Robert Heinlein-Your Favorites and your dislikes

Just reading through some threads today and Saw the old Robert Anson Heinlein was coming up a lot, so I thought why not an entire thread for him.

I pointed out my favorites in another thread but I'll repeat here,

Citizen of the Galaxy
Farmer in the Sky
The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress
Starship Troopers

amongst the ones i do not like

Farnham's Freehold

I think we can bring our discussions of Heinlein all together.

I've read three books of his and while he may be a Grand Master, his writing leaves a lot to be desired. He's no Aldous Huxley or George Orwell, maybe more like Ayn Rand ... In Space.

He has wonderful ideas, but he is:

*Too talky. It's obvious he was paid by the word.
*In serious need of an editor.
*Was the product of his time (for good or ill).

I loved the movie Starship Troopers, a wonderful satire on creeping fascism in militarized societies.

Moon is a Harsh Mistress had fascinating ideas, at least on marriage. Who thought a book comprising mainly of committee meetings would be so boring? And painful to read. It's Heinlein's Fountainhead, full of shrill lectures on why capitalism is good. (A daring stance to take in the Eisenhower's America.)

Three words: Raise. The. Bar.

Why does no one ever mention Friday? The pacing is like whoops it's over, wow!

I remember I Will Fear No Evil being really boring.

His juveniles were entertaining, but they've not aged gracefully. Starship Troopers is a lesson in fascist politics in search of a plot. I Will Fear No Evil is a dirty old man in search of a plot. It's been so long since I read Stranger in a Strange Land I remember little about it. But fear not, I shall be rereading this year as part of my masochistic read a sf classic a month reading challenge. And I shall blog the results. Expect a loud whirring noise from the vicinity of Carmel, California...

Did I start something?

I like Stranger in a Strange Land and Time Enough for Love primarily because I like Heinlein's old men - Jubal probably carried Stranger in my mind. The Moon is a Harsh Mistress is another favorite.

It's utterly perverse that I like Heinlein best when he lectures the reader when I don't stand it from any other author regardless of genre. Perverse but true.

To Sail Beyond the Sunset and I Will Fear No Evil I actually sold after reading them. Friday I got from the library and was glad I hadn't bought. Apparently Heinlein's women as main characters have the opposite effect on me from his old men. I didn't care for Farmer in the Sky, which leads me to believe I probably don't need to read the juveniles since that seems to be one of the most recommended ones. It's still too early for me to offer an opinion on Number of the Beast.

Estelle - Number of the Beast will test your love for Heinlein in talky mode.

Ah yes, Number of the Beast. That one was Heinlein himself in search of a plot...

Heinlein is no Sade or Ayn Rand when it comes to his lecturing the reader. When compared to Sade, it's near-beer, since Sade's attack on religion go farther, say more, and are better written.

I do want to read Lazarus Long. Time travel and incest sound interesting. Far more interesting than the committee meeting in search of a plot that was Moon is a Harsh Mistress

I think a pattern is emerging...

- Starship Troopers - a lesson in fascist politics in search of a plot
- I Will Fear No Evil - a dirty old man in search of a plot
- Number of the Beast - Heinlein himself in search of a plot
- The moon is a Harsh Mistress - a committee meeting in search of a plot

and...

- The Cat Who Walked Through Walls - a cat (doh) in search of a plot
- Job: A Comedy of Justice - a plot in search of a joke

Any more anyone?

Liked:
- Starship Troopers
- The Moon is a Harsh Mistress

Ambivalent:
- Stranger in a Strange Land
- Double Star

Didn't Like:
- Friday
- The Cat Who Walked Through Walls

Is there anyone here, other than me, that likes all of Heinlein?

I have not read every word he wrote but, except for the last section of Stranger, I liked all his works.

I have aged. If I were still 10 years old I think I would love to read his juveniles.

Well, I haven't read everything either, but I've read a lot from across his entire career. My favorites are his most recent (and it seems the most panned.) The first book of his I read was The Unpleasant Profession of Jonathan Hoag when I was 12 or so. So I've been reading him for 30+ years.

We own 35 of his books and all have been read.

I read all the early Heinleins between 1959 and 1965, with Between Planets being the first Heinlein and the second science fiction book I ever read. I liked all of them. My favorites included Between Planets, The Star Beast, and Door into Summer. I read Stranger in a Strange Land as a college freshman in the mid-60s and loved it. What can I say? It was the times, and my time. I read the rest of the "mature" heinlein novels as they came out, up to 1970, and enjoyed The Moon is a Harsh Mistress and Glory Road, while hating Podkayne of Mars passionately. I got through I will Fear No Evil and Time Enough for Love but without much enthusiasm. The "late' books from the 80's--hit or miss. I'm pretty sure I read Friday and I know I tried and was disappointed in The Cat who Walks Through Walls. So, no, I don't like all of Heinlein, but I like almost all the earlier work.

If you put yourself in Heinlein's shoes, engineer, academy graduate and now able to earn additional income, then a living writing science fiction that had a very good appeal, would you have a different career.

In the forties to the sixties, the juveniles would seem to be sci-fi indicative of an age. Appealing to the reading young boy, teen just as Harry Potter did this last decade.

The juveniles did not need an agenda, except to entertain.

We see Starship Troopers as something more. Published in 1959, us against them, I see Heinlein as writing to the world war II analogy. Much of the classroom intervals preaching to his agenda of what it means to defend your democracy.

I can't jump on the bandwagon that so many tales need a plot. I do recognize that a few are preachy and that he is in search of a plot, mostly in the latter years when his popularity was its highest, he wasn't being paid by the word and earning big advances because his books did sell.

I find what I do like of his work is based on the strength of his Juveniles, for the latter books, just aren't as Grokable as the earlier ones.

I will probably never reread Stranger, or Friday, or Time Enough, or Number of the Beast.

I like Glory Road. It starts off slow, but when the hero is drawn into an adventure in a different universe, picks up considerably.

Time Enough for Love is good in that Heinlein manages to convey something of a life that is thousands of years long and thousands of light-years in scope.

Lazarus Long is an endearing character, despite wanting to sleep with his mother. The later pictures of Heinlein show a man who looks like Locke (Terry O'Quinn) on Lost, but what did his mother look like...

Lazarus's sayings, which you can read in The Notebooks of Lazarus Long are exceedingly funny. Tanstaafl, another endearing term which I believe we only get in The Moon is a Harsh Mistress is one I always remember.

Loved Stranger in a Strange Land...do not dislike any of his books. Stranger turned out to be prophetic re. the merging of the right wing of the Republican Party with Christian extremists...way too prophetic!

Time Enough for Love is my all time favorite. Although I haven't re-read any Heinlein for awhile, and don't remember the book, his was the 2nd sci-fi book I read. His stories will always rank as my favorites. I'm scared to re-read any and find my illusions shattered!

>11 Morphidae:

I, too, liked all of his works - and re-read them all each year and my favorites even more often. I have read all of his fiction and even broke my own eBay rules and spent more than my limit to obtain copies of a few stories in pulp mags that were never republished.

Still, I have favorites and least favorites:

Favorites:
The Moon is A Harsh Mistress
To Sail Beyond the Sunset
Time Enough for Love
Starship Troopers

Middle:
juveniles, Farnham's Freehold, Sixth Column

Least Favorites:
Stranger In a Strange Land
final quarter mostly
Orphans of the Sky

also not really enamored of the last chapters of a number of his adult novels - examples:
Number of the Beast
Job: A Comedy of Justice
I Will Fear No Evil

Fished up a post I made on alt.fan.heinlein, oh, so many years ago, on the same question and looking over my list - doesn't look like my preferences have changed much - quote from that post:

PS. Cheers for me! I finally got a copy of Analog Oct 1973 for the two page "Notes from Magdalen More" which are one liners of "The Notebooks of Lazarus Long" ilk.

It always saddens me when I think that there is no more Heinlein fiction for me to "discover."

I was excited when For Us the Living was published - and while I wouldn't recommend it for anyone who wasn't a hardcore RAH fan I thought it was interesting that you could see that so many ideas that were expanded in later works that were present right here at the beginning. I would be reading along and have a sense of "OHHH, this turned into...insert novel here. "

Then I got to feed my Heinlein addiction again when Variable Star was published...

I was a reader from early on but Heinlein was the first author that "grabbed" me - I think I was in 4th grade...maybe we never quite get over our first literary love?

Dipping back into my old afh post:
I have to say that "The Tale of the Adopted Daughter" from TEFL is one of my FAVORITE stories of all time.
Yup. Still true.

Well I am certainly not a big fan of the later stuff.

The earlier stuff - The Moon Is A Harsh Mistress and before tends to be at least readable although there are ones I didn't enjoy (Starship Troopers, I'm looking at you). Like Ian I suspect that the juveniles have aged really badly, they seemed "from the past" when I read them as a juvenile in the 70s. Maybe The Rolling Stones might be OK although to be honest it is a bit hazy in my memory.

However so far no-one has mentioned the short stories. This is where early period Heinlein really shines for me and I would say that his best work is all at a shorter length.

The only one I bought Stranger in a Strange land was enough to put me off seeking out any more of Heinlein's works.

But I did come across The Unpleasant Profession of Jonathan Hoag in an anthology which I quite liked without realising it was his.

Andy, one juvenile I suspect that might hold up today is Citizen of the Galaxy, although I have a horrible feeling its protagonist might be too obviously of the 1950s... Certainly the computing (and I use the term loosely) described in Starman Jones will have anyone under the age thirty rolling around on the floor in laughter. And the characterisation in Space Cadet will be entirely foreign to anyone not familiar with the mores of the post-WWII generation.

The short stories... Yes, there were some classics, and they remain so: 'All You Zombies', 'By His Bootstraps' (which Heinlein himself thought was a bit of fluff he knocked off one afternoon), 'Columbus Was A Dope'... I think Heinlein was a master at deploying sf tropes, and a lot can be learned from his technique. But his "personality" (for want of a better word) was often too obvious in his prose, if not in danger of overwhelming it on occasion - and that made his fiction less appealing to me (and, I suspect, many Brits).

>15 DWWilkin:: "If you put yourself in Heinlein's shoes, engineer, academy graduate and now able to earn additional income, then a living writing science fiction that had a very good appeal, would you have a different career."

So why didn't he start a religion for Hollywood idiots? His close friend L. Ron Hubbard did. Granted Heinlein didn't have the best view of organized religion, but that didn't stop some of his more fanatical readers from founding The Church of All Worlds, Inc. -- http://www.caw.org/ -- apparently more than a few readers don't know how to read between the lines.

That's not really fair, since conservative Christians know nothing about the Bible except what their clerical overlords tell them -- be pro-life, pro-gun, pro-Bush, pro-death penalty, pro-war, anti-gay marriage (anti-gay sex, unless you're caught), and pro-capitalism. So much for "Thou shalt not covet" and communist and pacifist teachings of Jesus, a guy who never married and hung around with 12 dudes, prostitutes, and tax collectors. In today's world, he'd be Larry Flynt not Jerry Falwell

Priests tell people to be pro-gun?

I did not think to debate Heinlein's stance on religion, though I expect he would enjoy such.

I know that he had several stories/plot lines that showed a society controlled by a hierarchal church. Can't remember there names. Anyone else remember them.

As I recall the arc was that the cult like government was established, but ultimately it came down.

I rather liked Podkayne when it was new and I was very young. I've read a lot of the others, though none recently; once I developed a taste for good writing, I'm afraid ol' RH no longer appealed.

>26 DWWilkin: Revolt in 2100

>11 Morphidae:

I, too am very fond of all of Heinlein. The datedness of the books doesn't really bother me. Science fiction tends to contain more date-related references and concepts than other types of fiction, so one gets used to it.

>25 Carnophile:: Here it is in T-shirt form:

http://www.zazzle.com/christian_heterosexual_pro_gun_conservative_shirt-23583426...

And this essay is pretty blunt:

http://reformed-theology.org/html/issue10/why_i_am_pro.htm

Well, you have to find some rationalization to put Christ-infused armor-piercing bullets into liberals, atheists, and Jews. The Christian Right have that argument down pat.

Never underestimate the insanity or viciousness of someone carrying a Bible.

"God is omnipotent, omniscient, and omnibenevolent — it says so right here on the label. If you have a mind capable of believing all three of these divine attributes simultaneously, I have a wonderful bargain for you. No checks, please. Cash and in small bills." -- Heinlein

Now for a real shock horror posting: I still have a fondness for Sixth Column/The day after tomorrow (UK title). (Ha! Just seen what the touchstones did...) I know it's nowadays seen as appalling racist stuff, and I can't deny it. But it has one chapter opening with a whirlwind description of the spread of the Church of Mota which has struck in my mind as a remarkable image. One of the jokes also stayed with me about the priests of Mota paying for everything with gold: "Well, you can hardly expect a priest with a golden beard and flowing robes to whip out a chequebook and pen."

Liked most of the early stuff, especially Stranger in a Strange Land. I think that was my first Heinlein.

Loved Friday, but had to slough through Name of the Beast.

I also really liked The Moon is a Harsh Mistress.

I still have all the Heinlein's that I or my husband ever bought and my kids won't let us donate them to the Friends' book sale.

The books he did toward the end of his life were sporadically good. He'd have one great on, in my opinion, like Friday and then he'd have a clunker.

I think he just got to the point where he would be published simply because he was Robert Heinlein and little would be edited because he was Heinlein.

I was happy that my husband got me to read his stuff though!

My favorites:
Starship Troopers
Time Enough for Love

Good but didn't live up to the hype (IMHO)
Stranger in a Strange Land
The Moon is a Harsh Mistress

Wierd/Bad/Couldn't Finish
The Cat who Walks Through Walls
The Number of the Beast
I Will Fear no Evil

Honorable mention goes to some of his short story collections, like The Past Through Tomorrow. There are some real gems buried in there.

I think that all of the hype surrounding Heinlein's politics is a bit overwrought. If you look at his stories (even the bad ones) he basically tells people "stop whining, learn how to stand on your own two feet and protect/take care of your family (however you might define it). The rest is details."

He did have some serious Oedipal issues, though.

Name me some worthwhile books by writers who were completely self-adjusted and "normal"?

I'm with RobertDay: I loved The Day After Tomorrow. I remember curling up on the sofa and not moving until I'd finished it. Magical.

As a kid I loved all the juveniles and short stories, and then hit Stranger. Wasn't sure about that one, and then things went downhill. I bought and read them all of course - it was Heinlein after all. Whenever thinking about who my favourite author was, the first name that would spring to mind would be Heinlein ... and then I'd start thinking about the question a bit more.

I haven't read a Heinlein I didn't like - maybe my problem is I read to enjoy the story - I don't analyze books - I don't care what an author may have been having for breakfast while he was writing or if he was for or against whatever politically - I read it for pure entertainment - and he does this for me.

Are any of us 100% normal? So why knock an author who isn't?

>maybe my problem is I read to enjoy the story - I don't analyze books

Ditto.

My favorites:

Stranger in a Strange Land
The Moon is a Harsh Mistress
I Will Fear No Evil
The Number of the Beast
Starship Troopers

Ones I didn't like:

Job - Boring
Double Star - Too short and not enough about the Mars.

I have some others I know I haven't read yet, and some I think I have read, but am not sure (way back when I was a kid).

No-one is stating that you can't just read books for entertainment but Heinlein is interesting in this regard - in his adult works he certainly wasn't writing just for entertainment, his works are very much a reflection of his personality (beliefs, politics, etc).

You may doing the author an injustice when you just read "for entertainment". Certainly if they've worked long and hard on it, crafting their sentences, building up their themes... it's a little off-putting to have it all dismissed as "entertainment".

I also find it hard to believe that people read books and completely turn off their brains. Surely there are times when you think, "that's a clumsy way of phrasing it", or "nobody is as stupid as this character", "I didn't know that", or "he's stacked his argument", etc...

Every author's work is a reflection of his or her personality, beliefs, politics, etc. It stands out easier in older books, because we have moved on and the text has not.

The difference is whether the book crosses the line into propaganda, which I don't think RH's do. Many want to bash him because they think they see beliefs and politics that they don't approve of, others simply enjoy his stories and have no desire to judge the author on those issues.

I never got into the political part. I just found some of his later works hard to read - period. I did finish them, though. I just didn't enjoy them as much and some more editing might have helped - but who could say "No" to Heinlein at that point - his books sold, regardless.

#42

That is an important point. I think that some of the later books may have been rescued with a strong editor. However they weren't going to sell any more or less having spent another 6 months being reworked so there wasn't any business incentive to do so.

#41

I don't think it is so much propaganda but sheer clumsy writing. In a number of his books Heinlein reads as though he is hectoring the reader even when most readers have some sympathy to his point.

Perhaps some of Heinlein's stylistic problems are a result of his rules for writing -

1. You must write.
2. You must finish what you write.
3. You must refrain from rewriting, except to editorial order.
4. You must put the work on the market.
5. You must keep the work on the market until it is sold.

These rules appeared in the 1947 essay "On the Writing of Speculative Fiction."

#43,

I haven't read all his books, but the ones I have read didn't have that aspect for me. Most of the stuff I liked I read when I was a kid, so perhaps I didn't notice. Though I have re-read Stranger and MIHM as an adult and still enjoyed them. The 2 I didn't like I also read as an adult, but my dislike was not due to 'hectoring'.

I still wonder though, if people who think they know his 'politics and beliefs' and don't approve, find anything that they think touches on those issues to be hectoring, when to others it is simply part of the story.

Although I wouldn't call 'The day after tomorrow'/'Sixth Column' a favourite, as I said I'm still impressed by the writing. My favourite was 'The moon is a harsh mistress'. I don't have a lot of Heinlein on my shelves, and I suppose most of it is the short story collections.

As to his politics; the story I always remember is that when Philip K. Dick was struggling and living on dog food, Heinlein loaned him money, not because they were friends, not because they agreeed on their views of the world, not even because Heinlein liked his work, but because Heinlein considered PKD "one of us". Reason enough to respect the man.

Jargoneer, cool research.

Most works, by any author, will have fans and those who dislike the work also, and also those who have no opinion either way.

Heinlein is no exception. By the time I discovered him in the late 70's, he was already a big name in Science Fiction. Winning Hugo awards probably helped, but he had crossed over and sold beyond Sci-Fi fans to the mainstream, making real money at this craft.

I would not agree that everything an author writes is a reflection on the beliefs of the author, for authors often portray characters who are totally different from what they believe to be themselves. How many books have murderers telling us the tale, but surely no author sees themselves as the murderer.

Heinlein though has much to say as the years go by in his canon. Certain elements seem to be a theme. I expect much of what he advocated most would not hold with, and sometimes it does seem he is hitting me over the head with a giant stick, pounding his point in.

But can I read his stories and enjoy them? Certainly. Some of the stories I have reread many times, and as the years grow on me, there are some that I know I will never reread, these being mostly the later part of his work.

In considering that aspect of myself, I find I would rather not be preached at, and take the juveniles at the value that they are a fun read. They are from a time when the breadth of science fiction was not so great that these stories were fresher and I can focus on them. Simple plot structures. No worries about Einstein and warped universes, or other more complex physics. I can even go back and appreciate the Lensmen also. I can enjoy Asimov.

I find that certain books of Heinlein, and other authors of an earlier time than present to be timeless, and will always be enjoyable.

Favorites
---------
The Moon is a Harsh Mistress
Friday
Rocketship Galileo
Podkayne of Mars
The Door into Summer

Liked
-------------------------
Tunnel in the Sky
Number of the Beast
Starman Jones
Methuselah's Children
Time Enough For Love
Many of the stories in The Past Through Tomorrow

Many others, either liked, or at least, did not dislike.

Only one do I genuinely dislike:

Stranger in a Strange Land

I read and like Heinlein. There are more holes and issues reading the books as an adult but they are still enjoyable reads. Read what you want and let others do the same. I have books that make me think and books that are straight escapist brain candy. I choose which to read depending on my mood. Either way, I read fiction for entertainment.

I have enjoyed Heinlein over the years and have reread a number of his books. I agree that the quality of the writing changes over the years but when I reread the juveniles I let myself remember the joy I felt when I read them the first time as a kid. You can anyalyze any book you read and while that can be a worthwhile concept I sometimes feel that you then loose the overall picture of the novel. Sometimes a "cigar is just a cigar".

Must admit though that I like Number of the Beast (along with many other of his novels) but that was mainly because it recalled the times when I read Burroughs.

#44

Every work ever published followed those rules.

Of course there are many books written filling in the details he left out.

>48 feaelin:
Whoops, your link to Friday is an "author" page, not a "work" page.

"Ayn Rand in space" w/ marginally better prose pretty much sums up my RAH hating too. Worst - Stranger in a strange land.

Someone once advised me about Ayn Rand, a person who had read The Fountainhead etc. I had asked pointedly should I read them, and based on her information, decided it was not for me.

I wonder is Ayn Rand really needful. Will reading her material round my character out?

Avoid Ayn Rand at all costs. I was not so foolish - see here.

I would have to disagree with some of the comments that do not give Heinlein much credit however, everyone is entitled to their opinion.

I myself find that out of all the Sci-Fi authors read Heinlein was and still is the most versatile writer and I have a very difficult time comparing him to anyone else. I have read quite a few of his books and short stories and even though I haven't enjoyed them all equally they each entertained me fully.

Keep in mind you have to put the book in perspective of the era that it was published. Many time I have read a publication from 25-50 years ago and am amazed at the for thought and inventiveness of the author. Today some older book concepts are today every day occurrence and or topic in the news.

My favorites:

Friday
Farmer in the Sky

I cannot recall the first SF book I read, but I know that I quickly started reading Asimov, Clarke and Heinlein as a teenager and I enjoyed most of their works. On this board many trash all three to varying degrees, but I still enjoy reading many of their works, especially Heinlein. I have re-read his stories the most and I still find many of them enjoyable, especially his juveniles. My two favorites are Starship Troopers and The Door into Summer. I never read Stranger in a Strange Land or most of his later works and I have no desire to.

>54 DWWilkin:
Borrow The Fountainhead from the library. If you dislike it you haven't wasted any money. Rand was perhaps the 20th century's preeminent individualist. You will get less lecturing in The Fountauinhead than you will from a Heinlein novel of equal length. (Her Atlas Shrugged is a different story - lecturing up the wazoo.)
Rand never generates "meh" reactions, everyone either loves her or hates her, I think. I also think she would have loved this fact; "lukewarm" does not describe her in any way.

my son, sister and wife all like (some) heinlein (the moon is a harsh mistress being the favorite, i think). And my sister gave her nephew, our son, many Heinlein juvies, which he liked. So disagreement w/in family, disagreement w/in groups. No biggie.

I think one of the things we see as a theme is that the Juveniles hold up as good rereads for the majority who have posted so far.

If we look at some of the author legends of Science Fiction, can we comment about as many Juveniles, or do we connote the writings of these other masters with periods as we so ardently have discussed in this thread for Heinlein?

I, too, have read everything by Heinlein I can get my hands on. I enjoyed almost all of it. Favorites include Job: A Comedy of Justice and Time Enough for Love. Stranger in a Strange Land is the first Sci-fi book I ever read, and has inspired me to collect quite a bit more. I credit Heinlein with opening up a whole new world for me.
I think that in some of his later work he was just writing to please himself, gathering the characters he'd created and loved most and putting them all in the same place just so he could visit them again, i.e. 'Robert and Ginny' showing up in the story.
BTW, I am 28, female and have read all of his work in the last five years.

#61 - part of it was what age one was when introduced to SF. In 1962 our jr. high library had Asimov, Clarke and Heinlein and i sucked 'em all in then. I think Clarke (for my tastes) holds up the best (and i'm thinking of Clarke pre 1965). A Wrinkle in Time was another key early SF book in our house. We were primed for fantasy courtesy of Nesbitt & Eager, in particular. And Marvel comics.

I'll add a little to my concept of periods and wonder if we can label Heinleins a little better.

Picasso has the famous blue period, and other periods that his art has.

We know that Heinlein wrote the juveniles during a specific time, but the latter work, can we name it, can we break it down, perhaps the last work is his last 8 years when he got a second wind in the later period after his carotid bypass operation. Certainly the wikipedia article has four eras of Heinlein. Early, seminal, Middle, and later, though I think there should be better names then that.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_A._Heinlein#Later_work.2C_1980.E2.80.931987

11 "Is there anyone here, other than me, that likes all of Heinlein?"

Me.

Well, except for For Us, the Living. That one wasn't good.

It seems to be fashionable for people to prove how sophisticated they are as readers to talk about how they don't like Heinlein, Clarke, or Asimov anymore, having outgrown them. I find such arguments to be unconvincing, but I'm not inside the heads of those making those statements either.

There's nothing "fashionable" about it. You grow up, you realise there's more to fiction than lumpen prose, cardboard characters and 1950s sensibilities... so you stop reading Asimov, Clarke and Heinlein. Then you discover that there are plenty of current writers who deliver exactly the sort of stuff you do want... which only leads you to wonder why people keep on recommending other people read some 60-year-old piece of crap.

Ian, the idea is only to say that it is crap to you, to others it is great stuff. I certainly want my kids to have the pleasure of the juveniles when they are ready for it. And then to enjoy with them The Moon is a Harsh Mistress together. There are a few others who feel that Heinlein is completly outdated but there are many who feel that even if new writers have passed him by, he still remains a fun read and that is to be respected.

There are plenty of books and opinions to go around. Some here may argue that Heinlein has been surpassed, it being now 30 years since his death, and he having no way to stay current. Others will argue that he will never be out of vogue.

Everyone can appreciate him in a different way. Perhaps we might have some suggestions of books, like the juveniles, by the well read readers here, that could do similar by current science fiction writers?

I find that much of YA is written to a younger reader than the juveniles of Heinlein but that may just be my age now, and if I were a teenager I would see that YA was spot on.

Has it never occurred to you that some of Heinlein's juveniles just won't be understandable to a 21st Century teenager? When Starman Jones pulls out his slide-rule to calculate the route home, it will make no sense to them. And then there's all the 1950s sensibilities and politics...

Obviously tastes change, but I think nostalgia plays a large role in people's likings for such books. I read most of them back in the 1970s. But the world was closer to the 1950s back then than it is now - and I don't just mean closer in years. If I tried rereading them now... well, I've a feeling they've aged badly.

As for current YA sf - well, I'm not all that well-read in the genre as I obviously prefer adult sf. But I'd heard such good things of Patrick Ness's The Knife of Never Letting Go that I bought myself a copy. I also have PB Kerr's One Small Step, although since that's about the Apollo programme it's arguably not sf. Ann Halam is excellent - I particularly like The Haunting of Jessica Raven, The NIMROD Conspiracy, and Taylor Five. I understand Philip Reeve's books are quite good. And Scott Westerfeld seems to be doing very well.

I always find it fun to read those books written in the 1950s. We should be on Mars by now. It's hard to think that 50 years ago 2009 was distant future and who then would be around now to see how incorrect they were! Ah, but if only ...

> 11 Morphidae likes all his works

So do I, with the single exception of 'The Unpleasant Profession...' which I never finished.

I started reading him about 30 years ago, and was happy to put aside his irritating attitude to women (brilliant, beautiful, but in need of help and control from their menfolk), capitalism (the only game in town, if you are RAH) and lecturing the reader (well, he intended to do that, so fair enough) because I loved the ideas and will still happily put up with everything for that.

I reread Farmer a few weeks ago and enjoyed it just as much as the first time round. Time Enough has always been a favourite, together with Methuselah's Children. But my absolute faves are Starship Troopers and Moon is a Harsh Mistress. Those both made me think about society and the duties and rights of citizens. For that, thank you, RAH.

I acquired a copy Grumbles last year, which I thought gave a pretty good insight into his ethos and the background and reasons for it. Quite funny for such an arch Conservative to be so liberal in his attitude to personal relationships!

To whoever complained about Lazarus wanting to sleep with his mother: surely the intent was to make you think about our reasons for such interdictions. Why would they be necessary in the society of Time Enough?

It's funny ...I was watching A Clockwork Orange, recently and for the first time I noticed the glaring lack of cell phones, and how the wired phone was a key plot element. It made me think "how could Kubrick and Burgess miss cell phones in their vision of the future?"

It's like the slide rule mentioned above.

I have a fond memory of slide rules, they were passe when I started school, but calculators were not fully in just yet. My father had one that he had to use in college and he brought it out to show us and give to my brother and myself.

That the knowledge in a story of a slide rule or an abacus, or a time before computers (Hey LPs are coming back) is something that might make the writing quaint for a young teen now, does not mean that being exposed that part of technological history should be denied.

I think it makes it even more interesting and fun to discuss that this is the way it was...

Could we consider such an artifact as a "reverse anachronism" is there a specific term for it?

Um, I'm a bit old to be a twenty-first century teenager (well, technically I guess I was a teenager for the first year of it), but I do know what a slide rule is. I might not have ever used one but I certainly wouldn't be confused by a character in a book using one. If the modern reader can read and enjoy historical fiction that involves eighteenth century sailing ships, I see no reason why those of us who never used a slide rule can't enjoy books written a few decades before our births that mention them. So what if they show those technologies being used in a future in which we now know they're outdated? 1984 hasn't suffered any because the year 1984 wasn't actually like that.

My taste in SF seems to run towards Cold War era in a lot of ways, in spite of not having been old enough during any of it to have been aware of it at the time. Frequently it's clear in direct influence in the plot of my favorites, but even if not they seem to have been written during it.

My point in coming back to this thread today was mostly to follow up on Number of the Beast, though. I probably wouldn't have bothered mentioning it in this discussion if I hadn't been reading it when I first posted. I found it enjoyable but not a favorite. I occasionally found myself wanting to throw something heavy at Jacob for deciding that he's wrong and then keeping on with doing the same things, but all in all I found it to be similar to Time Enough for Love, not done quite as well.

Look at the cinema of Terry Gilliam -- all clockworks and pneumatics and whatnot -- very retro-future, but that doesn't stop the films from being enjoyable. Then again, Gilliam is quite the writer. He's more cantankerous than Heinlein every was. As long as the check cleared, Heinlein didn't really bother with the whole quality control thing in his writing. Why write a 5-star book when you can churn out 3 2-star books. His writing foresaw the coming of such industrialized hacks like James Patterson and John Sanford.

>70 sarahemmm:
put aside his irritating attitude to women (brilliant, beautiful, but in need of help and control from their menfolk)...

You've missed some of his stuff.

In Friday the heroine kills a man who is tailing her in the third sentence. Later on she kills a few men who are attacking her, with her bare hands. Throughout the book, whenever anyone of either sex tries to boss her around, they end up somewhere between having their ears burning and their necks broken.

In To Sail Beyond the Sunset the heroine has a man tell her (early in the 20th century, iirc) to hang up his coat and get him some coffee. She tells him to F-- off. Nowadays it wouldn't be a big deal, but clearly, given when the scene occurs, Heinlein is showing the woman being ahead of her time.
(My memory is hazy on this - I'm thinking of a meeting of stockholders of a company, of which Maureen Johnson is one - anyone who remembers please feel free to correct my account if it's off.)

In another scene her husband rebukes her for not making another man's bed (!) when a group of friends are staying at a hotel. She straightens her husband right out.

I could provide examples well into the double digits, but trust me, you haven't read all of Heinlein. Actually, I'm kind of wondering what you've read. I don't remember any works in which women "need control" from their menfolk. Help certainly; Heinlein portrayed all members of a family helping and relying on each other, men relying on women as well as vice versa. E.g., the two female protagonists in Number of the Beast rely on their husbands, but then, their husbands rely on them too.

Never considered him sexist, and i think I would have noticed. This kind of abject name calling, with little evidence to support it, does not belong in the discussion and is quite silly.

Message 68: > Has it never occurred to you that some of Heinlein's juveniles just won't be understandable to a 21st Century teenager? When Starman Jones pulls out his slide-rule to calculate the route home, it will make no sense to them.

Well I have to confess that a lot of Science Fiction writers use 'make believe' gadgets that make no sense to me - I just accept I am reading Science fiction and move on. A lot of us know how to use slide rules still (showing my age here - LOL) but I am sure that juveniles of today will just presume a slide rule is a science fiction gadget, accept it as such, and continue to read on.

As an aside - 10 years ago I returned to school and finished my year 12. i did maths and part of that was learning (or in my case revising) logarithms. I am very bright when it comes to maths - so myself and a sweet bright thing went head to head doing some problems - him with his electronic scientific calculator me with my slide rule and log tables - I beat him 90% of the time :)

>76 Carnophile:

I'm not sure where the "in need of help from their menfolk" thing came from either. Heinlein's women, like his men, are a bit superhumanly perfect, or what's apparently his idea of it: brilliant, beautiful, not a jealous bone in their bodies, for the most part never needing a shoulder to cry on so that they're always the perfect company, and rich to the point where they never have practical difficulties in being able to afford everything they're capable of doing. If he has a problem with women it's putting them too high on a pedestal, except that in general his male leads are too good to be true, also. (Except for the aforementioned Jacob, who is infuriating.) Therefore I don't think it can be called sexism.

But I can't think of any of them who need control or help from their menfolk unless they're in the juveniles that I don't bother to read. Mostly they're willing to accept help from their menfolk, e.g. have a chair pulled out for them or a door held open, but that's just their manners. I can't think of one of them that needs or would submit to "control."

I am sure that juveniles of today will just presume a slide rule is a science fiction gadget, accept it as such, and continue to read on.

Interesting point. Will the youth of today recognise old tech for what it is, or assume it is a) some invention of the author, or b) used to give the story a steampunk aesthetic?

>79 Unreachableshelf: - that's a valid point but are Heinlein's heroes much different than the standard sf hero of the time. It is always worth remembering that the main readers of sf were/are male adolescents (que the quote - the golden age of sf is 13) and that the characters were often aimed at teenage wish fulfillment. The women he portrays are also wish fulfillments - for all their achievements in the end they know their place. (Heinlein's women have a tendency to fall for the strong hero who treats them like a child).

He did repeat this witticism in a couple of stories, about a woman wearing ''a perfume that was probably named something like 'Summer Orchard' but would be better called 'Justifiable Rape.' ''

Alexei Panshin, a decent sf writer and insightful critic, said this about Heinlein - that early Heinlein dealt in 'facts' and later Heinlein in 'opinions-as-facts', turning his novels into 'exercises in solipsism', ventriloquist-dummies for the ideological content of the author.

So he turned into Ayn Rand?

> 76 ...trust me, you haven't read all of Heinlein.

Well, yes, actually, I have. I agree that RAH thought he was wonderfully advanced in his attitudes to women and minorities, and I agree that, for his era and background, he was indeed. That doesn't change the fact that in fact his attitude was quite extraordinarily condescending.

Yes, Friday is trained to fight. RAH still makes it clear that her one aim in life is to be part of / have a family.

There is one scene at the beginning of the book with the Gay Deceiver (not near my bookshelf today) where Jacob teaches the womenfolk a lesson about who is in charge that still makes me grind my teeth.

No doubt Virginia had her ways of managing RAH...

Edited to add:
> 81 the characters were often aimed at teenage wish fulfillment. The women he portrays are also wish fulfillments...

Absolutely agree - and I happily reread him because I know that.

I don't think that Heinlein chose to use his books as preaching in his later works, though we have the clear example that a church arises from it. I think that was just an extension of success.

Looking at his life, I can envision him saying, wow, these books I have been writing have been successful for us, and we have made a good living. Now lets try something more adventurous and make not only the science futuristic, but the interaction of the people also. hence we get groking.

I can see him building a philosophy based on some personal beliefs, but amplified so that his characters have larger than life thoughts for the era in which they were written.

I don't see him like L ron Hubbard, creating a religion out of the ether with him as its leader based on thoughts. I wonder if Hubbard would recognize scientology now. I wonder if Heinlein, if alive, would not continue to have his moral and political thoughts evolve as society has evolved since his passing.

We will have made real progress in sexual relations when women don't have to be strong, just women.

And when men don't have to be civilised, just men! ;)

have those man bonding retreats that seemed to be popular a decade ago disappeared?

Now we have one great day to do it, oh that's this Sunday... But wait, women have horned in on that last bastion of when a man can be a man. Superbowl sunday no longer the sacred day of yore.

Iron John FTW!

#86

Thank God I don't have to be civilized any more.

If memory serves, to talk about Heinlein again, was there a character named Jubal in Stranger, where we have Groking, but then Jubal is elsewhere in the canon, but Groking isn't?

Is that correct? It has been more than 20 years since I read that part of the works.

>91 DWWilkin: Jubal shows up in Number of the Beast, but that book is about the multiverse concept and brings in many characters from Heinlein's other books, so he's a minor character.

I think Heinlein's later works were often on the order of anthropological experiments. The recipe being take a bit of this culture, take a bit of that culture, add in a lot of Heinlein's boyhood mores, mix and see what comes out. Heinlein is one of the most anthropological of the 1950s writers; he is very concerned with cultural relativity and pits characters with strong cultural mores against each other to demonstrate how much of culture (typically American culture of the time) is not universal. Often he's debunking the cultural standards that were very much enforced in his boyhood and youth.

I would be curious to see how Heinlein will fare in a few generations. I really enjoyed The Egoist, but there was a lot I had to have explained since it was written at the turn of the twentieth century and relied on a fairly detailed understanding of the social mores of the time. Heinlein may prove more intelligible to the teenager who has never heard of any telephones (having a chip in the head or something) than for the teenager who vaguely understands that old people couldn't just call for directions if they got lost.

I would never suggest that Heinlein is a great writer in the sense of one who makes the language sing; I don't think that's what he set out to be. What I enjoy about his work, and I enjoy nearly all of his work, is the exploration of ideas that, at the time, were radical. The juveniles are clearly teaching devices, and I don't mind that too much, since they have a decent story and likable, if stereotypical, characters. The Moon is a Harsh Mistress is a lesson about the American Revolution wrapped in a scifi chocolate coating to make it taste better to those (the aforementioned teenage boys) who would find plain history unpalatable, but I will always love Manny and Mike and Wyoh for themselves.

I wouldn't want someone to read Heinlein as their first or only experience of SF, but I think his work is an important part of the history of the genre, and enjoyable to just read on a rainy afternoon - which is not faint praise in my book.

# 11: Morphidae

Dislikes?

A moment deep in thought...

I got nothin'

#66: I've read lots of those current writers, and often their material is significantly less readable than the 1950s era authors. That's why people keep recommending Clarke, Asimov, and yes, Heinlein. Sixty years after the fact, their material still works. Their material is also the root influence on most more recent writers of the genre, so their work should be read for that reason alone.

And any teenager too uneducated to even know what a slide rule is really should find out (and clearly has never watched a movie like Apollo 13).

I still have my slide rule. My husband and a friend were at a Computer Science teachers conference a few years ago and when they got to a vendor's table where a slide rule was being used a a decoration, they both just had to play with it. The vendor had never seen anyone use one before!

It seems to me, personally, that all the sci-fi authors I can name all came from back in the day! I may read current stuff but their names don't stick as well - maybe one day they will be the Heinleins of the 21st century.

>81 Jargoneer:
for all their achievements in the end they know their place. (Heinlein's women have a tendency to fall for the strong hero who treats them like a child).

?

I can’t think of what you mean. Perhaps you’re thinking of some of his early stuff? If he showed women in subservient roles in 1940, I think he can be forgiven; we are all creatures of our time. Anyway, cite some examples, please.

The Justifiable Rape thing is in questionable taste, though he obviously meant it as a joke, but the man wrote - what? 3/4 of a million? (just guessing here) -words in his career. Let's not take that as representative.

So yes, they do know their place. Deety Burroughs is a math genius, not to mention karate expert, superb computer programmer, etc. Friday is a secret agent who gets through every problem in her rough-and-tumble world due to the fact that she’s smarter, stronger, faster, and just generally...better than everyone else. Hazel Stone is a revolutionary who helped overthrow Luna’s oppressive government - when she was just a kid! The girl in The Menace From Earth is studying to be a spaceship designer. Star in Glory Road is the Empress of the Galaxy. Dagmar from Tertius (Time Enough for Love and sequels) is a genetic engineer. Do I really have to continue?

Against allllllllll this we have...what? That Heinlein’s women occasionally cry on a man’s shoulder? What, that’s not realistic? Oh my God! In between being a math genius, computer genius, kick-ass karate expert, playing hockey better than Wayne Gretsky, etc., Deety Burroughs cries once (or twice, whatever)! Obviously Heinlein’s condescending toward women!

A common theme is emerging here. Clearly some people have a deep, overwhelming need for Heinlein to have been a male chauvinist, and they are firmly determined to ignore what the man actually wrote to get to that desired conclusion. Odd.

>83 sarahemmm:
...trust me, you haven't read all of Heinlein.
Well, yes, actually, I have.

Then you haven’t remembered it.

Yes, Friday is trained to fight. RAH still makes it clear that her one aim in life is to be part of / have a family.

The fact that she settles down in a family at the end does not mean that her “one aim in life” is to have a family. Worse, and more relevant, is your odd idea that having her want to be in a family implies condescension on Heinlein’s part. Why? What are you saying, that there’s something objectionable about wanting a family? Not to rock your world, but most people - of both sexes - eventually get married and have families. Just a little memo, FYI.

Speaking of family, apparently you’ve forgotten the scene in Friday in which she has contests of speed and strength with one of the husbands in her S-family. She wins both.

And, furthermore, he becomes all insecure because he lost these contests, and gets angry about it. You could not draw a more feminist-ly correct description of an insecure male. Not only is this not chauvinist, it’s like something right out of the pages of Katherine MacKinnon.

Heinlein had many of his characters, male and female, seeking family. Oh my God, in The Puppet Masters the hero proposes to the heroine. Oh horrors! He wants to be part of a family! This obviously demonstrates Heinlein’s condescending attitude toward men! A large part of the action in The Door Into Summer is based on the hero’s desire to marry a certain girl. Andrew Libby is described as “just wanting people to like him.” Lazarus Long starts many families in his life. Etc.

I just think it’s priceless that a woman described as a "supergenius" (by Boss, who’s in a position to know, since he handled the genetic engineering that created her) prompts accusations that Heinlein was being “condescending.”

That doesn't change the fact that in fact his attitude was quite extraordinarily condescending.

The confident tone of this assertion does not change the fact that it is a vaporous fabrication plucked from thin air. E.g., in The Notebooks of Lazarus Long RAH said

Men are more sentimental than women. It blurs their thinking.

This kind of assertion of women’s cognitive superiority is only the most overt of Heinlein’s respect, and then some, for women.
Here’s another example from the Notebooks. This is in fact so extremely “pro-women” that I hesitate to reproduce here because I actually find it quite offensive, but it makes the point quite plainly:

Whenever women have insisted on absolute equality with men, they have invariably wound up with the dirty end of the stick. What they are and what they can do makes them superior to men...They should never settle merely for equality.

As I said, rather offensive, but in the opposite direction of what some people on this thread are claiming.

The idea that Heinlein was condescending to women would merely be amusing, if it weren’t for the possibility that some uninformed people might be reading this thread and get the idea that these slanderous falsehoods about RAH have some tenuous connection to reality.

It is very clear that there is a burning emotional need by some people to tag Heinlein as a male chauvinist. This need is interesting, but only in a clinical sense.

There is one scene at the beginning of the book with the Gay Deceiver (not near my bookshelf today) where Jacob teaches the womenfolk a lesson about who is in charge that still makes me grind my teeth.

Who did the four of them finally elect as their permanent captain? Oh right, Hilda.

Also, Jacob is not supposed to be sympathetic in that scene. He’s quite outrageous much of the time. Obviously, the fact that an author puts words into a character’s mouth does not necessarily mean the author agrees with those words. In the case of Jacob’s annoying remarks, it’s especially obvious, because we also get the words and thoughts of the other characters, especially the female ones, natch, who remark what an ass he’s being.

>97 Carnophile:

First of all, I must admit that Heinlein is my most favorite author so I admit to a significant bias right out of the chute. As a young girl reading Heinlein, oh-so-(depressingly)-many years ago my interpretation was entirely pro-girl. Heinlein definately shaped my world-view (starting in about the 4th grade) and my impression at that time was distinctly "anything-you-(-boys-)-can-do-I-can-do-
better."

Several years later (after I had bested all the boys - of course) I read a few things - particularly Heinlein's views on what HE thought he was driving at with the original ending for Podkayne - that I found rather disappointing. This made me resolve to try to ignore what authors THOUGHT they were conveying with their writing... Luckily by the time I found this disillusioning commentary by Heinlein I had already profited by what I had interpreted his work to convey at the time I read it.

We are all a product of our upbringing/culture - ANY attempt to overcome this should be encouraged.

>97 Carnophile: Thank you. Couldn't have said it better myself. RAH was many things, but condescending toward women? No.

I feel an RAH jag coming on. I haven't read any of his stuff since Stranger in a Strange Land some few odd decades ago, and am beginning to see a much more complex person developing here than I had thought. I am one of those people Carny is referring to who might get the wrong idea because of their ignorance of his work.

Gotta get on the stick. Besides, it should be fun to revisit his juveniles, most of which I read and enjoyed as a ... juvenile.

That's what I like about LT, it reminds you of some many books that you read and enjoyed or want to read and enjoy for the first time.

I have read all (I am pretty sure about this) of Heinlein's works. Got miffed at some, but still it was Heinlein and I couldn't not read it. I can't say I have an author right now that I feel the same way about.

I would also say that the sexiness of the women needs to be looked at in the context of the times. Yes he was a man writing about women for mostly teenage boys, but that time period was the epitome of 'Boys don't make passes at girls who wear glasses'.

If you will remember girls/women who were smart, independent, and thoughtful were often portrayed as ugly, lacking in style, physically defective, repressed with hints of lesbianism (at the time a terrible fate). The idea was that if you were smart and spoke up, you would be considered ugly and an inferior specimen of your sex, and doomed to be alone and unloved. RAH singlehandedly made it safe and sexy for women to be smart, active, and leaders. He influenced not just women, but men also.

RAH sexist, Not in this universe.

Should Heinlein have its own Group, so we can discuss all the various facets?

>103 DWWilkin: I'm on the fence. I don't think the Heinlein threads are in danger of taking over this group, but maybe there is enough interest in really discussing his work to warrant a stand alone group.

>97 Carnophile:

I've been letting this marinate for a couple of days, and you still said everything that I thought of better, and with more examples.

even though i'm in the "anti-RAH" camp, i really don't think this (or other RAH threads) are taking over SFF and, really, this IS where he belongs, i think. He's important, he's SF, wtf - because i and some others don't care for his books doesn't mean discussions of him and his work don't belong here. That really would be a form of Cyops putative "censorship" to write Heinlein out of SFF. But if RAH buffs would rather have a RAH group, that's fine too.

I've added a few cents to this thread but will toss in two more...

I am a huge RAH fan, which is HOW I came to be a SF fan - but I don't think he needs his own group - LT has a plethora of narrow special interest groups already and I, personally, don't feel it would benefit from more.

To tell the truth - I have read all of Heinlein and participated in Heinlein-groups before and am happy for the opportunity to debate points in a thread here and there but I don't know that a All-Heinlein-All-the-time group would hold my interest. I kind of feel like I have been over all those points before and, while I like to dust off those talking points once in a while and see if I still agree with myself, it is not like he is writing anything new for me to think new thoughts about.

I'd leave the discussions here and let the normal waxing and waning of interest bring him up now and then. Keeping the new/old SF in one place can lead to some lovely compare/contrast discussions and exploration of where the genre came from, where it went, and where it is heading.

I find RAH's politics to be grating, and the nigh-insatiable baby hunger of people is strange to me. (RAH and his wife couldn't have kids, right?)

That said, I adored Job: A Comedy of Justice. I found his angle on religion, especially traditional right-wing religion, to be very refreshing. Hell turning out to be a lovely place was fun.

It must have been very satisfying to write the types of books he wanted to, there at the end, incorporating all the characters of his books into one universe.

I'm not a big fan, the only two books of his I liked were:

The Door into Summer
Double Star

I find his humour to be juvenile and his characters wooden and over-the-top. These two books were quite poignant though and he really nailed the characterization.

Perhaps these are good because they are short?

I read lots of RAH when I was younger. I went off him as he developed word-bloated and emasculated his editors. I gave my 13 year son my copy of Star beast though, he loved it as did my wife who is not a SF reader. It is far better than Speilberg's E. T. and better than most YA novels. It deserves to be remembered.

Is Star Beast the one where the alien creature turns out to be the heir to the throne?

Thats the one. Also the alien is regarded as the family pet.

And the last talks about Princess something or other taking her human pets home with her.

Yes,

Grew up on Heinlein. Anyone read, 'The Man Who Sold the Moon'. Admittedly, this one is a bit slow, but my point is that Robert Heinlein did exactly that, he sold us on the moon and on science fiction.

The one that sold me was Arthur C. Clarke's Earthlight, read it when I was 10. My first SF book.

>112 justifiedsinner: justified said, "Also the alien is regarded as the family pet."

Sounds like "American Dad".