How come we never see any aides to Picard or Kird in Trek Lit???

[Nathan]

Well, I guess the reason is that readers would rather see more action, character interaction with the main characters instead of Picard conferring with his aide saying stuff like, "What is the status of the Welcome Reception for the Tellar delegation?"

I guess being a former General aide back when I was a second lieutenant, I recall really being intergral in the planning/actions of the General that I worked my tail off for. Yeah, besides handling all the "devil in the details" work, I remember his asking me stuff like, "what did you think of Colonel so-&so...I thought he was up my @$$, did you get the same impression??" I was even asked on operational details opinions as well when I was in Iraq years ago. Believe me, the guy who i worked had his own decision set, but I think he did value my opinion on things.

I guess with the books, there is time/pages to explore how busy the Captain is commanding (Insert number of people here) on the ship. One thing about Vanguard is that it does sorta touch on the fact that more goes on than just the mission of the day (i.e. Jon Cooper's character) even tho' he is the XO, he sorta acted as an aide.

Guess sometimes I think the books just give the impression that the Enterprise is a glorified taxi for Kirk & and the main crew. Or the only folks that ran DS9 were the folks listed on the opening credits. Sorta like how I got that in Rings of Time (without digressing into the details of the book), I just felt when the crew responds to a crisis, the Captain is given a lot more detail and planning as opposed to "Captain, the planet leader is hailing you, you want it on the Main Viewer??"

Wonder if anyone felt the same way that some books felt that TOS Enterprise or TNG Enterprise was almost a taxi cab or the cast listed in main credits.

 

[Christopher]

Well, the captain's yeoman was originally intended to be a major recurring character in the original series -- Yeoman Colt in the first pilot, Yeoman Rand in the early first season. But the idea didn't last long.

 

[Sho]

I just read Harbinger, and that one has Kirk's yeoman recurring a few times, though essentially as a bipedal coffee dispenser.

You might like Articles of the Federation. It has a civilian setting, but is full of fully fleshed out hierarchies of staff characters, and a wonderful book in general.

 

[Thestral]

I agree with Christopher - I think the Captain's Yeoman was meant to be (and could have been) a good aide/assistant/confidante sort of character. Heck, for those that have played Mass Effect 2, that's exactly the role Yeoman Kelly played (plus psychologist and potential minor love interest).

But I think all most people remember about Janice Rand is the super-short skirt and soft-focus lense and maybe there's a sense that her role was just one of Gene's little 60s-era things that were better done away with. And of course Grace Lee Whitney left fairly early on and Yeoman Colt (who I've always liked) only appeared in The Cage. Something of a disservice then, maybe?

 

[Therin of Andor]

But we do see them in TrekLit. Rand has popped up in many TOS novels, sometimes to help us realize it's set in the early part of the 5YM, but sometimes she's around long after the actress playing her had departed the show. IIRC, even "Mission to Horatius", the very first ST novel, has Rand and Chekov appearing in the same story.

Kevin Riley is Kirk's aide during "The Lost Years".

As for TNG, Troi took on the confidante part of the aide role.

Wonder if anyone felt the same way that some books felt that TOS Enterprise or TNG Enterprise was almost a taxi cab or the cast listed in main credits.

Certainly not in TOS era books by LA Graf, Diane Duane and JM Dillard, nor Kevin Ryan's two "lower decks" trilogies, nor MJF's "My Brother's Keeper", nor Christopher's TMP stuff, nor the recent "A Choice of Catastrophes" by Mollmann & Schuster.

 

[Sky]

Yeoman Rand has quite a large role in Enterprise - The First Adventure by Vonda N. McIntyre.

 

[FordSVT]

I guess being a former General aide back when I was a second lieutenant, I recall really being intergral in the planning/actions of the General that I worked my tail off for. Yeah, besides handling all the "devil in the details" work, I remember his asking me stuff like, "what did you think of Colonel so-&so...I thought he was up my @$$, did you get the same impression??" I was even asked on operational details opinions as well when I was in Iraq years ago. Believe me, the guy who i worked had his own decision set, but I think he did value my opinion on things.

Ignoring the fact that Starfleet military roles are not identical to roles set in the modern US military, Starfleet Admirals, who are definitely more analogous to a modern Army General definitely have aides.

Picard's "aide" was Riker. The XO acts as the Captain's aide on a starship. Picard set the agenda and made the big decisions, Riker saw that they were carried them out. The Yoeman in TOS seemed to do nothing more than bring Kirk coffee and hand him things to sign, I guess at some point Starfleet decided that role was unnecessary.

 

[Christopher]

A yeoman is essentially the naval equivalent of a secretary or clerk. Maybe the idea is that by the 24th century, the ship's computer is advanced enough to do the sort of clerical/assistant work that yeomen would've done in the past.

 

[FordSVT]

^That's what I'm thinking. Replicators, padds, etc. Not much point in having a secretary when the ship's AI, replicator and comm system can do it all for you.

 

[Cybersnark]

The Enterprise in particular also had Data, who could probably handle all the administration the ship needed in a few seconds each day.

Voyager had Neelix, who I presume was handling such things off-camera (as in, Janeway would task him and let him go, glad to not have to deal with that job). Probably Chakotay was also working his ass off off-camera (which would explain why he usually seemed so tired and lifeless on-camera ).

We never really saw much on DS9, but we did see Sisko sitting in his office a great deal poring over PADDs (Kira too, though she had no office). And I get the feeling Sisko was another "you handle this, don't bother me 'til you need me" hands-off boss.

 

[Snaploud]

I imagine much of the administrative task-work could be delivered via the 24th-century equivalent of e-mail. Those PADDs, for instance, could each have a string of messages from different departments.

 

[timothy]

Re: How come we never see any aides to Picard or Kirk in Trek Lit???

if you think about it archer never had an assistant nor were they any yoeman.

 

[Captaindemotion]

^ What do you think that Beagle was doing when the camera wasn't on him?

 

[Yevetha]

Do ambassadors have aids on Trek?

 

[Sho]

They do in TrekLit.

 

[Christopher]

Do ambassadors have aids on Trek?

No, I'm sure they have a cure for HIV by then.

But they do have aides from time to time. Sarek had Ki Mendrossen and Sakkath in the episode "Sarek."

 

[Yevetha]

ooops.

 

[JD]

Do ambassadors have aids on Trek?

No, I'm sure they have a cure for HIV by then.

But they do have aides from time to time. Sarek had Ki Mendrossen and Sakkath in the episode "Sarek."

And in Trek Lit Worf had Giancarlo Wu.

 

[comsol]

Do ambassadors have aids on Trek?

No, I'm sure they have a cure for HIV by then.

But they do have aides from time to time. Sarek had Ki Mendrossen and Sakkath in the episode "Sarek."

Also, Ambassador Fox had an aide who was shot in "A Taste of Armageddon" and Sarek also had two Vulcan aides in "Journey to Babel". Ambassadors Shras and Gav also had aides in the latter episode as well.

 

[timothy]

What do you think that Beagle was doing when the camera wasn't on him?

that's mean. lol