In-universe non-fiction work. If you read carefully, a second story or theme underlies it.
First edition was published 1 year before the Millennium Summer Sun Celebration. Interest was re-kindled after the famous events that occurred then, and the text has been updated and expanded to include commentary on events since then. Includes a mix of traditional legends and original fiction, followed by an analysis of the state of Equestrian science and/or history with respect to each story.
Chapters (13)
Why does this not have more attention? I put it in my read later stack and just now got around to it, but gods, all of the effort put into this and just in the preface and first chapter alone... Holy hell. I will shamelessly plug for this fic at some point.
....the space age. You glorious magnificent bastard. You brought in this as a flight of fancy by the 'author' of the book and you did it amazingly well. I look forward to further additions. Consider yourself under intense scrutiny, such that of the pony 'writing' his flights of fancy in the book, and his analysis of such therein.
7134534 Now you know why the parts are slow in coming. This takes a lot out of me. And thanks. :)
7134569 You may want to edit that last clause of that last sentence. I'm not 100% sure what that says. Thanks on the rest, though. I had that little Space Age sketch worked out in my head for a convention panel awhile ago, but it didn't fit, so I've been looking for a place to set it since then.
7134987 thank you for that. I was half asleep as it were when writing both comments.
7135412 I'm still not sure what this sentence meant: "Consider yourself under intense scrutiny, such that of the pony 'writing' his flights of fancy in the book, and his analysis of such therein. " Fatigue at least explains the why. XP
You continue to further impress me with this. I may eventually have to give a nod to this in one of my stories when I return to writting if I ever get around to it x'D and I already have shamelessly plugged links to this story on facebook for my friends to see.
7164181 Thank you very much. I'll add your stories to my reading list... though it's a bit long so that may take awhile. XP
7166217 don't. They are ammateurish and painful to read x'D even if others disagree
7167879 Ah. Well, I'll bear that in mind. XP
Hm. Quite interesting indeed here. I'll keep sitting and wait on the next chapter then.
Already knew astronomy and parallax calc. But still always nice to bring things back into perspective. Very nice little bit here. Rather enjoyed it :)
7231142 Geeze, you read that fast. XP I spent hours making sure my science/astronomical techniques were accurate, dang it! Savor it! SAVOR IT! XP
But I will be reusing that research both for class (if I teach that one again), and for convention panels.
7231148 consider it savored. With a box of chocolates and half a liter of Coca Cola.
7231150 Heh. I approve! I like to get those glass-bottled Mexican Cokes. Corn syrup has a sticky aftertaste to me. XP
I edited this material to square with my current plans for the "Second Edition" chapters. I had planned to only do 2 originally, but then came up with a third I wanted to do. I also added slightly more detailed descriptions of those chapters.
Appendix A will have to wait as it is essentially an epilogue to "Rainbooms 101" and I don't want to spoil the mystery on that one. Once that fic is finished, it will cross-reference to here and vice-versa.
I point out that historians generally consider that you need 50-100 years to understand the significance of events and longer is better.
In other words, we've got a fairly good grasp of WWI, some idea of WWII, & starting to get a grip on the 1960s. Anything nearer than that is just a guess.
I'd say Equestrian historians have the same problems.
I've seen this idea in Ponyverse. "The stars will aid in her escape .... and she will bring about night eternal." (IIRC. It's been awhile since I've seen the pilot). The stars refers to Twilight (her Cutie Mark is stars). Several hers escaped that night -including Luna. The she referred to is Twilight and if you assume Luna has several poetic titles & The Eternal Night (or some such) is one of them, then it works.
Ponies do have fireworks, so they should understand rockets although I'm unsure how powerful they are.
Not actually seen that. I'm not fond of the "all prophecies are 100% true" trope, though. However, given the vagueness of that one, I could see that as being a valid interpretation, but in and out of universe.
7648653 True. Doesn't stop people from trying in our world, though. XP
7648699 While I will point out that fireworks were invented about 2000 years ago, and rockets around 100 (in terms of the initial test models at least), you do have a valid point in that describing a rocket as a giant firework would be more relateable. Let's just say the in-universe author had the same failure of imagination that I did. XP
Chapter 1 Thinking about it, a good portion of Ponyville escaped that night. You want something ridiculous? Mayor Mare is convinced it's about her.
Chapter 6
I used to be a Dungeon Master (30+ years ago). For adventure material I researched a lot of things including alchemy.
Western Alchemy got its start when a man called Hermes Trimegeistus (3 x as great as Hermes, God of Thieves) spent 20 years infiltrating Egyptian Alchemists & stealing their secrets. It's difficult to know exactly what he learned because future alchemists often published their work under his name to lend greater credence to their ideas. It could be that Starswirl had the same thing happen to him. The deeds ascribed to Starswirl could be the work of many ponies using his name.
7739767 Entirely possible. I thought there was debate as to whether Hermes Trimegeistus even existed? Seems like I read about that somewhere.
7739717 Right when Nightmare Moon showed up you mean? Been too long since I watched the episode.
I don't know that Nightmare Moon actually did anything to any of the Ponyvillians (or whatever the word is)... she kidnapped Celestia (probably), terrorized some ponies that were nearby, then retreated to the castle. Only real explanation for that is that she had gone a bit crazy... I've got a section on that in the 'post start of series' chapters.
As to Mayor Mare escaping, she was on the stage when Nightmare Moon arrived & lived to (mis)tell the tale. I'd call that an escape. For Hermes, it was game research not a documentary on The History Channel. In other words, a good story trumps strict accuracy. Still, the knowledge came from somewhere. So, even if he didn't exist, several people must have done something to learn Alchemy.
You could call the story Close Enough For Government Work
7739817 ...A documentary on the HIstory Channel would be pretty inaccurate these days. XP I wasn't holding you to strict standards, just wondering if that was true. Can't recall for sure. I do like the phrase 'close enough for government work'. XP
Ah, right, fair enough for Mayor Mare.
7739803
She tasered several guards. Very restraint for pony, who been banishment bigger part of her life.
7748482 Ah. Man now I gotta go back and re-watch the episode. Doesn't change anything in this story but could affect what I include in another one.
For a different take on this issue (spaceflight to the Moon) in the context of the Ponies, try my "A Meeting by Moonlight."
(*nods*) You can see examples of this in all sorts of legends from the Bible to American frontier tall tales. The usual structure is that "Leader went here, leader did this, etc." and sometimes, around the middle to end of the story, there'll be a casual mention of something that makes it obvious that "leader"was leading a whole army or expedition of dozens or hundreds. Heck, even in modern history "Leader's Name" is often used as shorthand for his whole faction or force, as in "Jackson conducted a vigorous 'hard cider' political campaign" or "Rommel drove through the Ardennes to flank the French forces in the Low Countries."
My headcanon is that there were more than six Ponies on the first Tri-Tribal expeditions into what became Equestria.
7831502 Eh, from the description, I can kinda see it. Have to read it to be sure, but I marked it for later reading
Here, I was mostly wanting to depict how a pony might view the development and Space Age of the real world.
7831529 That seems probable.
The biblical examples I can think of right off are David's test from Saul which I can't repeat here or it'll bump the rating up, and a case where the opposite probably happened with Exodus. The latter is rather contentious, but I had a religious studies prof (general ed requirement) say that there is a Passover tradition of saying "we were slaves in Egypt," thus putting it to the present day. Thus his hypothesis was that the Torah numbers are those at the time the stories were put to paper, possibly around the time of the united Kingdom.
Good point on those more modern examples. I hadn't thought about it but that is pretty common parlance. One can see how, were continuity of records lost, historians might think they were mythical figures when it fact it is a metaphorical shorthand.
Coming back to this some years later, and I'm still quite impressed by it. I also fully intend to follow through on referencing it in one of my stories, especially now that I've got the creative spark back.
Know you're not as active anymore but still kicking about