Appointment In Samara

This is the fable at the beginning of a short story  written by John O'Hara in 1934. It has been retold and reprinted in many slightly different forms, including a French version in which the name of the city is Toulouse instead of Samara.  The story is about the inevitability of fate.

The particular version below is taken from the science fiction novel, "A Far Sunset" by Edmund Cooper. In the story, the lone survivor of a survey ship that crashed on an alien planet, and rescued by aliens in primitive culture society, recounted the story of "Appointment in Samara."  (Yeti, Sep 26th 2005)[/FONT]



   Appointment in Samara

   "The servant of a rich man in Baghdad or Basra, or some place like that, went out to do a day's shopping.  But in the market place he met Death, who gave him a strange sort of look... Well the servant chased off home and said to his master: "Lord, in the market place I met Death, who look as if he were about to claim me. Lend me your fastest horse that I may ride to Samara, which I can reach before night-fall, and so escape him."

   The rich man lent the servant his horse, and he duly set off for Samara at a great rate of knots. But when he had gone, the rich man thought: "This is a bit of a bore. My servant is a jolly good servant, I shall miss him. Death has no right to give him the twitches. I think I'll pop down to the market place and give the old fellow a piece of my mind."

   So the rich man went to the market place and button-holed Death. "Look here," he said,"What do you mean by giving my servant the shakes?"  Death was amused. He said:"Lord, I merely looked at the fellow in surprised."

   "Why so?" asked the rich man."He is just an ordinary servant".

   "I look at him in surprise." explained Death, "because I did not expect to find him here. You see, I have an appointment with him this evening--- in Samara." [/FONT][/COLOR]

Journey Up the Canal of Life.

This second story is taken from two sections of the science fiction novel 「A Far Sunset」 by Edmund Cooper.(1)

In the passage below, Paul Marlowe, the sole survivor of a crash landing of a space survey team in a distance planet, travelled up the "Canal of  Life" with the entourage of the god-king Enka Ne.  At the end of the 「Canal」, the King would die and be replaced by a new King. In the quotation below, "Oruri" is the god of  death, Poul Mer Lo is the way the natives pronounce the name "aul Marlowe".  

What is the story about.  Read to the end and draw your own conclusion. (Yeti, Sep 26th 2005)[/FONT]



   "oul Mer Lo gazed at the guyanis--a brilliantly coloured butterfly with a wing span longer than his forearm--as it flapped lazily and erratically along the Canal of Life, just ahead of the barge containing the oracle. As he watched, a great bird with leathery wings dived swiftly from a tree-fern on the banks of the canal and struck the guyanis with its toothed beak. One of the butterfly wings sheared completely and drifted down to the surface of the water: the rest of the creature was held firmly in the long black beak. The bird did not even pause in flight.

   Enka Ne clapped his hands. "Strike!" he said, pointing to the bird. A warrior raised his blow-pipe to his lips. There was a faint whistle as the dart flew from the pipe. Then the leathery bird, more than twenty meters away, seems to be transfixed in mid-flight. It hovered for a moment; then spiralled noisily down to the water.

   Enks Ne pointed to the warrior who had killed the bird. "Die now," he said gently, "and live for ever."
The man smiled " Lord," he said, " I am unworthy." Then he took a dart from his pouch and pushed it calmly into his throat. Without another word, he fell from the barge into the Canal of life.........

   ...(continuing on later in the book)...

   Now, as he (Paul Marlowe) sat on the veranda step, sipping his kappa spirit, he became suddenly filled with a great and impersonal sadness--not only for himself and Shah Shan and Mylai Tui, but for all living things on all possible worlds scattered throughout the black starlit vault of space. He was sad because of the very predicament of living. Because every living creature--like the guyanis, the brilliantly coloured butterfly that he had seen killed by a leathery bird when he travelled with Enka Ne along the Canal of Life--was doomed by journey from the darkness to darkness, with only a brief burst of sunlight and pain between the two long aspects of eternity. The guyanis had died, then the bird who had killed it was struck down by a warrior, then the warrior himself died at the command of Enka Ne. Now Enka Ne was dead and another Enka Ne was alive. And doubtless many more guyanis butterflies had been torn to pieces by toothed beaks. And doubtless many more warriors had gone to the bosom of Oruri.

   Multiply these things by a billion billion, square the number and square it again. The resulting figure would still not be big enough to tally all the tragedies, great and small, taking place throughout the universe during one billion billionth of a second."
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