HEINLEIN, Robert A(nson)

(1907-1988)

   US writer, educated at the University of Missouri and the US Naval Academy, Annapolis. After serving as a naval officer for five years, he retired due to ill-health in 1934, studied physics at UCLA for a time, then took a variety of jobs before beginning to publish sf in 1939 with "Lifeline" for ASF, a magazine whose GOLDEN AGE he would profoundly shape,just as he rewrote US sf as a whole in his own image. RAH may have been the all-time most important writer of GENRE SF, though not its finest sf writer in strictly literary terms; his pre-eminence from 1940 to 1960 was both earned and unassailable. For half a century he was the father - loved, resisted, emulated - of the dominant US form of the genre.He came to the role naturally. Unlike most of John W. CAMPBELL Jr's pre-WWII recruits to ASF, he entered the field as a mature man, already in his 30s, with one genuine career (the military) honourably behind him. He was smart, aggressive, collegial, competent and highly inventive. And he worked fast. By 1942 - when he stopped writing to do his WWII service as an engineer at the Naval Air Experimental Station, Philadelphia - he had already published almost 30 stories, including three novels which would only later be released in book form. Moreover, it had soon been made clear that those stories published under his own name - like "Requiem" (1940), "The Roads Must Roll" (1940), "Blowups Happen" (1940) and the short novel"If This Goes On . . ." (1940; rev 1953) - fitted into a loose Future History, the schema for which Campbell published in ASF in 1941. As a device for tying together otherwise disparate stories, and for establishing a privileged (and loyal) group of readers familiar with the overall structure into which individual units were magically inserted, RAH's outline of the future was an extraordinarily acute idea. It wasimitated by many other writers (with considerable success by Poul ANDERSON and Larry NIVEN, to name but two), but for many years only RAH's and perhaps Isaac ASIMOV's similar scheme - by priority, and by claiming imaginative copyright on the imagined future - were able to generate a sense of genuine CONCEPTUAL BREAKTHROUGH. RAH himself largely abandoned his Future History after 1950 (if the RECURSIVE novels of his last years are discounted for the moment); all the short stories in the sequence were soon assembled in book form as The Man who Sold the Moon (coll 1950; with 2 stories cut 1951), The Green Hills of Earth (coll 1951) and Revolt in2100 (coll 1953). Two early novels also belonged to the series: Methuselah's Children (1941 ASF; rev 1958), which concerns an extended family of near-immortals, and Orphans of the Sky (fixup 1963 UK) - assembling Universe (1941 ASF; 1951 chap) and "Common Sense" (1941 ASF) - which contains an innovative presentation of the GENERATION STARSHIP concept. With Methuselah's Children, the three collections were republished - "Let There Be Light" (1950) being omitted and "Searchlight" (1962) and "The Menace from Earth" (1957) added - in THE PAST THROUGHTOMORROW (omni 1967; with Methuselah's Children omitted, cut 1977 UK).Not all of RAH's early writing consisted of Future History stories, although most of his non-series work was initially published under the pseudonyms Anson MacDonald, Lyle Monroe, John Riverside and Caleb Saunders, includingthe novels Sixth Column (1941 ASF as MacDonald; 1949 as RAH; vt The Day After Tomorrow 1951) and BEYOND THIS HORIZON (1942 ASF as MacDonald; 1948as RAH). In Sixth Column an Asiatic INVASION of the USA is defeated by a resistance - disguised as a RELIGION - which uses superscientific gadgets to accomplish "miracles". The original idea came from Campbell, who had incorporated it in the then unpublished novella "All" (in Campbell's The Space Beyond (coll 1976). BEYOND THIS HORIZON describes a future society of material plenty where people spend their time seeking the meaning of life (GENETIC ENGINEERING). Some of RAH's best stories belong to this period: "And He Built a Crooked House" (1941), about an architect who inadvertently builds into another dimension; "By His Bootstraps" (1941 as by MacDonald), a superb TIME-PARADOX fantasia; and "They" (1941), a fantasy about solipsism. "Waldo" (1942 as by MacDonald), about a crippled inventor who lives in a satellite, gave rise to a significant item of TERMINOLOGY, the real-life equivalents of the protagonist's remote-controllifting devices subsequently being known as WALDOES. These stories, and the later non-series stories, are collected in various volumes: Waldo and Magic, Inc. (coll 1950; vt Waldo: Genius in Orbit 1958), Assignment inEternity (coll 1953; in 2 vols, vt Assignment in Eternity 1960 UK and Lost Legacy 1960 UK), The Menace from Earth (coll 1959), The Unpleasant Profession of Jonathan Hoag (coll 1959; vt 6 X H 1961), The Worlds of Robert A. Heinlein (coll 1966) and Requiem: New Collected Works (coll 1992) ed Eric KOTANI.In a style which exuded assurance and savvy, RAH's early writing blended slang, folk aphorism, technical jargon, clever understatement, apparent casualness, a concentration on people rather than gadgets, and a sense that the world described was real; it was a kind of writing able to incorporate the great mass of necessary sf data necessary without recourse to the long descriptive passages and deadening explanations common to earlier sf, so that his stories spoke with a smoothness and authority which came to seem the very tone of things to come. His characters were competent men of action, equally at home with their fists and a slide-rule (EDISONADE) and actively involved in the processes and procedures (political, legal, military, industrial, etc.) which make the world turn. Described in tales whose apparent openness concealed very considerable narrative craft, these characters seemed genuinely to inhabit the worlds of tomorrow. By the end of his first three years of writing, RAH had domesticated the future.In the years 1943-6 RAH published no fiction, but in 1947 he expanded his career - and the potential reach of genre sf as a marketable literature - in two new directions: he sold a number of short stories to the Saturday Evening Post and other "slick" magazines; and he published - with Scribner's, a highly respectable mainstream firm - the first US juvenile sf novel to reflect the new levels of characterization, style and scientific plausibility now expected in the field. Rocket Ship Galileo (1947) is not an outstanding work (its young heroes confront and defeat a gaggle of conspiring Nazis on the Moon) but it was the first in a series that represents the most important contribution any single writer has made to CHILDRENS' SF. (It also formed the basis of a film, DESTINATION MOON (1950), scripted by RAH.) Space Cadet (1948), the second in the series, renders RAH's own experiences at Annapolis in sf terms. With the third, Red Planet: A Colonial Boy on Mars (1949; text restored 1989), which recounts theadventures of two young colonists and their Martian "pet", RAH came fully into his own as a writer of sf for teenagers. A strong narrative line, carefully worked-out technical detail, realistic characters and brisk dialogue are the leading virtues of this and most of his later juveniles, which include Farmer in the Sky (1950), Between Planets (1951), THE ROLLING STONES (1952; vt Space Family Stone 1969 UK), Starman Jones(1953), The Star Beast (1954), Tunnel in the Sky (1955), Time for the Stars (1956), CITIZEN OF THE GALAXY (1957) and Have Space Suit - Will Travel (1958). The last three of these, along with Starman Jones and The Star Beast, rank among the very best juvenile sf ever written; their compulsive narrative drive, their shapeliness and their relative freedom from the didactic rancour RAH was beginning to show when addressing adults in the later 1950s all make these books arguably his finest works.After 1950 RAH wrote very little short fiction - the most notable piece is thetime-paradox tale "All You Zombies" (1959) - concentrating for some years on the highly successful stream of juveniles, although never abandoning the adult novel. The Puppet Masters (1951; text restored 1989) is an effective if rather hysterical INVASION story, and a prime example of PARANOIA in 1950s sf. Double Star (1956), about a failed actor whoimpersonates a galactic politician (RURITANIA), won a HUGO, and is probably his best adult novel of the 1950s, although the mellow and charming The Door into Summer (1957), a TIME-TRAVEL story, is also much admired; all three books were assembled as A Heinlein Trio (omni 1980).His next novel, however, was something else entirely. STARSHIP TROOPERS (1959), originally written as a juvenile but rejected by Scribner'sbecause of its violence, is the first title in which RAH expressed his opinions with unfettered vigour. A tale of interstellar WAR, it won a 1960 Hugo but also gained RAH the reputation of being a militarist, even a"fascist". The plot as usual confers an earned adulthood upon its young protagonist, but in this case by transforming him from a pacifist into a professional soldier. This transformation, in itself dubious, is rendered exceedingly unpleasant (for those who might demur from its implications) by the hectoring didacticism of RAH's presentation of his case. Father-figures, always important in his fiction, tended from this point onto utter unstoppable monologues in their author's voice, and dialogue and action become traps in which any opposing versions of reality were hamstrung by the author's aggrieved partiality.But this, for good and for ill, was the fully unleashed Heinlein. His next novel, STRANGER IN A STRANGE LAND (1961; text restored 1990), a stronger work which won himanother Hugo, is even more radical. Valentine Michael Smith, of human stock but raised on Mars, returns to Earth armed with his innocence and the PSI POWERS bequeathed to him by the Martians. After meeting Jubal Harshaw and being tutored by this ultimate surrogate-father and know-allvoicebox for RAH himself, Valentine begins his transformation into a MESSIAH-figure, demonstrates the nature of grokking - a term which RAHcreated for this book, and which can be defined as gaining, more or less instantly, deep spiritual understanding - and eventually "discorporates", a form of dying which is painless and which can be freely imposed upon others. This costless discorporation of human beings marks the book as a FANTASY, and not, perhaps, as one very markedly adult; and it wasunfortunate for Sharon Tate that its dreamlike smoothness (a smoothness even more winningly evident in the much longer restored version) could, if his claims are to be credited, be translated into this-worldly action by the sociopathic murderer Charles Manson. However, among those capable of understanding the nature of a fiction, it has proved to be RAH's most popular novel, in the later 1960s becoming a cult-book among students (who were drawn to it, presumably, by its iconoclasm and by RAH's apparent espousal of free love and mysticism), and remains by far the best of the books he wrote in his late manner.There followed 2 minor works, Podkayne of Mars: Her Life and Times (1963), an inferior juvenile which proved to be his last, and Glory Road (1963), a largely unsuccessful attempt at SWORD AND SORCERY. Farnham's Freehold (1964), another long and opinionatednovel of ideas, invokes rather unpleasantly a Black despotism in the USA of the FAR FUTURE (see also POLITICS; SURVIVALIST FICTION), and begins to fully articulate a theme that obsessed the late RAH: the notion of the family as utterly central. From this time onward, hugely extended father-dominated families, sustained by incest and enlarged by mating patterns whose complex ramifications required an increasing use of time travel and ALTERNATE WORLDS, would tend to generate the plots of his novels. Before he plunged fully into this final phase, however, RAH published THE MOON IS A HARSH MISTRESS (1966), which won a 1967 Hugo and marked a partial return to his best form. About a revolution among Moon-colonists - many historical parallels being made evident with the Warof Independence - it is of value partly because it shows the nature of RAH's political views very clearly. Rather than being a fascist, he was aright-wing anarchist, or "libertarian" (LIBERTARIANISM), much influenced by SOCIAL DARWINISM.But the fact that RAH's politics are a prime concern in discussions of his later novels points to the sad decline in the quality of dramatization in his sf. As Alexei PANSHIN, his most astute earlier critic, pointed out, RAH once dealt in "facts" but latterly he dealt only in "opinions-as-facts". And as these opinions-as-facts were uttered in RAH's voice by domineering monologuists, his last novels increasingly conveyed a sense of flouncing solitude, and were frequently described - with justice - as exercises in solipsism; for, no matter how many characters filled the foreground of the tale, his casts ultimately proved either cruelly disposable or members of the one enormous intertwined family whose begetter bore the countenance, and spieled the tracts, of the author. I Will Fear No Evil (1970) is an interminable novel about a rich centenarian who has his mind transferred to the body of his young secretary; it brought into the open the espousal of free sex (and inevitable babies begat upon wisecracking women who long to become gravid) first evident in STRANGER IN A STRANGE LAND. Time Enough for Love, or The Lives of Lazarus Long (1973), a late coda to the Future History series,was perhaps the most important of the late books in that it established the immortal Long, a central character in Methuselah's Children, as RAH's final - and most enduring - alter ego. Other novels which revolve around Lazarus Long include "The Number of the Beast" (1980 UK), The Cat whoWalks through Walls (1985) and To Sail Beyond the Sunset (1987). FRIDAY (1982) and Job: A Comedy of Justice (1984) similarly gathered other works from RAH's prime into the late fold. The final effect of these novels - in direct contrast to their joke-saturated telling - was one of embitterment. By devaluing everything in the Universe except for the one polymorphicfamily, RAH effectively repudiated the genre whose mature tone he had himself almost singlehandedly established, and the USA whose complex populism he had so vividly expressed. In the end, the father of sf abandoned his children.RAH was guest of honour at three World SF Conventions, in 1941, 1961 and 1976. His works remained constantly inprint. He has repeatedly been voted "best all-time author" in readers' polls such as those held by LOCUS in 1973 and 1977, and in 1975 he was recipient of the First Grand Master NEBULA. His death in 1988 was deeply felt.

   DP/JC

   Other works: The Discovery of the Future . . . Speech Delivered by Guest of Honor at 3d World Science Fiction Convention (1941 chap); Tomorrow, the Stars (anth 1951); The Robert Heinlein Omnibus (omni 1958 UK), containing The Man who Sold the Moon and The Green Hills ofEarth, which is not to be confused with A Robert Heinlein Omnibus (omni 1966 UK), containing BEYOND THIS HORIZON, The Man who Sold the Moon and The Green Hills of Earth; Three by Heinlein (omni 1965; vt A Heinlein Triad 1966 UK), containing The Puppet Masters and Waldo and Magic, Inc.; The Best of Robert Heinlein (coll 1973 UK; vt in 2 vols as The Best of Robert Heinlein 1939-1942 1977 UK and The Best of Robert Heinlein 1947-1959 1977 UK); The Notebooks of Lazarus Long (1978 chap), being extracts from Time Enough for Love; Expanded Universe (coll 1980), including much nonfiction; Grumbles from the Grave (coll 1989) ed Virginia Heinlein, a first selection of letters with other material; StarshipTroopers/The Moon is a Harsh Mistress/Time Enough for Love (omni 1991); Tramp Royale (written 1953-4; 1992), travel memoir; Take Back Your Government: A Practical Handbook for the Private Citizen Who Wants Democracy to Work (1992), a pragmatic nonfiction text written in the 1940s.

   About the author: "One Sane Man: Robert A. Heinlein" by Damon KNIGHT, in In Search of Wonder (1956; rev 1967); "Robert A. Heinlein" by Sam MOSKOWITZ, in Seekers of Tomorrow (1966); Heinlein in Dimension (1968) by Alexei Panshin; "First Person Singular: Heinlein, Son of Heinlein" by James BLISH, in More Issues at Hand (1970); Robert A. Heinlein: ABibliography (1973 chap) by Mark OWINGS; Robert A. Heinlein: Stranger in his Own Land (1976; much rev 1977) by George Edgar SLUSSER; The Classic Years of Robert A. Heinlein (1977) by Slusser; Robert A. Heinlein (anth1978) ed J.D. OLANDER and Martin H. GREENBERG; Robert A. Heinlein: America as Science Fiction (1980) by H. Bruce FRANKLIN; "Robert A. Heinlein" by Peter NICHOLLS, in Science Fiction Writers (1982) ed E.F. BLEILER; ARobert A. Heinlein Cyclopedia: A Guide to the Persons, Places, and Things in the Fiction of America's Most Popular Science Fiction Author(1992) by Nancy Bailey Downing. A. Heinlein.

   See also: ALIENS; ANTI-INTELLECTUALISM IN SF; ARTS; ASTOUNDING SCIENCE-FICTION; AUTOMATION; CHILDREN IN SF; CLONES; COLONIZATION OF OTHER WORLDS; COMPUTERS; CRIME AND PUNISHMENT; CRITICAL AND HISTORICAL WORKS ABOUT SF; CYBERNETICS; DEFINITIONS OF SF; DIMENSIONS; DISCOVERY AND INVENTION; DYSTOPIAS; ECOLOGY; ECONOMICS; END OF THE WORLD; ESCHATOLOGY; EVOLUTION; FANTASTIC VOYAGES; FASTER THAN LIGHT; GALACTIC EMPIRES; GALAXY SCIENCE FICTION; GAMES AND TOYS; GODS AND DEMONS; HISTORY IN SF; HISTORY OF SF; HIVE-MINDS; IMMORTALITY; JUPITER; JUVENILE SERIES; LINGUISTICS; LONGEVITY (IN WRITERS AND PUBLICATIONS); MACHINES; The MAGAZINE OF FANTASY AND SCIENCE FICTION ; MAGIC; MARS; MATHEMATICS; MONSTERS; MOON; MUSIC; MUTANTS; NEAR FUTURE; NUCLEAR POWER; OPTIMISM AND PESSIMISM; PARALLEL WORLDS; PARASITISM AND SYMBIOSIS; PASTORAL; PHYSICS; POCKET UNIVERSE; PREDICTION; PSYCHOLOGY; PUBLISHING; RADIO; ROCKETS; SF IN THE CLASSROOM; SEX; SOCIOLOGY; SPACE FLIGHT; SPACESHIPS; SPECULATIVE FICTION; SUPERMAN; TECHNOLOGY; TERRAFORMING; TRANSPORTATION; UFOS; VENUS; VILLAINS; WEAPONS; WOMEN AS PORTRAYED IN SCIENCE FICTION.