Quote:
Originally Posted by radius
Sometimes I think whether people like RAH or not depends on where in his career they started reading. Readers who started with the juveniles or short stories seem to become fans while his longer novels which start exploring unconventional family structures are hit and miss.
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Unconventional family structures? How about
totally screwed up philosophies of life!
I submit as evidence a quote from
Stranger in a Strange Land.
"...But I was coping with wolves when you were still on Mars. Nine times out of ten, if a girl gets raped, it's at least partly her own fault. That tenth time - well, all right. Give him your best heave-ho to the bottomless pit. But you aren't going to find it necessary."
I am ashamed to say I read right over this, and it was not until a girl in my SF class expressed her anger at such a statement. Justifiably so. This is delivered in all seriousness, and it's difficult to conclude that RAH didn't really believe this was true.
Having read several Heinlein books, I cannot conclude anything but is an old-school scumbag. "That tenth time"? Give me a freakin' break.
Starship Troopers was not a novel, but his treatise on military theory -- again, espoused by a fictional character -- sandwiched between three short stories. He leveraged atheistic-Scientology as the philosophical backbone for a military society. I'm absolutely sure the movie had RAH spinning in his grave, which was the only reason I liked the movie!
Like L. Ron Hubbard, he is on my list of Golden Agers avoid at all costs (sad that I even have such a list, since that is my favorite era of SF).
-Pie