Slog - Comments on Book Club of the Damned: I Will Fear No Evil, Part 2

Comment by mike

mike — Wed, 21 May 2008 15:40:13 -0800

See? Hard to read, intercut narrative, oddbal punctuation convention, a light editorial hand, gender-bending... It's like Dhalgren's evil twin!

Comment by JC

JC — Wed, 21 May 2008 15:48:06 -0800

Heinlein has written some pretty interesting short stories, but I've never read any novel by him that didn't make me almost gag with the amount of puerile sexism contained within. He makes Piers Anthony look like a feminist.

Comment by elenchos

elenchos — Wed, 21 May 2008 15:50:30 -0800

For me the climax is every time Heinlein writes "mammary gland".

Comment by Art

Art — Wed, 21 May 2008 15:53:22 -0800

For hot and heavy 70s SciFi action what you want is Norman Spinrads Bug Jack Barron.

Comment by spock

spock — Wed, 21 May 2008 16:02:11 -0800

Heinlein is supposed to be read when you are 14. That is when I read this book and it seemed entertaining enough, although obviously it was conservative propaganda.

Comment by Greg

Greg — Wed, 21 May 2008 16:02:36 -0800

It may be tame by our current standards, but when I was 11 it was almost as good as National Geographic.

Comment by Fnarf

Fnarf — Wed, 21 May 2008 16:09:23 -0800

Science Fiction books aren't edited, they're typeset.

That sample paragraph makes me want to unlearn language.

In real life, of course, the instant that woman realized what was happening to her, she would have blown her brains out.

Comment by NapoleonXIV

NapoleonXIV — Wed, 21 May 2008 16:23:18 -0800

Hmmm....

Perhaps I'd best retain my affection for Heinlein by never reading him again.

Comment by merry

merry — Wed, 21 May 2008 16:27:47 -0800

@2 - Bingo. Thank God I'm not the only one who can't stand stupid, sexist, sexist Heinlein.

Comment by Sachi Wilson

Sachi Wilson — Wed, 21 May 2008 16:42:34 -0800

I NEVER could stand Heinlein. Utterly overrated IMHO.

Comment by Will in Seattle

Will in Seattle — Wed, 21 May 2008 16:43:21 -0800

Well there was the door into summer ...

Comment by Ramdu

Ramdu — Wed, 21 May 2008 16:44:55 -0800

I hated this book even when I was 14. The sex in The Harrad Experiment was way hotter. Dhalgren, on the other hand, just confused me. After 60 pages, I turned it into my eighth grade reading teacher and asked if she could explain what was going on. She never returned it.

Comment by Soupytwist

Soupytwist — Wed, 21 May 2008 17:04:26 -0800

Paul, I think I might love you more than I love Adrian!

Comment by Greg in Des Moines

Greg in Des Moines — Wed, 21 May 2008 17:14:58 -0800

To answer the question about the editing, Heinlein was really sick in the period before it was published, and was unable to do his usual final edit. I'm not sure why he and Virginia chose to publish it at that time. In any case, yes, it was definitely not as good as his usual stuff. I find it pretty painful to reread.

Comment by RHETT ORACLE

RHETT ORACLE — Wed, 21 May 2008 17:29:12 -0800

Years ago when I was a young purser on the s/s MARIPOSA, Robert Heinlein and his wife were aboard as passengers on a cruise to the South Seas. He asked me to do some typing for him which I did.

While I didn't expect to get paid, he could have at least given me a signed copy of "Stranger in a Strange Land". Neither. That book had just gained notoriety because it allegedly was an inspiration to Charles Manson though it was said Manson couldn't read.

http://scifipedia.scifi.com/index.php/Stranger_in_a_Strange_Land

Heinlein - not a very pleasant fellow - was red-headed, dour and cheap, and he takes no place in the diadem of other notables for whom I have typed.

Sci-fi (even with sexual content) terminally bored me, although I regularly got off to Frank Yerby's "The Foxes of Harrow".

Comment by Gitai

Gitai — Wed, 21 May 2008 18:07:50 -0800

Editor? No editor. This was the point in Heinlein's career where people thought he could shit gold, when really, all he could do was write about acts his organs could no longer perform. I'll say it again. Stranger in a Strange Land and Starship Troopers. Don't touch anything else, or you might land in some incest.

Comment by JenK

JenK — Wed, 21 May 2008 19:39:06 -0800

Re: editing, I don't know what was going on in the publisher's mind, but I do know what was on Heinlein's: Medical bills.

Comment by K X One

K X One — Wed, 21 May 2008 21:23:43 -0800

Dhalgren does start out slow and nigh incomprehensible but sticking it out is well worth it. It's been awhile since I read it, but I read it multiple times and would still rate it high amongst my favorites.

Comment by Dave M

Dave M — Wed, 21 May 2008 22:33:56 -0800

@15

Do you spend your days wandering around the internet to find new places to post lies? Do you expect anyone to believe you? Don't bother answering it will just be more ridiculous bullshit.

Comment by rtm

rtm — Wed, 21 May 2008 23:10:44 -0800

As an avowed Heinlein lover from the 4th grade forward, I think I got to this when I was 12 or 13. Even then, it was a steaming pile of crap.

Paul, you hang in there.
Also - never re-read Dune. Great when you are 13 - pure tripe now.

Finally, Cory Doctorow is the shit. He's totally corrupted my son with "Little Brother." And if you want to read Heinlein re-done, with less sexism and a fresh take, the 2 John Scalzi books (Old Man's War, Ghost Brigades) do a fine job - even with the one brain inside the other stuff.

Comment by Nay

Nay — Thu, 22 May 2008 01:06:09 -0800

Better still I think you should host a book club of the damned and make us all ready crappy books and then drink and complain about them.

Comment by Spoogie

Spoogie — Thu, 22 May 2008 07:36:09 -0800

@19, I know @15, and all of which he speaks/writes is truth. Apparently he's had a life and you don't.

Comment by LMSW

LMSW — Thu, 22 May 2008 07:50:13 -0800

You're not done with it yet? Really, it's just for 50 bucks. Practice your speed reading.

Comment by NaFun

NaFun — Thu, 22 May 2008 08:10:31 -0800

Really, this is nothing compared to Norman Spinrad's _Child of Fortune_. I would bet you $75 you couldn't read it, but I was able to without promise of monetary gain so I bet you could, too. OMG was that difficult, though. Almost a thousand pages of a stupid stuck up bitch taking drugs and having sex in the most florid prose you could imagine, with about 400 pages of repetition. *gag*

Comment by NaFun

NaFun — Thu, 22 May 2008 08:13:30 -0800

@12 Dude, _The Harrad Experiment_ was awesome to read in high school. I re-read it a few years ago and boy did it NOT stand the test of time. Definitely helped form a lot of my opinions on sex and sexuality, though.

Comment by Jys

Jys — Thu, 22 May 2008 09:24:04 -0800

I had a Heinlein phase when I was in highschool- I read every one of his books I could get a hold of. Worse even than "I Will Fear No Evil" is "Job, A Comedy of Justice". I can remember the plot from the former, but the latter was absolutely, unequivocally horrible. I couldn't tell you what it was about, besides something akin to a modern day biblical Job tale. If your eyes aren't bleeding after "Evil" I'd suggest you read "Job" for the pure amusement... while at the dentist.
Alternatively, one of my favorite Heinlein books "Time Enough for Love" and it's companion "To Sail Beyond the Sunset" is every bit as sexist as one would expect. I always gave him the benefit of the doubt, perhaps it was the culture he grew up in (or the unfortunate grip of the my southern baptist upbringing) which, to him, probably was progressive, but to modern folk is rather horrifying.

Comment by Doctor Memory

Doctor Memory — Thu, 22 May 2008 10:27:14 -0800

What Gitai@16 said, although honestly I'd substitute "The Moon is a Harsh Mistress" for "Stranger". Certainly anything other than those three books should be approached with extreme caution or better yet not approached at all.

I will give Heinlein this: he left behind one of the most simple and accurate tests ever for whether a person you are corresponding with on the internets is an insufferable idiot. Just look for the Lazarus Long quotes.

Comment by Schweighsr

Schweighsr — Thu, 22 May 2008 11:08:57 -0800

To answer Question #2 Paul; yeah, that is as steamy as it is going to get. Heinlien never mentions any sexual organs except "mammary glands". So sorry for your pain and suffering.

But if you really want to suffer, take up #26's suggestion, or read "Farnham's Freehold" [where blacks take over the world and all white women are sluts who like to have sex with them and gorillas - I'm not making this shit up].

Comment by John Thomas Stuart XI

John Thomas Stuart XI — Thu, 22 May 2008 15:30:24 -0800

Beginning with Stranger in a Strange Land his prose always included an old fart who was mysteriously sexually attractive to young women. I figured he was going through the male menopause.

I Will Fear No Evil, Time Enough for Love, etc. were all serials -- maybe that's why they seem choppy and repetitive.

Comment by David Brown

David Brown — Sat, 24 May 2008 11:45:15 -0800

In 1974/75 (or was it 1973/74?). I was on a cruise (SS Mariposa) and Heinlein was a passenger. Pacific Far East Line had asked me to lead a creative writing workshop (better than washing dishes to pay for my passage). I was embarrassed when I learnt that he - a prominent, widely published author - was on board because I was not a promient, widely published author and, in leading the workshop in his presence, as it were, felt like an intruder or something. It was suggested that I invite him to speak to us; but I didn't, because the few times I encounteed him he struck me as a rather unpleasant individual who wanted nothing to do with a peasant like me.

Comment by FIDDLE-FADDLE

FIDDLE-FADDLE — Sat, 24 May 2008 16:21:58 -0800

@15: Rhett has also consorted with at least three Pulitzer Prize winners, viz: broken bread with cartoonist Berkeley Breathed at Palisade; hosted a bon voyage party for novelist Allen Drury ["Advise & Consent"] and his lover; spent a day with poet Gary Snyder and his family while helping construct an ashram - all of us in the nude. Not to mention Rhett dated Fritzi, the niece of New Yorker author Philip Hamburger, who was once hit on by brain cancer victim Ted Kennedy.

Why would anyone make up lies like this except to yank your chain, Dave? Are you there, Dave?

HAL

Comment by wench

wench — Wed, 28 May 2008 20:11:01 -0800

Thanks, JC. I had almost forgotten why I stopped reading Piers Anthony. I read a couple of his books, and then when I came to the end of one of them it was the most outrageous, sexist piece of crap ending to a book I otherwise liked.

Made me so cross, I threw the book across the room.