdom of Great Britain in 1707. The new British Army incorporated Regiments that had already existed in England...
soldiers. However, due to Winston Churchill
Winston Churchill
Sir Winston Leonard Spencer-Churchill, was a predominantly Conservative British politician and statesman known for his leadership of the United Kingdom during the Second World War. He is widely regarded as one of the greatest wartime leaders of the century and served as Prime Minister twice...
's lobbying of President Franklin Roosevelt and his Congress, there is some US military assistance provided. As with France
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
during the First World War, there is only partial occupation of southeastern England
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
, and a Nazi "Protectorate of Albion" (similar to Vichy France
Vichy France
Vichy France, Vichy Regime, or Vichy Government, are common terms used to describe the government of France that collaborated with the Axis powers from July 1940 to August 1944. This government succeeded the Third Republic and preceded the Provisional Government of the French Republic...
) is established. The Nazis occupy a band of territory that stretches from Portsmouth
Portsmouth
Portsmouth is the second largest city in the ceremonial county of Hampshire on the south coast of England. Portsmouth is notable for being the United Kingdom's only island city; it is located mainly on Portsea Island...
in the southwest, including communities like Tunbridge Wells, Horsham
Horsham
Horsham is a market town with a population of 55,657 on the upper reaches of the River Arun in the centre of the Weald, West Sussex, in the historic County of Sussex, England. The town is south south-west of London, north-west of Brighton and north-east of the county town of Chichester...
, Hastings
Hastings
Hastings is a town and borough in the county of East Sussex on the south coast of England. The town is located east of the county town of Lewes and south east of London, and has an estimated population of 86,900....
, Pevensey
Pevensey
Pevensey is a village and civil parish in the Wealden district of East Sussex, England. The main village is located 5 miles north-east of Eastbourne, one mile inland from Pevensey Bay. The settlement of Pevensey Bay forms part of the parish.-Geography:The village of Pevensey is located on...
, Dover
Dover
Dover is a town and major ferry port in the home county of Kent, in South East England. It faces France across the narrowest part of the English Channel, and lies south-east of Canterbury; east of Kent's administrative capital Maidstone; and north-east along the coastline from Dungeness and Hastings...
, Folkestone
Folkestone
Folkestone is the principal town in the Shepway District of Kent, England. Its original site was in a valley in the sea cliffs and it developed through fishing and its closeness to the Continent as a landing place and trading port. The coming of the railways, the building of a ferry port, and its...
and Gravesend
Gravesend, Kent
Gravesend is a town in northwest Kent, England, on the south bank of the Thames, opposite Tilbury in Essex. It is the administrative town of the Borough of Gravesham and, because of its geographical position, has always had an important role to play in the history and communications of this part of...
. They establish a puppet regime in Canterbury
Canterbury
Canterbury is a historic English cathedral city, which lies at the heart of the City of Canterbury, a district of Kent in South East England. It lies on the River Stour....
led by renegade English Nazi collaborator
Collaborationism
Collaborationism is cooperation with enemy forces against one's country. Legally, it may be considered as a form of treason. Collaborationism may be associated with criminal deeds in the service of the occupying power, which may include complicity with the occupying power in murder, persecutions,...
Lord Haw Haw, and while London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
remains unoccupied, the adjacent occupation results in the evacuation of senior governmental personnel, politicians, George VI and his royal family to elsewhere in Northern England
Northern England
Northern England, also known as the North of England, the North or the North Country, is a cultural region of England. It is not an official government region, but rather an informal amalgamation of counties. The southern extent of the region is roughly the River Trent, while the North is bordered...
.
Baxter traces the effects of the occupation on several protagonists. Ben Kamen is Jewish, gay
Gay
Gay is a word that refers to a homosexual person, especially a homosexual male. For homosexual women the specific term is "lesbian"....
and a latent telepath, while Mary Wooler, and her son Gary, and daughter-in-law Hilda, work on covert projects for the British Army
British Army
The British Army is the land warfare branch of Her Majesty's Armed Forces in the United Kingdom. It came into being with the unification of the Kingdom of England and Scotland into the Kingdom of Great Britain in 1707. The new British Army incorporated Regiments that had already existed in England...
, endeaviouring to discover how to dislodge the Nazi presence from the "Protectorate of Albion" in the southeast. Ernst Keiser, a relatively kindly officer, lodges with a rural family, whose female members, Irma and Viv, collaborate intentionally with the military, while Alfie is made to serve in a forced labour unit later in the war.
As in "our" timeline, Hitler still launches Operation Barbarossa
Operation Barbarossa
Operation Barbarossa was the code name for Germany's invasion of the Soviet Union during World War II that began on 22 June 1941. Over 4.5 million troops of the Axis powers invaded the USSR along a front., the largest invasion in the history of warfare...
against the Soviet Union
Soviet Union
The Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991....
, but there are other divergences, as the Japanese Empire has sufficient manpower to invade Australia
Australia
Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...
in this timeline as well, although no other details are forthcoming.
Ben's identity is discovered, but he is spared from the ravages of an expanded version of the Holocaust due to his latent telepathic abilities. Julia Fiveash, another English Nazi collaborator
Collaborationism
Collaborationism is cooperation with enemy forces against one's country. Legally, it may be considered as a form of treason. Collaborationism may be associated with criminal deeds in the service of the occupying power, which may include complicity with the occupying power in murder, persecutions,...
, is involved in the Ahnenerbe
Ahnenerbe
The Ahnenerbe was a Nazi German think tank that promoted itself as a "study society for Intellectual Ancient History." Founded on July 1, 1935, by Heinrich Himmler, Herman Wirth, and Richard Walther Darré, the Ahnenerbe's goal was to research the anthropological and cultural history of the Aryan...
, an SS occult
Occult
The word occult comes from the Latin word occultus , referring to "knowledge of the hidden". In the medical sense it is used to refer to a structure or process that is hidden, e.g...
warfare division. In 1943, the tide of war has turned, and the British and US armed forces launch "Operation Walrus" to recover the territory of the former "Protectorate." However, they stumble on Ahnenerbe plans to use Kamen to alter the course of history so that either William the Conquerer lost the Battle of Hastings
Battle of Hastings
The Battle of Hastings occurred on 14 October 1066 during the Norman conquest of England, between the Norman-French army of Duke William II of Normandy and the English army under King Harold II...
to Harold II
Harold Godwinson
Harold Godwinson was the last Anglo-Saxon King of England.It could be argued that Edgar the Atheling, who was proclaimed as king by the witan but never crowned, was really the last Anglo-Saxon king...
in 1066, or Christopher Columbus
Christopher Columbus
Christopher Columbus was an explorer, colonizer, and navigator, born in the Republic of Genoa, in northwestern Italy. Under the auspices of the Catholic Monarchs of Spain, he completed four voyages across the Atlantic Ocean that led to general European awareness of the American continents in the...
turned east, reviving Crusader
Crusades
The Crusades were a series of religious wars, blessed by the Pope and the Catholic Church with the main goal of restoring Christian access to the holy places in and near Jerusalem...
hostility against the Islamic world during the sixteen century, instead of his discovery of the Americas
Americas
The Americas, or America , are lands in the Western hemisphere, also known as the New World. In English, the plural form the Americas is often used to refer to the landmasses of North America and South America with their associated islands and regions, while the singular form America is primarily...
. In the ensuing battle, Fiveash kills Gary, and Mary is able to prevent any further historical change through influencing Kamen's choice of telepathic transmissions. However, the novel ends with Kamen once more entering a dream state, and hints that our timeline is the result of his broadcasting a telepathic message to one of Hitler's advisors at the time of the Dunkirk Evacuation.
Historical, scientific and metaphysical basis
In an afterword, Baxter described his influences as Niall Ferguson's book Virtual History (1997), PanzerPanzer
A Panzer is a German language word that, when used as a noun, means "tank". When it is used as an adjective, it means either tank or "armoured" .- Etymology :...
General Heinz Guderian himself (from his book Panzer Leader (1952), Derek Robinson's Invasion 1940 (2005), and Martin Marix Evans' Invasion! Operation Sea Lion 1940 (2005).
He used Heather Pringle
Heather Pringle
Heather Pringle is a prize-winning Canadian non-fiction author and journalist, focusing on archaeology. Her 2006 book The Master Plan detailed Heinrich Himmler's establishment of the Ahnenerbe in a pseudo-scientific attempt to "prove" Aryan superiority. It won the Hubert Evans Non-Fiction Prize...
's work on Nazi pseudoscience, The Master Plan: Himmler's Scholars and the Holocaust (2006), Julia Gardner's Wartime Britain 1939-1945
(2004) and Richard Vinen's account of Vichy France
Vichy France
Vichy France, Vichy Regime, or Vichy Government, are common terms used to describe the government of France that collaborated with the Axis powers from July 1940 to August 1944. This government succeeded the Third Republic and preceded the Provisional Government of the French Republic...
, The Unfree French (2006) for details of everyday life under Nazi occupation and British relative wartime rationing stringencies.
He took references from Kurt Gödel
Kurt Gödel
Kurt Friedrich Gödel was an Austrian logician, mathematician and philosopher. Later in his life he emigrated to the United States to escape the effects of World War II. One of the most significant logicians of all time, Gödel made an immense impact upon scientific and philosophical thinking in the...
's theories about time
Time
Time is a part of the measuring system used to sequence events, to compare the durations of events and the intervals between them, and to quantify rates of change such as the motions of objects....
and parallel universes
Multiverse
The multiverse is the hypothetical set of multiple possible universes that together comprise all of reality.Multiverse may also refer to:-In fiction:* Multiverse , the fictional multiverse used by DC Comics...
as well as his dialogue with the work of Albert Einstein
Albert Einstein
Albert Einstein was a German-born theoretical physicist who developed the theory of general relativity, effecting a revolution in physics. For this achievement, Einstein is often regarded as the father of modern physics and one of the most prolific intellects in human history...
.
Finally, he incorporated John William Dunne
John William Dunne
John William Dunne FRAeS was an Anglo-Irish aeronautical engineer and author. In the field of parapsychology, he achieved a preeminence through his theories on dreams and authoring books preoccupied with the question of the nature of time...
's concepts about metaphysical "time travel" through dream
Dream
Dreams are successions of images, ideas, emotions, and sensations that occur involuntarily in the mind during certain stages of sleep. The content and purpose of dreams are not definitively understood, though they have been a topic of scientific speculation, philosophical intrigue and religious...
s. There are also references to fledgeling "calculating engines" (computers), whose actual construction began in Manchester
Manchester
Manchester is a city and metropolitan borough in Greater Manchester, England. According to the Office for National Statistics, the 2010 mid-year population estimate for Manchester was 498,800. Manchester lies within one of the UK's largest metropolitan areas, the metropolitan county of Greater...
in 1934.
Original reference
- Stephen Baxter: Weaver: Time's Tapestry: Book Four: London: Gollancz: 2008: ISBN 978-0-5750-7864-2
Scientific references
- Kurt Gödel: "An Example of a New Type of Cosmological Solutions of Einstein's Field Equations of Gravitation" Reviews of Modern Physics (1949): 21: 447-450.
See also
- Emperor (Stephen Baxter)Emperor (Stephen Baxter)Book one of four in Stephen Baxter's alternate history and science fiction series Time's Tapestry.-Synopsis:A mysterious prophecy from the future shapes the destiny of a family through four centuries of the Roman occupation of Britain. Begins in 4 BC and incorporates such later events as the...
- Conqueror (Stephen Baxter)Conqueror (Stephen Baxter)Book two of four in Stephen Baxter's alternate history and science fiction series Time's Tapestry.- See also :*Emperor *Navigator *Weaver...
- Navigator (Stephen Baxter)Navigator (Stephen Baxter)Book three of four in Stephen Baxter's alternate history and science fiction series Time's Tapestry.- See also :*Emperor *Conqueror *Weaver...
- Fatherland (novel)Fatherland (novel)Fatherland is a bestselling 1992 thriller by the English writer and journalist Robert Harris. It takes the form of a high concept alternative history set in a world in which Nazi Germany won World War II.The novel was an immediate bestseller in Britain...
- It Happened HereIt Happened HereIt Happened Here is a 1966 British film, directed by Kevin Brownlow and Andrew Mollo. It is set in an alternate history in which Nazi Germany successfully invades and occupies the United Kingdom during World War II.-Setting:...
- Making History (novel)
- Man in the High Castle
- SS-GBSS-GBSS-GB is an alternate history novel by Len Deighton, set in a United Kingdom fictionally conquered and occupied by Germany during World War II. The novel's title refers to the branch of the Nazi SS that controls Britain.-Plot summary:...
- Swastika NightSwastika NightSwastika Night is a futuristic novel first published in 1937 and republished in 1940 by Katharine Burdekin, writing under the pseudonym Murray Constantine. Swastika Night was a Left Book Club selection in 1940....