Robert A. Heinlein began publishing in the 1940s at the dawn of the Golden Age of science fiction, and today he is considered one of the genre's 'big three' alongside Arthur C. Clarke and Isaac Asimov. His short stories were instrumental in developing its structure and rhetoric, while novels such as Stranger in a Strange Land and Starship Troopers demonstrated that such writing could be a vehicle for political argument.
Heinlein’s influence remains strong, but his legacy is fiercely contested. His vision of the future was sometimes radical, sometimes deeply conservative, and arguments have flared up recently about which faction has the most significant claim on his ideas.
In this major critical study, Hugo Award-winner Farah Mendlesohn carries out a close reading of Heinlein’s work, including unpublished stories, essays, and speeches. It sets out not to interpret a single book, but to think through the arguments Heinlein made over a lifetime about the nature of science fiction, about American politics, and about himself.
'An insightful addition to the academic study and appreciation of Heinlein’s body of work... Does a fantastic job of looking at the major themes of Heinlein’s career' Starburst magazine
However, Heinlein was never really a hard sf writer because he was always more interested in the human than the machine, more interested in the use of invention than the invention itself. Peter Nichols offers an accurate assessment when he maintains that the “emotional centre of his work has always been the political and social satire of man, and the cultures he builds and lives in”. Alfred Berger argues persuasively that it is in this way that Heinlein contributed to the feel that there was a ‘science of society’.
After leaving the navy Heinlein became involved in Californian politics as both a grass roots campaigner and a participant in classic block politics; he was married and enjoyed a radical open marriage with Leslyn MacDonald, who brought her experience of cinema and knowledge of script doctoring. He had already written a lightly fictionalised utopian manifesto that did not see the light of day while he was alive. His stories were startlingly political compared to those of his contemporaries (they often share interests more common to the utopian inflected writers of the 1920s and early 1930s), which have a clear cinematic art, and which tuck sexual and social radicalism first in their corners and then, as he moved into adult novels in the 1960s, brought up front as the primary interest. He understood science fiction as part of the historical process and as part of preparing for the future. “There won’t always be an England—nor a Germany, nor a United States, nor a Baptist Church, nor the Democratic Party, nor the superiority of the white race…” (GoH Speech at Devention)
Although it is not really helpful to think of sf writers as predictors, for all Heinlein never successfully predicted technological change (although there is Matt Dodson’s mobile phone in Space Cadet) it is amusing that he predicted the Presidential wife consulting an astrologer (Stranger in a Strange Land), an actor becoming President while controlled by his PR staff (Double Star), gender-neutral bathrooms (Friday), a demagogic Presidential candidate (“Revolt in 2100”), and gender fluidity (I Will Fear No Evil). His futures are politicised in complex ways over and above the stories he tells. This is not always successful and this book will tackle the failures as well as the successes but it is in those complex backgrounds that lie the truth in Peter Nicholls’ summation: “Although most of his themes were not new to science fiction, Heinlein was often the first writer to render them solidly believable rather than merely mind-boggling”
Robert A. Heinlein began publishing in the 1940s at the dawn of the Golden Age of science fiction, and today he is considered one of the genre's 'big three' alongside Arthur C. Clarke and Isaac Asimov. His short stories were instrumental in developing its structure and rhetoric, while novels such as Stranger in a Strange Land and Starship Troopers demonstrated that such writing could be a vehicle for political argument.
Heinlein’s influence remains strong, but his legacy is fiercely contested. His vision of the future was sometimes radical, sometimes deeply conservative, and arguments have flared up recently about which faction has the most significant claim on his ideas.
In this major critical study, Hugo Award-winner Farah Mendlesohn carries out a close reading of Heinlein’s work, including unpublished stories, essays, and speeches. It sets out not to interpret a single book, but to think through the arguments Heinlein made over a lifetime about the nature of science fiction, about American politics, and about himself.
'An insightful addition to the academic study and appreciation of Heinlein’s body of work... Does a fantastic job of looking at the major themes of Heinlein’s career' Starburst magazine
However, Heinlein was never really a hard sf writer because he was always more interested in the human than the machine, more interested in the use of invention than the invention itself. Peter Nichols offers an accurate assessment when he maintains that the “emotional centre of his work has always been the political and social satire of man, and the cultures he builds and lives in”. Alfred Berger argues persuasively that it is in this way that Heinlein contributed to the feel that there was a ‘science of society’.
After leaving the navy Heinlein became involved in Californian politics as both a grass roots campaigner and a participant in classic block politics; he was married and enjoyed a radical open marriage with Leslyn MacDonald, who brought her experience of cinema and knowledge of script doctoring. He had already written a lightly fictionalised utopian manifesto that did not see the light of day while he was alive. His stories were startlingly political compared to those of his contemporaries (they often share interests more common to the utopian inflected writers of the 1920s and early 1930s), which have a clear cinematic art, and which tuck sexual and social radicalism first in their corners and then, as he moved into adult novels in the 1960s, brought up front as the primary interest. He understood science fiction as part of the historical process and as part of preparing for the future. “There won’t always be an England—nor a Germany, nor a United States, nor a Baptist Church, nor the Democratic Party, nor the superiority of the white race…” (GoH Speech at Devention)
Although it is not really helpful to think of sf writers as predictors, for all Heinlein never successfully predicted technological change (although there is Matt Dodson’s mobile phone in Space Cadet) it is amusing that he predicted the Presidential wife consulting an astrologer (Stranger in a Strange Land), an actor becoming President while controlled by his PR staff (Double Star), gender-neutral bathrooms (Friday), a demagogic Presidential candidate (“Revolt in 2100”), and gender fluidity (I Will Fear No Evil). His futures are politicised in complex ways over and above the stories he tells. This is not always successful and this book will tackle the failures as well as the successes but it is in those complex backgrounds that lie the truth in Peter Nicholls’ summation: “Although most of his themes were not new to science fiction, Heinlein was often the first writer to render them solidly believable rather than merely mind-boggling”
The kind of book that a writer of [Heinlein's] stature deserves
