FOREWORD TO THE NEW INTERNET EDITION

Any story exists both inside its historical context, and outside it.

The passing of time can change the apparent meaning of a story. And this has caused me some concern over how people might "read" this novel.

THE ARGUS PROJECT was originally written down as the synopsis for a comic-strip, around 1991. In those days, Saddam Hussein was the top bullyboy of the Middle East, and made a grab at the rich Kuwaiti oil fields. He seemed to aim for total domination of the Orient, and this inspired my writing.

The novel based on this comic-book synopsis - about an interplanetary war for natural resources - was first written in complete form in the year 2000, and was posted as a web-serial almost as fast as the chapters were completed.

And less than a year after that serial had been completed (first-draft warts and all)... came 9/11.

Suddenly, it became possible to read THE ARGUS PROJECT as another kind of parable, one with rather unpleasant hidden meanings which I didn't intend.

And so, in 2004, I decided to proofread the novel and serialize it a second time. The question was: should I change the plot because of 9/11? In the end I decided to keep the plot unchanged; why bother, when everything new I'd write after 9/11 would be influenced by it anyway?

So when you read this new Internet Edition of THE ARGUS PROJECT, please bear in mind it was written for the 1990s - which now seem like another world.

Who knows? Perhaps in the future, some other world-shaking event(*) will cast this story in a wholly different light - good or bad.

Change is the only constant.

-A.R.Yngve
July 2005

(* Such as this.)


(To THE ARGUS PROJECT: PROLOGUE)

THE ARGUS PROJECT INTERNET EDITION (c)A.R.Yngve 1999, 2000, 2004. All rights reserved. May not be copied without permission.

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