It is still one of the finest jests of the modern muses that this fogged-in English don was going home nights to work on perhaps the most popular adventure story ever written, thereby inventing one of the most successful commercial formulas that publishing possesses, and establishing the foundation of the modern fantasy industry.

NEWYORKER: The Dragon��s Egg

Voyages, whether military or commercial, were undertaken in a spirit of ruthless calculation, not open-hearted adventure.

ECONOMIST: History��s most important sea