Happier are all men than the dwellers in Faerie – or the gods, for that matter…Better a life like a falling star, bright across the dark, than a deathlessness that can see naught above or beyond itself…the day draws nigh when Faerie shall fade, the Erlking himself shrink to a woodland sprite and then to nothing, and the gods go under. And the worst of it is, I cannot believe it wrong that the immortals will not live forever.

Van Rijn is however far from the modern type of business executive being a kind of throwback to the merchant venturer of the Dutch Golden Age of the 17th century. The family returned to the United States after the outbreak of World War II settling eventually on a Minnesota farm. Biography
Poul Anderson was born on November 25 1926 in Bristol Pennsylvania of Scandinavian parents.

He received numerous awards for his writing including seven Hugo Awards and three Nebula Awards. Poul William Anderson (November 25 1926 – July 31 2001) was an American science fiction author who began his career during one of the Golden Ages of the genre and continued to write and remain popular into the 21st century.