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08-03-2000 Thursday 9:00-12:00PM
Return to Index
"If This Goes on...","Stories Never Written" and "Logic of Empire" Thanks to Bill Patterson for collecting and pre-editing these postings for me. I was short on time this week: David
Subject: RAH-AIM Meeting Notice, 8-3 & 5-2000
From: agplusone@aol.com (AGplusone)
Date: 7/23/2000 4:29 PM Pacific Daylight Time
The Robert A. Heinlein Reading Group
Please see the following websites:
http://readinggroupsonline.com/group/robertaheinlein.html
http://members.aol.com/agplusone/rahmain.htm
and for instructions in using AIM especially, see:
http://www.alltel.net/~dwrighsr/heinlein.html
| Topic: | The Short Story "Logic Of Empire" |
| the afterward "Concerning Stories Never Written" | |
| and the novella "If This Goes On.." |
Place: On "AIM" software, in the room "Heinlein Readers Group chat" for which the basic download site is: and to which a 24/7 webpage link is contained at:
http://readinggroupsonline.com/group/robertaheinlein.html
Dates & times: Thursday, August 3, 2000, from 9 PM to midnight, EDT and Saturday, August 5, 2000, from 5 to 8 PM, EDT
[To attend: Register, download and install AIM. You need not put anything in the profile they offer you. Notify me please by e-mail of your registered user name so we may know to expect to see you in the room.]
We've returned to our chronological review of the Future History. Samuel Clemens, whose spirit left us in 1911 when Haley's Comet passed over, the same passing a four-year-old boy watched in amazed wonder one evening in a backyard in Missouri, believed the greatest challenge to our liberties is posed by extremes advocated by the religious who insinuate themselves into the fabric of our social order and seek to create a theocracy. Twain's sceptical forecast has not yet come to pass, but it could. There have been theocracies in past power here, in England and elsewhere, there are theocracies governing other countries today, and the unsettling question whether any one sect could obtain a working majority of the electorate at the polls and take over will never be settled as long as elections are held in our countries. Oliver Cromwell's party did once take over following a democratic parlimentary election. In the United States, we think "[t]he country is split up into such a variety of faiths and sects that a degree of uneasy tolerance now exists from expedient compromise; the minorities constitute a majority of opposition to each other."
"Could it be otherwise here? Could any one sect obtain a working majority at the polls and take over the country? Perhaps not--but a combination of a dynamic evangelist, television, enough money, and modern techniques of advertising and propaganda might make [earlier] efforts look like a corner store compared to Sears Roebuck. Throw in a depression for good measure, promise a material heaven here on earth, add a dash of anti-Semitism, anti-Catholicism, anti-Negroism, and a good large dose of anti-'furriners' in general and anti-intellectuals here at home and the result might be something quite frightening--particularly when one recalls that our voting system is such that a minority distributed as pluralities in enough states can constitute a working majority in Washington."
--from "Concerning Stories Never Written: Postscript"
in _Revolt in 2100_, (c)1953 by Robert A. Heinlein
Our reading selections for these upcoming meetings address Twain's fear. Will historians of our time or times following ever again write stories like these?
[NOTE concerning availability of the essay "Concerning Stories Never Written: Postscript" Revolt in 2100 and Methuselah's Children, were both recently reprinted and reissued in one volume by Baen--last winter-- and is readily available in paperback stock from the publisher, BUT check your bookstore to see whether it is on the shelves or needs to be ordered for you. We'll be reading all the stories from the rest of that volume in future weeks.]
Please post as many of your thoughts as possible about this defined topic before our meeting as a reply to this post to help make these meetings enjoyable and enlightening to all. Remember, the more pre-meeting posts we have, the better our discussions.
See you all a week from next Thursday and Saturday.
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David M. Silver
AGplusone@aol.com
"I expect your names to shine!"
Subject: Re: RAH-AIM Meeting Notice, 8-3 & 5-2000
From: "David M. Silver" agplusone@loop.com
Date: 7/28/2000 4:15 AM Pacific Daylight Time
AGplusone wrote:
[snip, snip, snip]
> Topic: The short story "Logic of Empire," the Afterward
> "Concerning Stories Never Written," and the novella "If This Goes On ..." from
> the Future History.
[snip, snip]
> Please post as many of your thoughts as possible about this defined topic
> before our meeting as a reply to this post to help make these meetings
> enjoyable and enlightening to all. Remember, the more pre-meeting posts we
> have, the better our discussions.
How do I nicely put this? Perhaps the fact this is only the second post in this thread demonstrates more graphically than anything else a point obvious to all. Chat co-hosts help us with the topics we discuss. Last meeting, this time last fortnight, with a co-host, we had more than 50 posts already made to spark discussion about "Gulf." We may not have exhaustively covered all possible points, but we ended up with 120 posts before we held those chat meetings. That made a very worthwhile discussion. It's not too hard to be a co-host for a story, or a theme. You simply post an expression of your thoughts, or propose an agenda, or points of view about the story or theme--it doesn't have to be profound or complex. Without a lead-off post, it falls on me to make one. I can. I have. I will, but after about three years, it gets old, and our reading group is entering its fourth year of doing this, even though we've only been here on AFH for about a year or so. In a week or so we may start a balloting on themes, stories, or topics we plan to discuss for the rest of the year. We're going to need volunteers to co-host those subjects. At some point even AGplusone gets tired of hearing about Heinlein according to AGplusone.
'Nuff said?
The next three posts in this thread will try to generate discussion on the readings set for this next week's meeting, now due to take place in five or seven days. Hope we see as many reply posts as we had last meeting and as many of you as possible at the meetings.
David M. Silver, aka AGplusone@aol.com
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Subject: Re: RAH-AIM Meeting Notice, 8-3 & 5-2000
From: Gaeltach gaeltach@fan.net.au
Date: 7/29/2000 5:51 AM Pacific Daylight Time "David M. Silver" wrote:
> At some point even AGplusone gets tired of hearing about Heinlein according to AGplusone.
David, I'm sure I speak for everyone when I say I admire your leadership and dedication to the Heinlein Reading Group. Any words you have to say about Mr Heinlein's stories or related matters is greatly appreciated, and I hope the burden that has rested on your shoulders for so long can be shared as much as possible. I would love to co-host, but put me down for one of the Juvies, or at least one of the stories I have had time to re-read recently. I only wish I had
more time for reading and critical analysis, something I enjoy dearly, but unfortunately with business and single parent responsibilities I barely have time to keep up with the posts here at AFH (when I'm lucky enough to receive them all).
Anyway, I think you need a big pat on the back. There ya' go. Feel better? :-)
Sean
gaeltach@fan.net.au
***************
.... and now for something completely different:
Sir Isaac's voder did not work when he said "Dia sehneh wkro wton didred ovsc aasiris."
***************
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Subject: Re: RAH-AIM Meeting Notice, 8-3 & 5-2000
From: ddavitt ddavitt@netcom.ca
Date: 7/29/2000 7:14 AM Pacific Daylight Time
Gaeltach wrote:
> "David M. Silver" wrote:
>
> >
> > At some point even AGplusone gets tired of hearing about Heinlein according to AGplusone.
>
> David, I'm sure I speak for everyone when I say I admire your leadership and dedication to the Heinlein Reading Group. Any words you have to say about Mr Heinlein's stories or related matters is greatly appreciated, and I hope the burden that has rested on your shoulders for so long can be shared as much as possible.
>
> Anyway, I think you need a big pat on the back. There ya' go. Feel better? :-)
Seconded over here......but I can see why David wants some help. I know not everyone here makes the chats but it doesn't stop you joining in the pre chat posts; the more input the better! The two stories scheduled next, plus the short article by Heinlein about the gap in between them, cover a pivotal point in the FH. Well worth reading and once read there's usually something to be said, or
questions to be asked. It'd be great to see people's thoughts and no, this isn't a nag about staying on topic :-)
Jane
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Subject: Re: RAH-AIM Meeting Notice, 8-3 & 5-2000
From: "David M. Silver" agplusone@loop.com
Date: 7/28/2000 4:18 AM Pacific Daylight Time
AGplusone wrote:
[all snipped]
"Logic of Empire" (novella, 1941; first published ASF magazine, collected in _The Green Hills of Earth_ (reissued Baen paper, 2000) and also available in a hardbound bookclub edition still in stock.
One advantage of reading the Future History in sequence is we take a close look at every work. "Logic of Empire" although described as "one of Heinlein's great early works" in James Gifford's RAH:ARC seems to me a bit of an orphan today. I don't know why. It shouldn't be. As Gifford points out, although many of Heinlein's works touch rather comprehensively on slavery, "Logic" is the only one that shows it from the inside. It's also precatory to _"If This Goes On ... "_, and is an archetypal "man who learns a lesson" story as Gifford points out.
Yet in three years of chats we've never really taken this one on specifically, only mentioned it peripherally with other works.
A couple points: historically, the citizenry of the United States, 1861 excepted, was never so close to a rebellion against established government as in the early 1930s; and it truly would have been a rebellion of the masses, not sectionalistic factions. Why? Rice bowl issues. Jobs, wages, hours, working conditions; but mostly lack of all the above.
It's obvious James is right, "Logic of Empire" takes on slavery from the inside; but it also takes on the entire concept of life-long toil at "honest work," defined somewhere else by a wise man as "a euphemism for underpaid bodily exertion, done standing up or on your knees, often in bad weather or other nasty circumstances, and frequently involving shovels, picks, hoes, assembly lines, tractors, and unsympathetic supervisors."
Do you agree or disagree with me that "Logic" can be applied to today's "interns" or "temporary employees" whether they work 'standing up or on their knees' or not? Do you know that for more than half the men born the year Robert Heinlein was born, including my father, their early fate wasn't twelve years of grammar and high school, followed by leisurely years of college. It was an indentured apprenticeship starting around age twelve to a tradesman, shop keeper, or farmer? This nation was built on the sweat of 'indentured' labor; and runaway apprentices and bond-servants started and maintained its revolution, explored its boundries, settled its states, and governed its populace for nearly two full centuries. Today, we think that's all gone. Look again. How long does a medical doctor intern spend working for stipend, sixteen and eighteen hours a week? Have you looked lately at what 'teaching assistants' make at universities? My father spent seven years apprenticed to a plumber, beginning in 1919, when he was twelve. How long does a physician spend apprenticed to his mentors, after completion of medical school? Try eight. Can you see other analogies, today? Look at the other 'interns' you've heard about. The ones who go to work for six months or a year or more for an actual nothing in wages to 'learn the job' after graduating college. Are we heading back towards indentures? What might "Logic" say about that? Now take a hard look at the 'temps' our lean, mean, down-sized corporations are employing. Ask Local 925, and others like it, what they're up to there.
Another thing: "Logic" is a archetypal Heinlein "man who learns a lesson" story, several times, as James points out. But Heinlein, as we all are learning, had a tendency to 'file the serial numbers off.' Where might the start of this story have come from? It's not Melville's Moby Dick, or Billy Budd; it's not Dana's Two Years Before the Mast; and it's not Kipling's Captains Courageous; but somewhere in the body of American or English Literature I think there's a story beginning very like it. Has anyone read a lot of Jack London, another writer who had an awful lot of nasty things to say about the "redemptive" nature of 'honest work?' Betcha we can find it. Any suggestions about this?
And there's much more to say about "Logic." Anyone have their own thoughts?
David M. Silver, aka AGplusone@aol.com
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Subject: Logic of Empire was Re: RAH-AIM Meeting Notice, 8-3 & 5-2000
From: ddavitt ddavitt@netcom.ca
Date: 7/28/2000 11:41 AM Pacific Daylight Time
Message-id: <3981D3DD.4FE85911@netcom.ca>
"David M. Silver" wrote:
> But Heinlein, as we all are learning, had a tendency to 'file
> the serial numbers off.' Where might the start of this story have
> come from? It's not Melville's Moby Dick, or Billy Budd;
>it's not Dana's Two Years Before the Mast; and it's
> not Kipling's Captains Courageous; but somewhere in the
> body of American or English
> Literature I think there's a story beginning very like it.
Interesting you should mention Captains Courageous David; I think it does have some similarity to the LOE story myself. CC is about a young boy who falls overboard on a luxury cruise and is picked up by a fishing boat. He is forced to do gruelling physical work of a kind he has never experienced in his pampered, spoiled life, in exchange for food. He is on a ship that cannot turn round and return him to his parents and he learns many valuable lessons before being reinstated, a "new man" in his old life. All this is paralleled in LOE but the underlying sense of unfairness is missing of course; his life has been saved by the people he has to work for and he is in no sense a slave.
One book that I did think of after reading LOE was Farnham's Freehold; it seems to me that both Wingate and Farnham face similar temptations and problems. This is particularly noticeable in the discussions of the habit forming alcoholic drink that makes life bearable at the cost of the ability to think clearly and retain the drive to free oneself. For Wingate it is rhira, for Hugh it is the ironically named "Happiness". Wingate realises early on that he has to have rhira in order to sleep; even though it costs him half a day's pay but he has enough determination to resolve to only drink the rhira before bedtime and keep a clear head in order to plan his escape. He reminds himself that, "No slave is ever freed, save he free himself."
LOE is one story that I haven't read very often; I think the downbeat ending may be responsible for that; it's quite a depressing story and there is no tidy resolution. The young girl who falls in love with Wingate is sent to Earth but there is no glittering future for her; certainly not with Wingate. Her father, who is a sympathetic character in spite of being cast in a "black hat" role of plantation owner, is left bereft of the one thing that made his life on Venus pleasant and Wingate discovers that his book and experiences aren't even enough of a pebble to cause a ripple of outrage, never mind a flood. Finally, we have the ominous figure of Scudder, looming up on the horizon. Hazel might see him as a potential saviour but we know that far from helping the workers on Venus, Scudder will effectively isolate them and doom them to a lifetime away from the cool breezes and blue skies of Earth.
It's interesting that the natives in this story are almost identical to those in Space Cadet; obviously SC fits into the FH with the link to Long Watch but it's hard to see the Patrol in the world of Coventry and MC. Oh well......the Stories Never Written article hints pretty broadly that Heinlein wasn't too keen on the FH tying him down.....
Heinlein really rammed home the links with the slavery in the American South but he offered no prospect of relief, no chance for freedom. Could this be because the situations _weren't _ so similar? The chance to go home at the end of 6 years was illusion rather than reality for the most part but it did exist; is this enough of a loophole, added to the fact that most of the people entered into the contract of their own volition to make the Venus set up "fair"? Would Wingate have stood a chance of telling it as it was and getting changes made once he returned home even if he had been a gifted writer?
Jane
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Subject: Re: Logic of Empire was Re: RAH-AIM Meeting Notice, 8-3 & 5-2000
From: James Gifford jgifford@rcsis.com
Date: 7/28/2000 12:52 PM Pacific Daylight Time
ddavitt wrote:
> LOE is one story that I haven't read very often; I think the
downbeat ending may be responsible for that; it's quite a depressing story and there is no tidy resolution.>
G'damn, Jane, are you and the baby hooked in parallel and multiprocessing this stuff? Your recent posts, especially this one, have been astonishingly insightful and entertaining... and for jaded old me, it's a good week when someone points up a minor connection between stories I hadn't noticed.
Keep it up.
--
| James Gifford - Nitrosyncretic Press - gifford@nitrosyncretic.com |
| "NitroPress" on AIM - See you at ChiCon 2000! |
| See http://www.nitrosyncretic.com for the Heinlein FAQ & more |
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Subject: Re: Logic of Empire was Re: RAH-AIM Meeting Notice, 8-3 & 5-2000
From: ddavitt ddavitt@netcom.ca
Date: 7/28/2000 2:06 PM Pacific Daylight Time
James Gifford wrote:
> Your recent posts, especially this one, have
> been astonishingly insightful and entertaining... and for jaded old me,
> it's a good week when someone points up a minor connection between
> stories I hadn't noticed.
>
> Keep it up.
Thanks Jim; at the moment I'm feeling quite the opposite; clumsy, indecisive and tired so it's nice to get a pat on the back Anyway, enough about me I think the stories of Wingate and Farnham have other similarities; if you're looking for connections how about Kitten and Annek? Both young, blonde and innocent, both help the man they feel some form of love or affection for, both betray those in authority over them....both end up shipped away from their homes to an unfamiliar place. Also, it could be argued that both men are ultimately rescued and returned to their point of origin by outside forces; Ponse and Sam's sister.
Wingate did manage to join the fugitives though; that was an interesting interlude. If he'd stayed there, using his technical expertise to help out and contributing to the Venusian equivalent of the Underground Railroad would it have been a stronger, more positive ending? He is tempted, having been there long enough to recognise that his life on Earth was an, "empty, sterile, bunkum-fed life" but in the end the home sickness wins out.
I also felt that there were some intriguing hints about the set up in the small town that could be linked to MIAHM; both colonies made up of the "scum of Earth" and yet developed into an "integrated" society. The way they dealt with the issue of three men to one women is a case in point. On Luna this resulted in women being placed on a pedestal, given full choice of who they would live with. On Venus...well, it wasn't spelled out but it seemed a little less clear cut;
"The great shortage of women in the community ( men outnumbered them three to one) caused incidents which more than anything else required the decisions of the Governor. Here, Wingate was forced to admit, was a situation in which traditional custom would have been nothing but a source of trouble; he admired the shrewd common sense and understanding of human nature with which the Governor sorted out conflicting strong human passions and suggested _modus operandi_ for getting along together."
I assume 'traditional custom' would be a couple getting married; the alternatives would at best seem to be plural marriages or casual liaisons; quite daring for the time of writing.
Any significance in Sam Houston Jones's name btw?
Jane
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Subject: Logic of Empire
From: merfilly8@aol.com (Stephanie Vickers)
Date: 8/2/2000 5:09 AM Pacific Daylight Time
Let's see...this is only my second read, so bear with.
I'm thinking the majority of the Venusian contractees are from the "poor, huddled masses", which made me think of the rhira in another sense. "It produces, not drunkeness, but lightness of heart, freedom from worry, and without it he could not get to sleep."
If something like this is so acceptable to them, granted under very harsh circumstances, I think I can begin to see why Scudder rose so quickly and so strongly. Because what rhira is providing on Venus is exactly what religion can offer a person. Lightness of heart in the face of adversity due to knowing there is another, better place. Freedom from worry, because you have to live by a code that defines right and wrong. And the peace of sleep after your bedtime prayers, knowing you've unburdened your sins of the day.
I started thinking that before I even got to the mention of Scudder, which seemed to confirm it to me. Because I think Scudder's rise had to have been from the "poor, huddled masses" turning to him for solace from their existences.
Filly
http://hometown.aol.com/merfilly8/myhomepage
"Let us endeavor so to live that when we come to die even the
undertaker will be sorry."
--Mark Twain
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Subject: Re: Logic of Empire
From: sonofwashu@aol.com (SonofWashu)
Date: 8/2/2000 8:20 AM Pacific Daylight Time
>I think Scudder's rise had to have been
>from the "poor, huddled masses" turning to him for solace from their
>existences.
Ain't that generally the way of religious movements (properly funded and silently approved, of course)? There's also the frightening (well, to most, anyway) prospect of how fast technology and awareness of the universe was expanding in Future times. The average person was confronted with the
possibility and practicality space-travel and other important scientific developments, without the glorious conceit of being the only thinking lifeform being as concrete as it is for folks here in the real world (i.e. world before the Future History diverges massively). People are fragile, and the fundamental keystone of Scudder's church and many like it, is that the body of faithful are superior to all and each, thus giving them a quick and easy way to dismiss and/or destroy everything that they are uncomfortable with otherwise, and still feel okeh wit doing so. Religion often means doing the immoral and being holy for it, this immensely so in the hyped and repressive way proselytised by Scudder.
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Subject: Re: Logic of Empire
From: Ogden Johnson III ojiii@home.com
Date: 8/2/2000 4:41 PM Pacific Daylight Time
On Wed, 02 Aug 2000 12:48:01 -0400, ddavitt >Mrs Biggs leaves Scudder all her millions and he sets up a TV station.
This is interesting; at the time of the original stories this wouldn't have been likely; TV was in it's infancy. Obviously in the gap between them and SNW Heinlein saw how TV could be a powerful tool for someone like Scudder. Without TV would he have been able to reach so many so fast I wonder?>
Before the TV evangelists, there were radio evangelists aplenty. In fact, they made the move to TV faster than many of the radio drama programs. TV evangelists have been a mainstay of TV since it was spreading city by city.
OJ III
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Subject: Re: Logic of Empire
From: "labert" labertspam@fast.net
Date: 8/3/2000 11:47 AM Pacific Daylight Time
Stephanie Vickers > Let's see...this is only my second read, so bear with.
>
> I'm thinking the majority of the Venusian contractees are from the "poor,
> huddled masses", which made me think of the rhira in another sense. "It
> produces, not drunkeness, but lightness of heart, freedom from worry, and
> without it he could not get to sleep."
>
> If something like this is so acceptable to them, granted under very harsh
> circumstances, I think I can begin to see why Scudder rose so quickly and
>so strongly.
snip
Filly
A valid point, Filly, though I wonder if that ability to accept that which provides easy relief is any more characterisitic of the society that brought Scudder than of any human society throughout history. We've always enjoyed our superstitions, because their explanations, however easy or wrong. We've also always enjoyed our narcotics, our intoxicants, even when in the end, the "lightness of heart" no longer has the power it had.
Perhaps rather than being symptoms of the society RAH was postulating, he was seeing them as characteristics of any society. To me, this is precisely what makes the tendency so damned dangerous.
labert
--
"Nothing is the reason we are here, oh nothin at all. . ."
- Big Head Todd and the Monsters: "Circle"
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Subject: Re: RAH-AIM Meeting Notice, 8-3 & 5-2000
From: "David M. Silver" agplusone@loop.com
Date: 7/28/2000 4:21 AM Pacific Daylight Time
AGplusone wrote:
[all snipped]
"Concerning Stories Never Written: Postscript"
I hope you've all taken the trouble to obtain a new copy of Revolt in 2100, now combined in print with a new issue of Methuselah's Children. We'll be reading the rest of the Revolt volume and later one in a couple months for certain.
You won't find this epilogue in The Past Through Tomorrow, and it's one of Heinlein's most important and well worth having.
There were three stories in the Future History never written (actually: probably five) discussed in this essay. "The Sound of His Wings," "Eclipse," and "The Stone Pillow" are the three the essay describes and explains why they probably never will be written ["Word Edgewise" and "Fire Down Below" are the two that slipped away through the cracks.]
"The Sound of His Wings" would have described the rise of the First Prophet, Nehemiah Scudder. "Eclipse" was to detail the fall of the U.S. into theocracy. "The Stone Pillow" was to tell the early story of the resistance movements later detailed in "'If This Goes On...'"
Instead of these, in later writings we got Digby and Foster in Stranger In A Strange Land, we got Alex Hergenshimer's Churches United for Decency in Job: A Comedy of Justice, and we got two juvenile novels (Red Planet and Between Planets), one 1947 short story, "Free Men," and one adult novel, The Moon Is A Harsh Mistress, covering revolutions, none of which, except "Free Men" really describe the harsh deadly time-consuming reality of building a revolution; and of course we have the rewritten "'If This Goes On'..." the real climax of the Future History in my view. Heinlein may have indeed hated Scudder too much to write about him; but I suggest to you writing the history of a successful resistance movement culminating in revolution, without a deus ex machina to depend upon, could occupy more than just one novel.
Consider this: lodges of freemasons in the Philippines began talking 'libery, equality, and brotherhood' around 1860, when Filipinos were first allowed to join their European brethern. They thereafter conducted several unsucessful rebellions against Spain through 1898, unsuccessful even though a harsher offshot of the freemasons, the Katipunan lodges formed from within those lodges for the express purpose of rebellion, existed from the 1880 period onward. When Dewey intervened, all seemed successful, but the Treaty of Paris selling the Islands to become part of the U.S.'s Manifest Destiny put an end to that hope. The rebellion continued, the Katipunan going to further extremes to ensure loyalty to the rebellion (lots of "blood on the tiles"), unsuccessfully until 1903 when Teddy Roosevelt unilaterally declared the hostilities over--anything following 1903 was deemed merely 'moro bandits.' Guerrilla warfare actually continued well into the 1920s; and one reason why when MacArthur in 1944 called for the Filipinos to rise and strike they did as well as they did was ... a lot of those folk had never wholly come down from the hills even after the 1920s. The legacy of guerrilla warfare to resolve differences continues to haunt the Filipino Republic today. BTW, you didn't think Heinlein invented the role of freemasons in rebellions did you? Franklin and Washington weren't the only 'fathers of their country' that came out of those lodges. Can you name others?
What would you speculate Heinlein might write in these three stories, and the two others, were he able and willing to write them today?
David M. Silver, aka AGplusone@aol.com
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Subject: Re: RAH-AIM Meeting Notice, 8-3 & 5-2000
From: "David M. Silver" agplusone@loop.com
Date: 7/28/2000 4:25 AM Pacific Daylight Time
AGplusone wrote:
[snipped]
"'If This Goes On' ..." (1940, rewritten and expanded for inclusion in Revolt in 2100, 1953). This is supposed to be everyone's favorite of the early novella.
Lemme see if I can start some trouble in just two sentences, to demonstrate how easy it may be to start a thread as a co-host.
Reading ITGO this time through I've noticed one thing: the pedestal treatment of the women. Do you think this was a typical 1940 chauvinistic 33-year-old male author ("women and children first") or did he have another reason for writing of their treatment this way?
David M. Silver, aka AGplusone@aol.com
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Subject: ITGO was; Re: RAH-AIM Meeting Notice, 8-3 & 5-2000
From: ddavitt ddavitt@netcom.ca
Date: 7/28/2000 6:44 PM Pacific Daylight Time
"David M. Silver" wrote:
> Reading ITGO this time through I've noticed one thing: the pedestal treatment of the women. Do you think this was a typical 1940 chauvinistic 33-year-old male author ("women and children first") or did he have another reason for writing of their treatment this way?
>
I'm not sure they were so treated David; John Lyle might have this attitude but it's certain the Prophet didn't. Maybe Lyle's innocence and religious fervour made him see women as objects of veneration ( and fear) but I don't see that this was widespread. Zeb seems to be more the norm. In fact, I would imagine that the status of women in a theocracy would be more akin to that in "Orphans"; second class citizens, using lots of Biblical quotations to back it up.
Jane
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Subject: Re: ITGO was; Re: RAH-AIM Meeting Notice, 8-3 & 5-2000
From: agplusone@aol.com (AGplusone)
Date: 7/29/2000 10:27 AM Pacific Daylight Time
Jane Davitt replied:
>"David M. Silver" wrote:
>
>> Reading ITGO this time through I've noticed one thing: the pedestal
treatment of the women.
>I'm not sure they were so treated David; John Lyle might have this attitude
>but it's certain the Prophet didn't. Maybe Lyle's innocence and religious fervour made him see women as objects of veneration ( and fear) but I don't see that this was widespread. Zeb seems to be more the norm. In fact, I would imagine that the status of women in a theocracy would be more akin to that in "Orphans"; second class citizens, using lots of Biblical quotations to back it up.>
But isn't that 'difference' merely the flip-side of the same coin, Jane? Objects placed on pedestals are possessions, to be used, used up, and then replaced with fresh models when one becomes jaded to their beauties.
--
David M. Silver
AGplusone@aol.com
"I expect your names to shine!"
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Subject: Re: ITGO was; Re: RAH-AIM Meeting Notice, 8-3 & 5-2000
From: ddavitt ddavitt@netcom.ca
Date: 7/29/2000 10:49 AM Pacific Daylight Time
AGplusone wrote:
> Jane Davitt replied:
>
> >"David M. Silver" wrote:
> >
> >>
> >> Reading ITGO this time through I've noticed one thing: the pedestal
> treatment
> >of the women.
>
> >I'm not sure they were so treated David;
> >snip
> >In fact, I would imagine that the status of women in a theocracy would be
> >more akin to that in
> >"Orphans"; second class citizens, using lots of Biblical quotations to back
> >it up.
>
> But isn't that 'difference' merely the flip-side of the same coin, Jane?
> Objects placed on pedestals are possessions, to be used, used up, and then
> replaced with fresh models when one becomes jaded to their beauties.
Maybe; but I just read ITGO today and to be honest I can't find any mention of how women are treated or regarded from the POV of anyone other than John and Zeb; mostly John. I contend that he is not enough to extrapolate from. My suggestion about second class citizens was a guess; now I've read it again I don't think there's enough data to decide. Certainly within the Cabal they seem to be treated as equals. They are placed on the field of battle to fight; some very young as in the case of the sensitives.
What particular bits were you thinking of to back up the pedestal/possession idea?
Jane
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Subject: Re: ITGO was; Re: RAH-AIM Meeting Notice, 8-3 & 5-2000
From: bpral22169@aol.com (BPRAL22169)
Date: 7/29/2000 10:37 AM Pacific Daylight Time
>Maybe Lyle's innocence and religious fervour made him see women as objects
>of veneration ( and fear) but I don't see that this was widespread.
I think this has something to do with John Lyle's state of development at the time, as well as his innate character. I noticed that there is an entire subplot about John Lyle's moral development in the 1953 (book) version of ITGO that was not in the magazine version, including the crucial scene at the pool. What happens there, without being specifically talked about, is that John Lyle gets "connected" into the sexual circuits of the world, whereas the light was off before. In the magazine version, there is a "Prolog at the End" in which John Lyle marries Sister Judith and goes off to be a textiles drummer and live in a white picket fence. In the book version when the light goes on he sees Magdalene as his mate, so Judith is gotten rid of offstage.
The other major idea difference between the two versions is that in one line of the magazine version he has the population of the U.S. hypno-conditioned into accepting the new regime, whereas there is a dramatic debate in the book version. Panshin thinks having the "angry Mark Twain" character fall over dead is a moment of false emotion -- and it may have been a bit "over the top" (of course, he does this again in The Moon is a Harsh Mistress), but I think he comes down on the right side in the final version. I don't think this was so much a "change of heart" on Heinlein's part as that in the technocratic context of 1939 he thought, "well, of course, there'll have to be conditioning in order for this to work" and wrote it in in one line, but by 1953 he realized it's inconsistent with the goals of the Cabal to liberate people, so he showed the argument why it wasn't. Just my impression.
Bill
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Subject: Re: ITGO was; Re: RAH-AIM Meeting Notice, 8-3 & 5-2000
From: David Wright dwrighsr@alltel.net
Date: 7/29/2000 1:14 PM Pacific Daylight Time
In article <39831CD3.8FFB0E4D@netcom.ca>, ddavitt wrote:
> BPRAL22169 wrote:
(snip)
> I definitely agree that the version where the people are given
> freedom of choice is
> both morally preferable and more in keeping with the ideals of the
> Cabal.
I was really shocked when I read that the first version didn't have this choice. That would have, it seems to me, really destroyed much of the underpinnings of 'Coventry'. Wasn't that written earlier than 1953?
>I've never quite understood why Winters has to die though; I even
> thought he'd been assassinated the first time I read it IIRC.
Just seems to add to the emphasis, but necessary? I don't know.
> Interesting that he ends up with Judith in the original version
> too; I'd like to
> read that. Without reading it I have a feeling that I prefer the
> book version;
> Judith is a bit of a wimp and Maggie is far better for John as he
> has become by the
> end of the story.
Agreed. Maggie far outshines Judith.
> Couple of points; what exactly does "Non Sibi, Sed Dei" mean? I
> tried looking it up
> but not much luck; Not man but God?
'Not Self, but God' I believe.
> Also, in the racist, intolerant society of the Prophet why is
> there a Sanctuary gate at all
You have to give them the appearance of safety, even though there
really is none. :) Gives everyone a nice rationalization.
>and why is someone half Scottish and half Cherokee
> accepted in the elite forces of the Angels?
outside of the 'pariahs', presumably Jews, there doesn't seem to be any evidence one way or the other about other forms of racism. Incidentally, there were a lot of Cherokee-Scottish marriages here in Georgia during the late 1700s and early 1800s. I live about a half-mile from the 'Chief Vann' house built in 1804. Chief Joseph Vann was the product of one such marriage and owned all of the land around here. It is an amazingly well-constructed brick house. His land was all taken away by the State of Georgia due to a law they passed which prohibited Indians from employing any white persons and given to cronies of the then Governor. Chief Joseph was part of the relocation to Oklahoma where he died in a knife fight.
(snip)
David
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Subject: Re: ITGO was; Re: RAH-AIM Meeting Notice, 8-3 & 5-2000
From: ddavitt ddavitt@netcom.ca
Date: 7/29/2000 2:25 PM Pacific Daylight Time
David Wright wrote:
> >and why is someone half Scottish and half Cherokee
> > accepted in the
> > elite forces of the Angels?
>
> outside of the 'pariahs', presumably Jews, there doesn't seem to be any
> evidence one way or the other about other forms of racism.
>
> David
But by the time of ITGO the US had been isolated for many decades; how could someone like Grace of God Bearpaw have been in the US at all? The British were considered to be illiterate baby eating monsters remember :-) If he was half Scottish, half Cherokee then one of his parents must have been a recent immigrant. The entry requirements for the Angels were strict; I'm surprised anyone got in who didn't fit the WASP like ideals that Scudderites favoured. It is mentioned that Catholics are part of the outside groups who help the Cabal; I imagine they are pariahs too. The only explanation I can think of is that it's a slightly inaccurate description and that the Scottish bit refers to an ancestor rather than an actual mother or father.
Jane
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Subject: Re: RAH-AIM Meeting Notice, 8-3 & 5-2000
From: "labert" labertspam@fast.net
Date: 7/28/2000 5:39 AM Pacific Daylight Time
AGplusone snip
" Perhaps not--but a combination of a
> dynamic evangelist, television, enough money, and modern techniques of
> advertising and propaganda might make [earlier] efforts look like a corner
> store compared to Sears Roebuck. Throw in a depression for good measure,
> promise a material heaven here on earth, add a dash of anti-Semitism,
> anti-Catholicism, anti-Negroism, and a good large dose of anti-'furriners'
>in general and anti-intellectuals here at home and the result might be
>something quite frightening--particularly when one recalls that our voting >system is such that a minority distributed as pluralities in enough states
>can constitute a working majority in Washington."
> --from "Concerning Stories Never Written: Postscript"
> in _Revolt in 2100_, (c)1953 by Robert A. Heinlein
While I can't exactly address whether or not writers will continue to write such stories, perhaps they should. Consider the rise of renewed interest in spirituality since the beginning of the 80's, the power of such groups as the Christian Coalition, Falwell's bunch, and the "Right to Life" wing. A part of all this was the grass roots movement to takeover local school boards in order to press religious agendas, leading to such wonders of modern intellectual prowess as the Kansas decision we all lamented last year to remove evolution from the required subjects.
Religion has run as an undercurrent for political acceptability for as long as the US has been around. Prohibition (of alcohol) was a religious movement; Kennedy was considered unelectable because he was Catholic; Congress made religion a national motto by putting "God" on our money, and courts have attempted to put their religion's rules up on their walls in direct contradiction to the nation's rules. The movement to outlaw a woman's right to reproductive freedom is specifically an attempt to enforce one religious perspective upon all people, regardless of whether or not those people believe in that religion or its precepts.
At the moment, a large portion of G W Bush's support (in terms of votes, if not money) comes from the remnants of the Christian Coalition, and the power of that support was enough to sway his choice of running mates. Tom Ridge (Pennsylvania governor) was set aside because of his pro-choice stance.
If people aren't fearful of religious control of public policy, it's because their beliefs run in line with the impetus, and therefore they believe its only "right" that such rules be enforced, and damn the poor sinner who is so foolish as to disagree. Or, they aren't paying attention.
Look at that quote again: "anti-Semitism, anti-Catholicism, anti-Negroism, and a good large dose of anti-'furriners' in general and anti-intellectuals here at home;" sounds like America to me. I don't necessarily see the economically turbulent 70's as entirely unlike the depression RAH suggested as a catalyst, and the 80's saw the beginnings of religious rising influence in politics.
A new Scudder might not need to set aside the constitution, given enough support for forcing religious principles down the throats of Americans regardless of their individual beliefs. Stack the Supreme Court well enough, and any ol' silly law can be declared constitutional.
ITGO has always scared the crap out of me, as America has within it the germ of such a theocracy. Hell, even Bill Clinton told me I ought to pray after the bombing in Oklahoma City.
Don't we already live in a theocracy of sorts?
labert
--
"Nothing is the reason we are here, oh nothin at all. . ."
- Big Head Todd and the Monsters: "Circle"
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Subject: Re: RAH-AIM Meeting Notice, 8-3 & 5-2000
From: merfilly8@aol.com (Stephanie Vickers)
Date: 7/31/2000 5:12 AM Pacific Daylight Time
I don't have the afterward for Stories never written! AUGHH! My Past Through Tomorrow and the copy of TGHOE doesn't have it unless I glanced past it!
Filly
>http://hometown.aol.com/merfilly8/myhomepage
"Let us endeavor so to live that when we come to die even the
undertaker will be sorry."
--Mark Twain
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Subject: Re: RAH-AIM Meeting Notice, 8-3 & 5-2000
From: bpral22169@aol.com (BPRAL22169)
Date: 7/31/2000 7:30 AM Pacific Daylight Time
I think it's in Revolt in 2100.
Speaking of which, does anybody have any idea why it's 2100? The revolution takes place in about 2075.
Bill
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Subject: Re: RAH-AIM Meeting Notice, 8-3 & 5-2000
From: merfilly8@aol.com (Stephanie Vickers)
Date: 7/31/2000 5:28 PM Pacific Daylight Time
>I think it's in Revolt in 2100.
>
>Speaking of which, does anybody have any idea why it's 2100? The revolution
>takes place in about 2075.
Because _Revolt in 2075_ just isn't catchy enough!
Seriously, was likely supposed to be 21st Century rather than 2100. A certain McCaffrey title went from _Get of the Unicorn_ to Get Off the Unicorn_ because it looked better and didn't need explanation. Perhaps a similar principle at work here?
Filly
>http://hometown.aol.com/merfilly8/myhomepage
"Let us endeavor so to live that when we come to die even the
undertaker will be sorry."
--Mark Twain
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Three Off-topic posts snipped
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Subject: Re: RAH-AIM Meeting Notice, 8-3 & 5-2000
From: Ogden Johnson III ojiii@home.com
Date: 7/31/2000 4:39 PM Pacific Daylight Time
On 31 Jul 2000 14:30:21 GMT, bpral22169@aol.com (BPRAL22169) wrote:
>I think it's in Revolt in 2100.
>
>Speaking of which, does anybody have any idea why it's 2100? The revolution
>takes place in about 2075.
Typical bureaucracy. The Navy started preliminary design on the SSN-21 [now the three-sub SEAWOLF class] somewhere around the mid-70s, a full 25 years or so before the *dawn* of the 21st Century.
Alternative suggestion. Blame it on Campbell. Title tinkering.
Third alternative. Round numbers sound better.
Basic fact - damfino.
OJ III
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Subject: Re: RAH-AIM Meeting Notice, 8-3 & 5-2000
From: bpral22169@aol.com (BPRAL22169)
Date: 8/1/2000 6:36 PM Pacific Daylight Time
> Blame it on Campbell. Title tinkering.
Well, we can blame it on Campbell, but this was 1953 and Shasta, and Campbell didn't have his oar in this one.
but we can blame it on him, sure!
Bill
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Subject: Re: RAH-AIM Meeting Notice, 8-3 & 5-2000
From: Ogden Johnson III ojiii@home.com
Date: 8/1/2000 7:29 PM Pacific Daylight Time
On 02 Aug 2000 01:36:28 GMT, bpral22169@aol.com (BPRAL22169) wrote:
>> Blame it on Campbell. Title tinkering.
>Well, we can blame it on Campbell, but this was 1953 and Shasta, and Campbell didn't have his oar in this one.
>
>but we can blame it on him, sure!
That's an editor's job, take the blame whether you earned it or not.
;->
OJ III
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Subject: Re: RAH-AIM Meeting Notice, 8-3 & 5-2000
From: William Dennis williamdennis@flink.com
Date: 8/1/2000 8:40 PM Pacific Daylight Time
Ogden Johnson III wrote:
>
> On 02 Aug 2000 01:36:28 GMT, bpral22169@aol.com (BPRAL22169) wrote:
>
> >> Blame it on Campbell. Title tinkering.
>
> >Well, we can blame it on Campbell, but this was 1953 and Shasta, and Campbell didn't have his oar in this one.
> >
> >but we can blame it on him, sure!
>
> That's an editor's job, take the blame whether you earned it or not.
> ;->
>
> OJ III
Edna Buchannan's (sp) three rules for new reporters:
1. Never trust an editor.
2. Never trust an editor.
3. Never trust an editor.
--
William Dennis II
Are you a Republican? Democrat? You sure?
Take the World's Smallest Political Quiz to find out:
http://www.self-gov.org/lp-quiz.shtml
For information about the Libertarian Party, go to:
---------------------------------------------------------------------
"I will accept any rules that you feel necessary to your freedom.
I am free, no matter what rules surround me.
If I find them tolerable, I tolerate them;
if I find them too obnoxious, I break them.
I am free because I know that
I alone am morally responsible for everything I do."
--- Professor Bernardo de la Paz
Robert A. Heinlein's The Moon Is A Harsh Mistress
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Subject: Re: RAH-AIM Meeting Notice, 8-3 & 5-2000
From: Richard Bensam rabensam@earthlink.net
Date: 7/31/2000 7:15 PM Pacific Daylight Time
On Mon, 31 Jul 2000 10:30:21 -0400,
BPRAL22169 wrote (in message <20000731103021.06840.00001008@ng-cl1.aol.com>):
> I think it's in Revolt in 2100.
>
> Speaking of which, does anybody have any idea why it's 2100? The revolution takes place in about 2075.
2072. The Covenant was signed in 2075.
Well, presumably the real answer is that someone decided "2100" would make a catchier number for the book title. But if you'll entertain a more whimsical theory, purely in a spirit of fun...the events of "Coventry" appear to take place sometime in the first three decades of the 2100s, and that story also has a theme of "revolt" in that David MacKinnon rebels against his ordered society while the plot is further driven by a planned uprising by the residents of Coventry. So one might consider that the book title refers to this story instead. If one were the sort of person who, like me, worries about things like this.
Richard
--
http:http://home.earthlink.net/~rabensam/
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Subject: Re: RAH-AIM Meeting Notice, 8-3 & 5-2000
From: ddavitt ddavitt@netcom.ca
Date: 7/31/2000 5:38 AM Pacific Daylight Time
Stephanie Vickers wrote:
> I don't have the afterward for Stories never written! AUGHH! My Past Through
> Tomorrow and the copy of TGHOE doesn't have it unless I glanced past it!
No, it's not in those books; you didn't miss it. It's only about three or four pages long Filly and David did quote some of the important bits of it in his original post; don't panic! I don't have it either but I nipped into Chapters and read it from the new edition of Revolt in 2100 ( the one with MC in it). I can't afford to buy it just for the sake of those 4 pages :-(
Basically Heinlein is explaining why he never wrote the stories ( too depressing and he hated Scudder so much he couldn't bear to write of his triumph) and thus why there was such a gap between the end of Logic of Empire and the start of ITGO. He gives a few details of what the stories he didn't write would have been about.
Jane
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Subject: Re: RAH-AIM Meeting Notice, 8-3 & 5-2000
From: keris remNOreSPAM@keris.demon.co.uk.invalid
Date: 7/31/2000 6:46 AM Pacific Daylight Time
ddavitt >No, it's not in those books; you didn't miss it. It's only
>about three or four pages long Filly and David did quote some
>of the important bits of it in his original post; don't panic!
>I don't have it either but I nipped into Chapters and read it
>from the new edition of Revolt in 2100 ( the one with MC in
>it).
MC? Ealing Broadway (and are we allowing bus routes?)...
>I can't afford to buy it just for the sake of those 4
>pages :-(
Hmm, I probably will because my copies are getting a little frail about the spine (so am I!).
>Basically Heinlein is explaining why he never wrote the stories
>( too depressing and he hated Scudder so much he couldn't bear
>to write of his triumph) and thus why there was such a gap
>between the end of Logic of Empire and the start of ITGO. He
>gives a few details of what the stories he didn't write would
>have been about.
There is one thing worse than not having all of the stories, and that's being told what the other stories would have been...
(And no, I don't want some other author to write them and claim they are "what Heinlein would have written"...)
Chris C
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Two Off-topic posts snipped
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Subject: Re: RAH-AIM Meeting Notice, 8-3 & 5-2000
From: Ogden Johnson III ojiii@home.com
Date: 8/1/2000 4:36 PM Pacific Daylight Time
On Tue, 01 Aug 2000 01:32:26 -0700, keris wrote:
>So where do I get the Heinlein Journal? I know it was mentioned
>somewhere but I unremember where...
Ask, and ye shall receive:
From the Indicta;
"The Heinlein Journal is issued semi-annually, in July and January. Edited and published by Bill Patterson, 602 West Bennet Drive, Glendora, CA 91471
Subscription Rates: $7.50 per issue, $15.00 per year, payable in U.S. funds; Rates outside the United States: $10.00 per issue, $20.00 per year."
Back issues 1-5 were $5.00 per, $25.00 total. I went for that, plus a subscription for 6 and 7 for $15.00 - total of $40.00. Worth every penny and more.
BPRAL's email addy is on my work computer, I don't have it here, so you'll have to grab it off one of his posts here. If you're interested in the back issues 1-5, you'll need a price from him - that $5 was probably the within US price.
OJ III
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Subject: Re: RAH-AIM Meeting Notice, 8-3 & 5-2000
From: bpral22169@aol.com (BPRAL22169)
Date: 8/2/2000 7:21 PM Pacific Daylight Time
>BPRAL's email addy is on my work computer, I don't have it here, so
>you'll have to grab it off one of his posts here.
And here it is. The cost of the issues 1-5 is $25; and I will simply add postage I actually pay to get it to you, less $6 (the postage allowance written into the subscription rate)
Bill
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Nine Off Topic Posts snipped
-----------------------------------------------------------------
And let's run this PSA Again: THE HEINLEIN SOCIETY
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Subject: Re: The Heinlein Society
From: bpral22169@aol.com (BPRAL22169)
Date: 7/23/2000 10:25 PM Pacific Daylight Time
OK -- here's the short explanation given at the AIM meeting this past Saturday.
Laurie or Tawn may want to add other comments:
OK -- I'll try to keep this short. Tawn3 and Fldax and I -- and others -- are in the
process of getting the paperwork in order to incorporate The Heinlein Society.
An introductory letter will go out shortly inviting memberships and participation and
general input.
Merfilly8: kewl
BPRAL22169: The website is up -- www.heinleinsociety.com. But it's just an "under construction" page with an e-mail link to Laurie (Fldax) Laurie is going to be the Administrator of the Society. Without her, this project would still be in limbo. And Tawn will be contacting all the newsgroups and sites in the Heinlein pseudo-ring to get us listed.
KultsiKN: Laurie who? Pls, give more
BPRAL22169: Laurie McDonald -- fldax on AIM.
AGplusone: FldAx=Laurie
BPRAL22169: There isn't a lot more -- what specifically would you care to hear about?
BPRAL22169: Or it may be MacDonald; I forget.
SageMerlin: This is becoming a real community. Perhaps it would be interesting to focus some of our discussions on H's theories of community, the group processes that he illustrates, instead of focusing so much on the individual.
BPRAL22169: Very good idea.
AGplusone: Do you have any links handy to sites of the Shavians, Wellsians,
Twainians, etc., Bill
BPRAL22169: Laurie has those links; why don't we ask her to post them on afh next time she shows up. Right now she is working the Comicon in San Diego -- expect the facility to be absolutely plastered with Heinlein Society flyers.
AGplusone: I keep wanting to ask ... any relationship to Leslyn ... but that's unlikely I know.
AGplusone: That's great!
BPRAL22169: We've actually had a presence for two weeks now -- Tawn Johnson worked the Minicon last weekend.
Merfilly8: I'd have hit Heroes Con in June....
* * *
OK -- the very short version is the Heinlein Society is formed for one major purpose, which is the motto of the Society: Pay it Forward. We could never possibly repay RAH for all the good we've gotten from him, but what he preferred was that it be paid forward.
This should be reflected in a lot of different projects. For example, the Society will sponsor blood drives, and we will make a special effort to get and keep his books in libraries and encourage people -- especially kids -- to read them. Many other projects have been suggested, and your suggestions for projects are solicited. In addition, the Society will maintain a website and an internet presence. To support the various activities of the Society (generally speaking the Society will limit its participation to seed capital, with projects raising their ongoing funding on an ad hoc basis), membership dues will be $35 for a participating membership and $15 for a sustaining or supporting membership.
And thats alls I knows.
Bill
End of alt.fan.heinlein Pre-Chat Posts Go To Beginning Pre-Chat Postings
Beginning of Chat Log You have just entered room "Heinlein Readers
Group chat."
Reilloc has entered the room.
Reilloc: Sorry to intrude.
Reilloc has left the room.
Merfilly8 has entered the room.
Merfilly8 has left the room.
Merfilly8 has entered the room.
Major oz has entered the room.
Merfilly8: hey Oz
Major oz: hello, all
Merfilly8: looks like a slow start
tonight
Major oz: I have C-SPAN on while we talk
Major oz: Also, I am 1500 miles from home, in
PA -- home of my brother.
Merfilly8: so we're in the same
time zone tonight
Merfilly8: something hot in the
world?
Major oz: But I am bright eyed and bushy
tailed
Major oz: Hot ?
Merfilly8: As in breaking current
event?
Merfilly8: we have no tv in my
house, and rarely listen to any
news. I catch it a bit on AOL
Major oz: GEE DUBYA is about to be
officially designated..........
Major oz: The convention -- right here in
Philly -- winds up tonight
Merfilly8: I heard something on
that going to work this morn
Major oz: I've been chewing out my neices
all week for not paying attention. Am I
going to have to do the same with You?
Major oz: :)
ddavitt has entered the room.
Merfilly8: Sure...if you have the
time to savor it :)
ddavitt: Hi everyone
Merfilly8: Hey there lady!
Major oz: OOOOOOOOOOHHHHH
Merfilly8: j/k
Major oz: yo, Jane
ddavitt: How's things?
Major oz: All right with the world.
Merfilly8: good...didn't finish my
re-read of ITGO, so I'm slow on
the uptake tonight
Major oz: I haven't re-read any of them, as
I have been here since before the subject
was determined.
ddavitt: Amazing how much you can
remember....and forget.
Major oz: I have been appointed as co-host
with Bill -- I hope he read them
BPRAL22169 has entered the room.
Merfilly8: ITGO just isn't my type
of story. LoE was a better read
this time though
ddavitt: Hi Bill
Merfilly8: hey Bill
Major oz: whew.............glad you are here,
Bill
Merfilly8: Oz was on a hook, Bill
BPRAL22169: Hi - I'm setting up, so I'll be
right with you.
ddavitt: It's gone all quiet....
Merfilly8: sorry. Looking at Gore's
prospective running mates
Major oz: how?
BPRAL22169: it'll be a second -- trying to get
two new people invited in, but they aren't on
AIM yet. /ga
ddavitt: Off you go Oz :-)
Major oz: .......yeah, right.......
SAcademy has entered the room.
Merfilly8: on aol, under
news/politics
Major oz: Give me the titles again, please
ddavitt: Logic of Empire
ddavitt: If this Goes On
Reilloc has entered the room.
Major oz: Evening, young lady
ddavitt: Stories Never Written
ddavitt: Hi!
SAcademy: Good evening
Reilloc: Evening...at least here.
Merfilly8: good eve
Major oz: .......story line........?
GHMyst has entered the room.
ddavitt: How do you mean story line?
BPRAL22169: Can somebody else invite
"ElizabethTee" in -- my invitation seems to be
hung up.
GHMyst: Good evening, all
labert8 has entered the room.
ddavitt: I have sent an invite
BPRAL22169: Dr. W -- I just finished
re-reading ITGO. I can't remember from our
prior talks -- was the Battle Tracker a
possibility for your "mystery device"?
Elizabeth Tee has entered the room.
ddavitt: Hi Labert
BPRAL22169: Thanks, Jane.
Major oz: I'm an old guy and have
forgotten.......as I said earlier, I didn't get
what the subjects were until after I left
home to be here (1500 miles away)
labert8: hello everyone
Merfilly8: hi all
Elizabeth Tee: Hello everybody
GHMyst: Hello, Bill
Major oz: Good Evening, one and all.
ddavitt: It gets like the Waltons at the start
and finish of the chats:-)
RMLWJ1 has entered the room.
RMLWJ1: Evening, folks.
PashaMor has entered the room.
Major oz: AGPlusOne had pressing family
concerns tonight.
Merfilly8: I threw invites to two
from weeks prior...and both
accepted!
Major oz: so........Bill and I have been
ordered, by Zim, to step in
PashaMor: hi everybody
ddavitt: Hi
Merfilly8: nothing wrong, is there,
Oz?
PashaMor: hi jane
ddavitt: Not as many posts this time....
PashaMor: brb
Major oz: Bill read them -- I didn't labert8: I managed a few, out of guilt. :-)
GHMyst: Am I getting through OK?
Merfilly8: I only got halfway thru
ITGO this time...read it last
year early on for the first time,
so I'll be sketchy
Major oz: No, but thanx, Filly. I'm here to
help my brother recuperate from rejection
of a transplanted lung.
ddavitt: Yes; I see you
Major oz: He is doing much better.
BPRAL22169: Well, I say we've got enough
people here to get started. Let's take a poll at
first, who has not read "Logic of Empire"?
ddavitt: Good!
Merfilly8: Glad to hear it.
Merfilly8: I read it!
ddavitt: Me too!
Elizabeth Tee: Read it.
Major oz: Good
Reilloc: I've read it but not recently.
Merfilly8: <---is slightly hyper
GHMyst: OK
RMLWJ1: Been quite a while for me.
labert8: silly rabbit, everyones read that! BPRAL22169: Just those who haven't at all,
please.
Major oz: Filly.......why don't you give us
the benefit of your lead-off criticism.
Major oz: Please
Major oz: :)
BPRAL22169: Wait a sec, Oz, Merfilly
Merfilly8: Major oz: hokay
BPRAL22169: Who has not read "'If This
Goes On--'"?
GHMyst: Which version?
Reilloc: I've read it but not recently.
BPRAL22169: Either version, smartie.
RMLWJ1: AGain, been quite a while. More
recently than "Logic" though.
GHMyst: :-)
BPRAL22169: Ok -- I was afraid we'd have
to do background, but it looks like everybody's
at least been exposed to it.
BPRAL22169: One last: has anyone not read
"Concerning Stories Never Written"?
BPRAL22169: It's in Revolt in 2100, if that
helps.
Major oz: Me
Elizabeth Tee: Not I :(
GHMyst: Been a while
RMLWJ1: Not I.
PashaMor: i'm afraid i haven't. not yet, anyway
Major oz: long time ago
Reilloc: A number of years ago.
ddavitt: Don't own it but I read it in the
bookshop last week
BPRAL22169: Ok -- we'll do some
background on that when we get to it, then.
ddavitt: I have an older version of revolt
without it
BPRAL22169: This is me ignoring Jane.
Major oz: I have read them all.......but have
a weird dissassociation thing with titles
BPRAL22169: Okay.
ddavitt: Why?! Major oz: who knows
BPRAL22169: Mer, why don't you lead off for
"logic of empire."
Major oz: ??
RMLWJ1: Read 'Revolt" but can't recall how
long ago.
BPRAL22169: Jane was showing off!
ddavitt: It's only three pages!
BPRAL22169: Either that or she was reading
the essay very humbly.
BPRAL22169: Ok, very humble 3 pages.
BPRAL22169: Mer, you have the floor.
Merfilly8: Logic of Empire which
shows sometimes that you can
be in the thick of it and still not
get it
Major oz: hokay....Revolt was the one with
the religion with the "Magic Sheppard's
Crook", yes?
labert8: ?
BPRAL22169: No, Oz. I think you're thinking
of Sixth Column/Day After Tomorrow.
Merfilly8: Wingate, argued about
the Venusian system at the
beginning of the story, but really
did not 'learn' much from his
experiences, I think
ddavitt: Revolt was John lyle falling for a
Virgin, becoming a rebel against the
Prophet
Major oz: OK........then is must be the
anti-Scudder revolt, yes?
ddavitt: Yes
Major oz: Ah yes.......
RMLWJ1: Revolt/If this goes on was about a
coup attempt by a bunch of latter-day aryan
supremacists.
Major oz: Total recall........let's go
ddavitt: Why do you think he didn't learn
Filly?
ddavitt: What did he miss?
RMLWJ1: Boy. REally been a while.
Merfilly8: Granted he did learn it
was a slave system, which he did
not believe at first
ddavitt: Yes....sort of; it was entered into of
own free will though
Merfilly8: but he 'learned' it in
such a way that he was still blind
to the overall economics and
dynamics of the system
Major oz: Aryan supremicists? .........must
think ST was fascist.........
BPRAL22169: I have a short summary of the
story -- would anyone like me to post it here?
ddavitt: He expected people back home to
get irate and stop it; never going to happen
Merfilly8: please Bill
GHMyst: "Logic" never struck me as one of
RAH's
GHMyst: better stories
PashaMor: sure, bill
Merfilly8: As pointed out...history
is not surprising, after the fact
BPRAL22169: "Logic of Empire" Short
story originally published in Astounding
SF in 1941; collected in The Past
Through Tomorrow
Major oz: ga
BPRAL22169: Humphrey Wingate and his
wealthy friend Sam Jones have done
something really stupid: to settle a
drunken bet (Wingate doesn't believe the
labor indenture system on Venus is
slavery), they shanghai themselves to
Venus to experience the system at first
hand and from the bottom up. By the time
they sober up, it is too late. They become
separated.
BPRAL22169: Wingate gets into trouble
defending a fellow labor "client" and is
forced into the Resistance in the Venerian
outback. Jones finally gets help from his
family and rescues him. Wingate writes a
book to prove the case he did not believe,
but he cannot sell it.
BPRAL22169: -30-
GHMyst: good summary
Major oz: hokay........it's back
labert8: And his compatriot says that people
don;t want reasonable answers
ddavitt: Is the reason he can't sell it really
because he's a bad writer though....
labert8: when he should have said complex,
difficult answers
Major oz: What was the pub date?
ddavitt: 41
ddavitt: Who was profiting from the system
though?
Major oz: you 'spose there was any
contemporary causation ?
BPRAL22169 has left the room.
ddavitt: The plantation owners...and the
people who "sold" the contracts. Was that
a govt or a company?
BPRAL22169 has entered the room.
Merfilly8: the plantation owners
weren't getting rich
BPRAL22169: March 41, while Sixth
Column was running.
Elizabeth Tee: It was a company, I think.
labert8: some mixture of the two, was my
impression
BPRAL22169: Oz, I hope you've got the log; I
just destroyed mine.
Merfilly8: I can save too
ddavitt: So one would think that the govt
might be interested?
Major oz: As I recall, it was the owners,
through a loose confederation, upheld by
the gov.
ddavitt: David Wright's alter ego is running
ddavitt: Automatic log
BPRAL22169: Excellent.
ddavitt: Did the govt get a cut?
Major oz: No, Bill.........I'm on my brother's
computer away from home........ou got it,
Jane?
ddavitt: maikosh is D Wright at work
ddavitt: I will
Major oz: Ah, es
Major oz: "Y"es
ddavitt: Similar set up to the Company in
red Planet?
Major oz: Did they get a cut.....I don't
remember
BPRAL22169: Ok - Dave W's got it.
Major oz: I think the gov was hardly in
effect.
Major oz: the "farmers" were the titular
gov
ddavitt: I find it hard to believe that Earth
wouldn't want to be involved; would leave it
to private enterprise
ddavitt: No world govt of course
Major oz: Hard to believe......why?
ddavitt: Missing out on huge profits
Merfilly8: Like many aggies, the
plantation owners "profit" was
bound up in the next season...a
losing battle unless you know
just when to cut
ddavitt: Can you imagine us letting Bill
gates "own" Mars for instance?
Major oz: I thought this was AFTER an
independent Venus was established.
labert8: Jones uses the analogy that Venus is a
"colony" in an expanding free market economy,
comparing it to earth colonialism
Merfilly8: so it had to be the
contractors selling the labor
getting the profit...even though
they had to stake bounty and
shipping fees
Elizabeth Tee: Only if Bill Gates agrees
to *live* there
BPRAL22169: A side point -- didn't Pohl and
Kornbluth redo the economic system of LOE
later in Gravy Planet?
labert8: It would seem the contractors and
shippers would see hefty profits
ddavitt: But the "clients" make nothing and
are trapped in a spiral
labert8: effectively, slaves
Merfilly8: the clients, paid a
pittance sum against the cost of
their exploits and upkeep are
on the losing side
ddavitt: When the Prophet stopped space
travel I wonder if non US companies took
up the slack or if Venus became
isolated?
ddavitt: That's assuming they were US
companies to start with of course
BPRAL22169: I had the impression from LL's
comments in Meth. Ch. that space travel
stopped entirely for awhile.
Merfilly8: But Wingate's
book...though likely drier than a
desert (he was a lawyer, after
all) had no chance of affecting it
labert8: Could it have subsisted without
re-supply? But that would've come from
Luna/Mars, I suppose
ddavitt: Could Venus survive with noone to
trade with?
Merfilly8: in Stories never Written,
I think it alludes to isolation for
the colonies
ddavitt: But only with respect to Earth?
Merfilly8: yes
labert8: Stoppped only in America, I thought
GHMyst: survive, not prosper
Merfilly8: true, labert
ddavitt: Yes; US slipped backwards and the
rest of the world carried on without it; not
too likely nowadays
Merfilly8: Having no one to trade
with is likely what killed the
Empire system
BPRAL22169: Jane Jacobs bases her
economic system on economic strength as a
function of replacement of imports -- that would
have forced Venus to become strong.
Major oz: When was the time of Poddy
........ before or after Logic?
ddavitt: I always felt that was unrealsitic;
that the world would let Scudder take over
and do that...
Merfilly8: I'd say after
BPRAL22169: I don't think Podkayne is in the
FH.
GHMyst: diferent timeline??
labert8: Their wasn't the one world felling...
labert8: that we have today to make RAH
consider the pressures that would've come from
outside
Merfilly8: but I see similarites in
the Venuses and mars' of the
two
ddavitt: Poddy's venus had similar contract
workers tho
Major oz: hokay -- I can buy different
timeline
Major oz: I am just trying to see what RAH
visualized the ultimate outcome of Venus,
given the conditions extant in Logic/
GHMyst: similar because used same basic
asumptions
Merfilly8: It turned into Nevada :)
labert8: Wouldn't he project a similar
post-colonial pattern to that here on Earth?
Major oz: with attendant casinos and
"ladies"
Major oz: :)
labert8: second class nation,
labert8: exploited
GHMyst: There is also the Venus of Betwwen
Planets
Elizabeth Tee has left the room.
BPRAL22169: I was about to say -- it's a
generic Venus that appears in Between
Planets also.
Merfilly8: hadn't read that one
ddavitt: Similar natives to BP
Elizabeth Tee has entered the room.
ddavitt: Matriarchal Little People; oops I
mean Space Cadet
ddavitt: BP was dragons
Major oz: In looking at where and when and
what Venus is to become, I think I am
distracted from the theme of the story
Merfilly8: yes Space Cadet is
similar
Major oz: i.e. you don't understand slavery
from the outside
labert8: When I re-read it recently, i saw it
purely as a commentary on slavery. . .
Merfilly8: but, considering The
Long Watch...Space Cadet might
be FH
labert8: aside from a cool story, that is
ddavitt: I mentioned parallels between
Wingate and farnham. Any thoughts?
labert8: the characters??
Merfilly8: I saw your parallels...but
not sure on them
ddavitt: Who coped better with the
situation?
BPRAL22169: I've been letting that one
percolate, and I don't get any real resonance
between the two.
Major oz: But weren't these two guys
"limosine liberals" in taking a
dillatente's holiday to Venus
Major oz: ?
GHMyst: Can you consider them both typical
GHMyst: Heinlein male charcters?
labert8: Yes, I see Farnham a far more capable
person
Merfilly8: I did agree with the
concept of corporate slavery, I
believe David Silver raised that
one
GHMyst: Farnham Yes..Wingate, I dont know
ddavitt: Both slaves not by choice, similar
drug temptation, both escape through
young blonde girls help
ddavitt: Both have to keep their identity
intact and not give in
labert8: corporate slavery has a long history, I
live 40 mile sfrom where the Molly Maguires
arose
Merfilly8: Farnham was an active
survivor...I don't see Wingate in
that category
GHMyst: exactly
labert8: exactly. Hugh wouldn't have signed up
ddavitt: He did pretty well in the escape and
rebel camp
BPRAL22169: I know what you mean in terms
of the similar plot device, but the characters
don't seem very alike to me.
Merfilly8: He had mentioned
interns as well
labert8: wuh-huh?
Merfilly8: As corporate slave
analogies
labert8: snicker. interesting
Merfilly8: you go to work after
college, making diddly, so you
"learn" the biz
ddavitt: Hugh would've had more sense
maybe but he ended up in the same place
Wingate did for all that
Major oz: a stretch........you CANNOT
escape from Venus. You can walk away
from the coal mines.
labert8: But Wingate was completely bailed
out, having given up on escape
ddavitt: He'd joined the rebels and was
fighting back
labert8: by default, though
ddavitt: How could he escape Venus? He
can't stowawy and he was wanted man
ddavitt: He deliberately sought them out
didn't he?
ddavitt: The incident that made him leave
was an accident, granted
BPRAL22169: Wingate is always a "fish out of
water." We never see him in a "proper" place.
Merfilly8: Yes. And he was unsure
if he could go back, in a social
sense
labert8: hmmn, maybe I'm misremembering. . .
ddavitt: He felt a sense of worth with the
rebels that he never had on earth
labert8: true. that ol' "real work" ethic
ddavitt: But he still went back..was he
fooling himself, thinking he was doing it to
help those on Venus?
ddavitt: Maybe a bit...
Merfilly8: giving them radio comms
was merely a hobby to intrigue
his own mind. I didn't see it as
a deliberate helpign measure
Merfilly8: and I think, agreeing
with Jane, that his going back he
rationalized in his mind
ddavitt: He was giving them real assistance
_using_ his hobby
Merfilly8: as helping them
BPRAL22169: I think he was stunned that this
was all real and felt a need to waken others
to its existence.
ddavitt: But he also wanted to go
home....can't blame him
Major oz: The Peace Corps approach ?
BPRAL22169: A faint echo of the bit with
Thorby's grandparents in Citizen.
ddavitt: Yes....with similar results
labert8: shout it from the hilltops, yes. But he
was naive about what he could accomplish. . .
Major oz: just like PC
BPRAL22169: mundus vult decipi
ddavitt: Those who knew didn't care, those
who din't know didn't want to know
Major oz: yeah, what he said......
BPRAL22169: And PC may also be read as
"Plato's Cave."
Merfilly8: should have learned
from beng at the bottom that
the power can only be shifted
from the top
labert8: he hadn't reflected on all his earthly
knowledge of the situation to realize that earth
didn't care, and probably knew
Major oz: Or politically correct.........
ddavitt: Yes Filly....maybe his friend Sam
Houston would have more success; or his
sister
labert8: Sam Jones. (humbly, sorry Jane)
Major oz: What did England know about
Caribean (sp) slavery, but pretended not to
know?
ddavitt: They were rich and powerful; more
chance of being heard but equally less
naive
Merfilly8: but Sam didn't seem to
"feel" his troubles as being part
of the slave's troubles
ddavitt: Sam Houston jones ddavitt: Missed off the Jones sorry
labert8: That there were "heathen savages"
there
ddavitt: _Is_ that a significant name?
Merfilly8: two stories with Joneses
being the benign help....
labert8: That's to Oz's question
Merfilly8: jones, derived from
John, gift of God
ddavitt: Governor of Texas yes?
labert8: well, RAH liked his Jones Elizabeth Tee: Sam Houston voted
against secession. Wanted to stay in the
Union.
Major oz: No,,,I had in mind the African
slaves imported to the sugar fields
Merfilly8: ddavitt: What is the other story Filly?
Elizabeth Tee: Don't know whether or
not he was a slaveowner.
ddavitt: He drank a lot and had a wife for
11 weeks....
ddavitt: Then she went home. noone knows
why
Merfilly8: Zebadiah Jones, ITGO
ddavitt: Duh!
labert8: There's a few more, I'm sure
BPRAL22169: And let's not forget Starman
Max Jones.
Merfilly8: I found it significant
enough to double check my
etymology of the name
Merfilly8: Obadiah Jones, aka
Galahad
ddavitt: Heinlein liked the average
surnames
Major oz: Interesting Texas connection:
East TX was populated, in the majority, by
black slaveOWNERS.
ddavitt: Smith especially :-)
ddavitt: Really?
Merfilly8: It's the Everyman
approach
Major oz: .......at the time of Houstin,
Austin, etc.
ddavitt: Yes...
Merfilly8: yes, it was
labert8: I've thought that might be it too.
BPRAL22169: Stover points to a patternin
RAH of famous first names with common family
names Woodrow Wilson Smith, for example.
Smith and Jones are everyman, yes.
GHMyst: some of his surnames were
NavalAcademy Clasmates
BPRAL22169: Andrew Jackson Libby.
ddavitt: Twins in Time For The Stars
Reilloc: Sir Isaac Newton.
Merfilly8: funny that pair...WW
and AJ seem very
cross-archetype in history
ddavitt: Thomas Paine, Patrick Henry
Merfilly8: yet Libby and Woody are
best friends
BPRAL22169: Bit surprised by WW as
exemplary name. He was a major racist --
set race relations in this country back 30 years.
ddavitt: Woodrow Wilson was a funny
choice for maureen to make; it gets
explained in TSBTS but I would have
thought his WW! attitude would have
bothered her later
Merfilly8: What did everyone think
of the non-glamorous female
intervention in LoE?
ddavitt: Poor thing!
ddavitt: She IS like Karen!
Merfilly8: I found it very
un-Heinlein-ish
ddavitt: Duh again; Kitten
Major oz: I agree, Filly
Merfilly8: But then so was Wingate
to me
ddavitt: Brain is dissloving tonight...
BPRAL22169: Also reminded me of the
waitress in "Gulf." No particular reason. . .
Merfilly8: pregnancy poisoning at
work, Jane
ddavitt: Dissolving I mean..it's getting
worse
BPRAL22169: Don't tilt your head.
ddavitt: I think you're right Filly
ddavitt: Why, will it run out my ears? :-)
BPRAL22169: My thoughts exactly. labert8: I found Wingate bothersome too. The
playboy type. I'm not sure we were supposed
to like him much.
BPRAL22169: Sorry -- that was a Low-Flying
Cheap Shot.
ddavitt: Men saved by women; because
sam's sister is Wingate's next helper
ddavitt: And as such, beneath me to reply to
Bill BPRAL22169: Oh, elevated one!That
Shanghai
BPRAL22169: bit was kind of turn of the
century pulpish, wasn't it?
ddavitt: Wingate was OK; heart in the right
place
Reilloc: What do you suppose the thought
process behind the choice of WW was when
clearly RAH idolized another enough that is
should have been Samuel Langhorn Smith?
Major oz: but brain missing, Jane
ddavitt: I've never been so drunk I couldn't
remember in the morning
labert8: Good point, Bill it was. Rather like the
beginning of a Tarzan novel
ddavitt: Who is Sam langhorn? Major oz: When did the Brits stop press
gangs?
Merfilly8: Samuel Clemens
BPRAL22169: I don't think Samuel Langhorn
Smith woul dhave worked -- it would have to
have been Mark Twain Smith. Samuel
Langhorne Clemens.
Merfilly8: Mark Twain
labert8: "The steely eyed gentle men walking
down the London street was aware of the three
predators stalking him. . ."
ddavitt: Ah! Didn't know the langhorn bit
Reilloc: Whether it would have worked in the
form I suggestion, the question still stands.
Reilloc: I just wish I could type well enough to
ask it better.
ddavitt: He included the real man instead
though
ddavitt: Man who dies in ITGO looks like
Twain
BPRAL22169: Maybe it would have been just
TOO obvious.
ddavitt: Still wonder if he was nobbled...
BPRAL22169: Nobbled?
ddavitt: Died very conveniently for those
who wanted to brainwash; did he die in the
magazine version?
ddavitt: Assassinated
GHMyst: not in mag version at all
BPRAL22169: No -- Interestingly, in the
magazine version, they go ahead and
hypno-condition the country.
ddavitt: Ah!
labert8: Which man who dies in ITGO looks
like Clemens?
ddavitt: Yes, so I've been told
BPRAL22169: One line in the magazine
version; an entire subplot in the book version,
carefully argued the other way.
labert8: ah yes, the orater
ddavitt: The one who protests the Cabal's
plans to use Prophet like brain washing
GHMyst: winter?
labert8: "leave my mind alone!
ddavitt: Yes
BPRAL22169: No -- he just objects to the
Cabal conditioning the population. "Free men
are not conditioned!"
BPRAL22169: Sorry, the "no" was earlier, to
Labert.
ddavitt: How could Heinlein ever have
written it any other way?!
labert8: Yes I'm a bit statled by that too
Major oz: he couldnt
ddavitt: Inconceivable to base a revolution
to restore US on brainwashing
labert8: startled, that is
BPRAL22169: I think it was something he
didn't think about when he wrote it originally,
and then later realized it was an inconsistency.
BPRAL22169: Just a supposition, of course,
but I think it works.
ddavitt: Big inconsistency....
ddavitt: Glad it was changed
labert8: Pump out the story, find a good out to
get the country functioning. Yeah, he could
have failed to analyse it at first
BPRAL22169: Both the Cabal and --
BPRAL22169: Just realized we're getting
ahead of ourselves. Why don't we hold this
topic until we move over to ITGO?
ddavitt: Though they still had the trick of
the false broadcast that triggered the revolt
Major oz: Am I missing something? Did
the original version INCLUDE
brainwashing?
ddavitt: Yes it did
Elizabeth Tee: Unfortunately, I have to
sign off...will try to catch the Saturday
group.
Major oz: ?
ddavitt: Are we getting ahead of ourselves
?
BPRAL22169: Shall we hold this topic for a
bit?
Elizabeth Tee has left the room.
Major oz: hokay
labert8: Bye E
ddavitt: Good night!
BPRAL22169: Oz, want to kickstart us again
for "Logic"?
Major oz: that's my weak point...........ITGO
is more vivid in memory..........but:
BPRAL22169: The playboy friend has a very
"thirties" feel to it, to me. Kind of "cafe society."
Major oz: I see the two as unlikeable
people, as they are dillatantes
labert8: Almost like something in Fitzgerald,
yes
Major oz: ......and I hate all of that type
BPRAL22169: It ws not fashionable to be
passionate in cafe society.
Major oz: the one gets screwed, and the
other (strikingly similar to JFK) has to be
rescued by his sister.
Major oz: the story put me off
ddavitt: I liked one small detail; about the
luxury item, sweet sour melon being cheap
on Venus but costs enough for food for a
week for a middle class family back on
earth; interesting swipe at relative/absolute
values of things
labert8: Didn't RAh need that type to put in
slavery, to emphasize their downfall?
Major oz: ......as being un-RAH
BPRAL22169: It was viewed as an important
story at the time.
Major oz: Rum is cheap in the islands
ddavitt: It's not one I read as often as the
rest of GHOE
labert8: In what way, Oz? The character
choices, or elsewise?
BPRAL22169: But I'm with you; I never felt as
strongly about it as about others.
Major oz: In what way what......?
ddavitt: Exactly; what is there that is
valuable no matter where it is?
Major oz: that I didn't like them?
Merfilly8: I had to read Menace
from Earth to get Logic out of my
head...
labert8: It doesn't thrill me like the others either,
I've always thought because it was more direct
social commentary.
ddavitt: Basic stuff; water and air?
labert8: In what way is it unRAH?
Major oz: Oh, I usually like his
"messages", his homilies, and
philosophical points.
Merfilly8: His social commentary
usually lies beneath a layer of
entertaining veneer
Major oz: I don't need "action"
ddavitt: I think the Southern slave analogy
was too marked; not sure it was a fair
comparison
Major oz: But most of hischarecters are
likeable, these are notl
Merfilly8: yet...a thought has just
come to me..
Major oz: It was a weak anti-slavery piece,
as the comparisons were too much of a
stretch.
Merfilly8: AGGH! Logic of Empire
itself comes across flat, and
somewhat lacking in
entertaining polish....just as
Wingate's book fails
Merfilly8: to me anyway
Major oz: meta-meta-meta..........
labert8: Could he have been that conniving in
the composition processs? I'm not sure
Major oz: nah
ddavitt: The rebel colony was interesting
though; again, on afh I memntioned
comparison to MIAHM?
Merfilly8: just coincidental then
ddavitt: Similar treatment of (scarce)
women? Or was it more sinister?
Major oz: I think so, Filly
Merfilly8: I thought that grew
from one of the stories never
written
Major oz: I have no memory of the woman,
other than that there was one.
Merfilly8: I had the impression that
the femmes probably had a
'duty' roster of sorts
Merfilly8: on Venus
ddavitt: No, she was back on the plantation;
owner's daughter
labert8: She was plain, daughter of the owner,
she liked Wingate, and passed info to him
ddavitt: Yes, I don't think they were
revered as they were on Luna
Major oz: Oh.......I was thining of the sister
Major oz: k
labert8: yes, just scarce, not revered.
ddavitt: Scary...
labert8: Though there were women among the
contract laborers
ddavitt: Was the Luna version believable?
BPRAL22169: I don't think slavery was the
theme of this story. It was a background.
Merfilly8: Go, Bill!
ddavitt: More likely to be rape and pillage
than respect?
Merfilly8: I want to hear it?
labert8: probably, Jane, unfortunately.
Major oz: Had RAH been to South Africa
before this piece was written
labert8: Well, Bill?
BPRAL22169: No.
BPRAL22169: Sorry -- I missed something.
What am I being asked?
labert8: background to what?
ddavitt: What was the theme
Major oz: ...cause the plantation owners
sure sound like the Africaaers
Major oz: n
BPRAL22169: Ijust meant, the story seems to
me to be "about" people blinding themselves
and a classic early Heinlein theme, being
unwilling to face manifest facts.
ddavitt: Gullibility and blindness?
BPRAL22169: The indenture-slavery situation
was story situation, so it is anti-slavery only
incidentally.
labert8: Hm. That is the topic of the last page,
true. Sam chides W for thinking his boo would
work
Reilloc: That's more of a consequence than a
story, though.
labert8: As Lazarus say, never underestimate. .
.
ddavitt: I would agree that economics is a
theme
GHMyst: Heinlein once said that of the
GHMyst: basic story themes is the
ddavitt: But in a way it segues nicely into
another form of willing slavery; the people
under the Prophet
GHMyst: man-who-learned-bteer.
Major oz: gee dubya is on the podium
labert8: ick
GHMyst: Would that apply to Wingate?
ddavitt: Well, is Wingate wrong in what he
says at the start?
labert8: He learned, but to no effect. There's a
lesson for ya.
ddavitt: He says they are emplyees, not
slaves in a feely entered into contract; all
true
labert8: But that is factually misleading
Major oz: Jane, I have always had trouble
with characterizing a citizenery as slaves
(eg CCCP, Hitlerien Germany)
ddavitt: I agree; big difference.
GHMyst: In fact, he admits that "Logic" is
definitely
GHMyst: a man-who-learned-better"story.
ddavitt: Which is why the plantation songs,
selling south bit never worked for me in
logic'
Merfilly8: Slaves in practice, but
not in theory...back around to
the slave of the wage
comparison
ddavitt: They weren't slaves.
ddavitt: No matter what Sam says.
ddavitt: They were fooled but not slaves
labert8: Who admits that, GH?
Major oz: agree
BPRAL22169: But it wasn't completely
useless. Wingate's book added an increment to
awareness of the situation.
GHMyst: Heinlein in his essay"On the
GHMyst: Writing of speculative Fiction"
Merfilly8: A bit of sand in the
hourglass, though
ddavitt: But we don't know how it resolved;
what happens to Venus after the Revolt
and the Covenant?
Major oz: yes
ddavitt: Remember lazarus is there during
the reign of the Prtophet; he wouldn't have
been involved in slavery
Major oz: I find that frustating
Merfilly8: it was a good enough
place for LL to slum by the time
of MC
labert8: True, Bill, and that's the only way
things have changed here as well, an
accumulation of voices speaking out.
ddavitt: Do they contibue to use contract
labour to get the swamproot? what is that
used for anyway?
Major oz: Doesn't that imply (a little bit)
that Venus was somewhat decent during the
Scudder era?
Eeyore3061 has entered the room.
ddavitt: If the market went, or machines
could do it 9 like cotton) would the systam
fail?
labert8: Lazarus presence might mot mean
much. Did he have the same scruples in 2100
as in 4100?
Major oz: I have lightening building,
folks......maybe be dumped soon.
ddavitt: He was pragmatic but always anti
slavery i would think
Merfilly8: did he even realize the
system?
ddavitt: OK Oz
GHMyst: Lazarus...scruples??
ddavitt: lazarus would know i think
Merfilly8: Stick to the cities, and he
might not ever see that side
Major oz: Yes, I think he did
Merfilly8: and he is still relatively
young at this time
Major oz: have scruples
ddavitt: Definitely had anti slavery scruples
from what he says in TEFL
Major oz: that shows from MC
BPRAL22169: He was an American.
ddavitt: That and not leaving a pregnant
women awere his two main ones
ddavitt: And so?
Merfilly8: otherwise he would
have jetted rather than stick his
head in the noose for the
families
labert8: He also may not have had much choice
but to be in a frontier where he could
"Masquerade"
Major oz: to an earlier Q: what was that
root for?
ddavitt: He would not have enjoyed life
under Scudder
ddavitt: Oh yes?
labert8: But I'd imagine slavery was gone or
going soon after "Logic"
Merfilly8: I don't think it said did it?
Major oz: something like "spice"?
labert8: I read it recently, and don't recall the
explanation
Merfilly8: zwilnik
Major oz: ?
labert8: melange?
Major oz: rings a bell
ddavitt: Not a drug I don't think Filly
ddavitt: Doc Smith
BPRAL22169: Soma
Major oz: hokay
labert8: hey, a Jason fan! good on ya Bill
ddavitt: Pea sized kernel in a husk
Merfilly8: but no explanation as to
its use
GHMyst: Can we consider moving on to
ITGO?
ddavitt: Not that i can see
Merfilly8: just re-read the passage
where he talks about working
with it
BPRAL22169: I'm in favor
ddavitt: Yes, me too!
Merfilly8: aye
Major oz: me 3
labert8: might give others more to say
ddavitt: Yes, ITGO sounds fine
Merfilly8: it go...hehehe
BPRAL22169: Do we want to take a short
break?
Merfilly8: poor english
SAcademy: Thunderstorm coming--have to
leave
SAcademy has left the room.
ddavitt: Night SA
GHMyst: 5 minutes??
ddavitt: Sure
Merfilly8: sure
BPRAL22169: Reconvene at 7:25, everyone.
Selah.
Merfilly8: any techies willing to
help a dunderhead? (namely
me)
GHMyst: shoot
Merfilly8: My monitor has a
noticeable "roll" across the
screen a lot lately
ddavitt has left the room.
Merfilly8: used to be just if the
microwave was running, despite
a surge strip
Merfilly8: now, doesn't seem to be
any particualar cause
GHMyst: could be neighbor
Merfilly8: in the army, we'd just
use it til it blew, then
replace...would like to avoid that
option
RMLWJ1: Might want to check your vid card.
Merfilly8: my nearest neighbor is
over half a mile up the road
Merfilly8: thanks
GHMyst: do any of the moniotr adjusts affect
it?
Merfilly8: nope.
RMLWJ1: How old is the monitor?
Merfilly8: but it sure gives me
eyestrain when it happens
Merfilly8: 2 years
labert8 has left the room.
labert8 has entered the room.
Reilloc: Win 98?
RMLWJ1: Should be within the number of
operatiing hours then.
Merfilly8: yes
GHMyst: sorry, nothing occurs to me other
than
GHMyst: the obvious point hat something is
degrading
Reilloc: Does the display type match the
display type of your video control card?
GHMyst: and will eventually die
Merfilly8: thanks for the
pointers....yes, it does.
Reilloc: Does the monitor type match the
monitor type of your monitor?
Merfilly8: I think it may have been
abused by being on the same
outlet as a major appliance for
awhile...my hubby didn't know
better
ddavitt has entered the room.
ddavitt: I went for a drink; came back to a
blue screen....
ddavitt: Are we still on a break?
Merfilly8: Jane, you have a built in
shelf yet? :)
Merfilly8: yes
ddavitt: Sort of....
Merfilly8: hehehe
GHMyst: give it another minute or 2
BPRAL22169: I think it's about time to
reconvene, isn't it?
Merfilly8: best wishes to the baby
and mommy
ddavitt: Lots of people don't think i look
pregant; i'm 6 months now
ddavitt: They should see me in the bath GHMyst: OK who starts??
Merfilly8: our elder girl turns one
tomorrow
BPRAL22169: I've got one of those story
summaries for ITGO. Shall I play it in?
ddavitt: Happy birthdat to her!
Major oz: ga
Merfilly8: yes, Bill
GHMyst: GA
ddavitt: Sure.
labert8: hey folks, I've gotta give my wife the
PC for a while, will try to get back later.
Have fun
ddavitt: Bye!
Merfilly8: bye Labert@!
BPRAL22169: If This Goes On --'" Short
novel originally published in Astounding SF in
1940; expanded and collected into REVOLT
IN 2100 and THE PAST THROUGH
TOMORROW150 years after the US voted
in a permanent Theocracy, John Lyle falls in
love with one of the "Virgins" destined for the
Prophet's bed. He arranges for the rescue of
his Virgin and defects to an underground
resistance.
BPRAL22169: His training in military science
gets him promoted to military arm of the
conspiracy. Lyle gradually acquires
sophistication as he educates himself in the ways
of free men. Lyle takes an important part in the
Second American Revolution and is present
when the Covenant is devised, a new
constitution for free men to live equitably
together.
BPRAL22169: -30-
GHMyst: ITGO is interesrting because it is
GHMyst: probably the most rewritten stories in
GHMyst: terms of what is changed betwen the
mag version
GHMyst: and the later bookversion
ddavitt: So it seems...
Merfilly8: I shall state now...I
don't like John Lyle, but not sure
why
ddavitt: He's not the average hero of a
Heinlein is he?
Major oz: talk it out, Filly
labert8 has left the room.
RMLWJ1 has left the room.
Major oz: I see him as closely related to
Oscar
ddavitt: His theft of the space ship is a bit
Oscar like...but totally out of character if
you ask me
Merfilly8: another character I did
not warm to
Major oz: similar niavate, similar learning
curve
BPRAL22169: in a sense he's the closest to
Heinlein personally -- his mother's maiden
name, the gunnery qualifications.
ddavitt: Oscar is cute!
Merfilly8: I found the whole
escape thing contrived, and
against character grain
ddavitt: Yes...but he suspects it was a plant
of course
ddavitt: I assume they were tracking him
hoping he would lead them to the cabal
GHMyst: LYle would be the first RAH
charcter
BPRAL22169: Andt hat particular thought is
never resolved is it.
GHMyst: to attend an Academy which makes
the analogy to
Merfilly8: To be honest, ITGO kept
reminding me on a sunconscious
level of 1984
BPRAL22169: it's an important transition
though --
GHMyst: RAH a good one
BPRAL22169: Andhe's being tracked by a
member of the Academy, too.
GHMyst: ??
ddavitt: So how does he manage to fool
them you mean?
BPRAL22169: As Reeves, he is being "spied
on," he thinks, by a West Pointer who has
removed his ring.
ddavitt: Yes.
Merfilly8: yes.
ddavitt: Then he overhears about the blood
test
Merfilly8: and then he is left
conveniently poorly secured on
'lock-up'
GHMyst: inresteing you should mention that
Major oz: I hacn't noticed that, Myst.
ddavitt: And a ship he can fly is there with
the keys in
Major oz: Interesting...............
GHMyst: While he is on the rocket, he picks
up
GHMyst: the earphones from the seat in front
GHMyst: to listen to the sound for the news on
the screen at the front
GHMyst: of the cabin...Is this the first time
someone
PashaMor: ok, the sun's up. gotta start the
day. have fun
Merfilly8: bye
PashaMor: bye
ddavitt: Bye!
PashaMor has left the room.
BPRAL22169: One thing that struck me this
time around is that there are three "phases" to
this story with different imagery. There is the
fake-medieval for the Prophet, then
Secular-boureoise as Reeves the textiles
drummer, then he transcends that to go
underground.
GHMyst: sugested something like airline
in-flight movies??
BPRAL22169: I noticed that, too.
ddavitt: :-) Could be.
ddavitt: I suppose that's abit we take for
granted, forgetting the publication date
Merfilly8: I began wondering if the
Cabal tipped off the police in a
manner that allowed them to
test John's capabilities
Dehede011 has entered the room.
Dehede011: Good Evening.
Merfilly8: After all, they weren't
sure how to fit him into their
hierarchy
BPRAL22169: Now, THAT is paranoid
thinking!
ddavitt: Isn't that on a par with the recent
discusiion about ship crash in SC?
GHMyst: definitely
BPRAL22169: I like it.
Merfilly8: I am not paranoid just
because they are chasing me
ddavitt: No! Too tricky and sneaky
GHMyst: right!!
BPRAL22169: And, of course, they wer
echasing him, weren't they?
ddavitt: Cabal wouldn't do that to one of
their own I don't think
ddavitt: Hi there
Merfilly8: I don't know...not too
impressed with their psychology
dept
ddavitt: Still think it would not fit in with
their rituals and such
Merfilly8: true
Merfilly8: And it is patterned after
the Freemasons, yes?
ddavitt: Yes
Merfilly8: A group I'm not very
educated on, unfortunately
ddavitt: He had the hyponotic message for
his bonafides but that was allowable;
setting the Prophet's men on him would be
too risky
Merfilly8: Though RAH seemed to
respect them
Dehede011: May a newcomer ask what is
modeled after the Freemasons?
ddavitt: Cabal in If This Goes On
Merfilly8: The Cabal of If this Goes
oN
Dehede011: Thank YOu.
Major oz: It is also one of the few works
where an organized religion is mentioned
favorably
Merfilly8: ee gads, my typing!
Major oz: .......the Mormons
Merfilly8: Ron, right?
ddavitt: Do you see the Masons as
religious?
Major oz: no
ddavitt: Oh, the Mormons!
Dehede011: As religious yes, as a religion, no.
BPRAL22169: Jews, too --
Major oz: More of:
BPRAL22169: Heinlein was very anti
-anti-semitic.
Dehede011: Yes, Merfilly Ron
ddavitt: Mormons get mentioned elsewhere
Major oz: good PEOPLE, not necessarily
commenting on the dogma
Merfilly8: We're on If This Goes
On, having moved past Logic of
Empire
BPRAL22169: I think he was a little generous
saying the Book of Mormon is no sillier than any
other theology.
Dehede011: Okay, I am with you.
Merfilly8: with Stories never
written up next
Merfilly8: I agree Bill
Merfilly8: I had difficulty with it,
and I read religious texts like
bestsellers
Major oz: how so
Major oz: ?
ddavitt: " all religions look equally silly
from the outside' was that Jubal?
Merfilly8: or Lazarus
BPRAL22169: I think Jubal did voice a very
similar sentiment.
Merfilly8: I began the Book of
Mormon with an open mind,
having been exposed to some
tnets early on
Major oz: OHHHH, Filly -- you mean the
religion, not the story
Merfilly8: yes
Major oz: hokay
BPRAL22169: I grew up near Morons in AZ.
Merfilly8: sorry, I jump brain
threads too much
Merfilly8: Morons?
Major oz: oooops
Merfilly8: we all live near Morons
BPRAL22169: typo.
Merfilly8: hehehe
BPRAL22169: Indood we de
GHMyst: thats fur sure
ddavitt: Hmmm...
GHMyst: Back to ITGO
GHMyst: REgarding the two versions
ddavitt: ISTR a letter to a Mormon that
Heinlein wrote that showed up on ebay?
Dehede011: I am a Freemason and one thing
about ITGO very interesting to me.
Merfilly8: I never knew there
were two til this thread started
Major oz: As I read it, H respected the
mormon people as exhibiting those virture
He wrote about, duty, responsibility,
self-sufficiency, etc
ddavitt: He was sympathetic to the reader's
beliefs and problem s with a story; Friday i
think
GHMyst: IN the mag version, Lyle marries
Judith
ddavitt: That would be a mistake IMO
Merfilly8: but in the book, he gets
Maggie
BPRAL22169: And goes off to be a textiles
salesman with Reeves.
GHMyst: IN the book version, he nevr sees
Judith again and marries
Merfilly8: right?
ddavitt: Yes
GHMyst: Magdalene
Merfilly8: a very interesting name
choice
ddavitt: Significant name?
Merfilly8: the whore that was
close to Jesus
ddavitt: What is Ron?
Dehede011: Judith might be, it means JEWISH
WOMAN
Major oz: Never having read the mag
version, I think I would like the book
version better.
ddavitt: Me too.
Merfilly8: Judith = woman who cut
off the head of the enemy,
yes?
ddavitt: maggie was a whore...but a temple
prostitute and thus OK
ddavitt: Holofernes
ddavitt: I think
GHMyst: It's also interesting to se how his
style or skill
Dehede011: The fact that RAH used so much
Freemasonry and always stopped short of
actually revealing anything important.
GHMyst: improved
Dehede011: Also that Merfilly
ddavitt: Well, he wasn't one so i assume he
couldn't know anything to reveal?
BPRAL22169: The book version also has a
lot of stuff about learning the American heritage
of freedom from Thomas Paine and Thomas
Jefferson. That was not in the magazine
version.
Major oz: whose, Myst, John Lyle's?
Merfilly8: I realized that the first
time I read it, without knowing it
was a direct allusion to the
Freemasons
Dehede011: Not true Jane
GHMyst: RAH
ddavitt: Never been proved Ron AFAIK
GHMyst: How he cahnged the wording in
subtle ways in
GHMyst: the book version
ddavitt: Though I suppose details have
leaked out over the years
Major oz: Did RAH edit the version that
became the book, or did someone else?
BPRAL22169: RAH
Dehede011: You can go to Amazon and buy
any number of acurate books on Freemasonry.
RAH evidently did.
GHMyst: No editedrewrote to acertain extent
ddavitt: Back in 1941?
BPRAL22169: Virtually all of the Scottish Rite
has been published.
GHMyst: Later
Dehede011: Bill, virtually all or everything.
BPRAL22169: The rewrite was in 1953 --
expanded from 34,000 to 54,000 words.
Dehede011: of everything
Merfilly8: that's a large addition
ddavitt: If H did know stuff I would imagine
he would've had too much respect to reveal
secrets?
BPRAL22169: You're probably right, Ron, it's
just that I happen to know about that particular
branch of the Freemasons.
ddavitt: Even open secrets?
GHMyst: most in the point after he escapes
from the rocket
GHMyst: and arrives at HQ
GHMyst: The first half is almost the same
GHMyst: in both versions except for name
changes and
Dehede011: It is pretty much an open secret
for those who truly want to search the ritual
out.
GHMyst: a few minor scenes
BPRAL22169: All of the stuff he learns in the
cavern is added in 1953.
GHMyst: Right
GHMyst: Also the escape from the rocket is
GHMyst: made a bit less hokey
ddavitt: Could the rise of Communism have
had an effect on the way H saw
brainwashing?
BPRAL22169: The main change in the first
part is having Judith met twice before she gets
into trouble and changing what it was Judith
saw that alarmed her.
ddavitt: Made free men become even more
imprtant a symbol?
GHMyst: correct
Major oz: I would have thought the
skinny-dipping scene was pretty racy for
the original.
BPRAL22169: He was dealing with Commies
during his political days. I think his opinion was
pretty well set by 1941. Remember, he started
writing as a 32 year old.
BPRAL22169: The skinny-dipping scene
wasn't in the original.
Dehede011: In that day and age it was to me
Major. :))
ddavitt: But the analogy with USSR would
have been more acute by the 50's?
GHMyst: Neither was Maggie smoking
Dehede011: Smoking was very common in the
forties, look at the old movies
BPRAL22169: Zeb is not quite as "in your face" and "get over it" in the
magazine version.
ddavitt: Was a woman smoking still shocking in the 40's then?
Dehede011: No, not at all, Jane
Major oz: No, Jane -- it was extremely sexy
ddavitt: Then why miss it out? Or add it in?
Dehede011: A few women were against it but not many.
ddavitt: Sexy? BPRAL22169: Maggie becomes a major character in the book version.
Dehede011: It was the more sophisticated that did it.
BPRAL22169: Look at Dietrich trickling smoke through her nostrils and tell
me it wasn't sexy.
Major oz: Look at promo stills for Bacall and some of the others
ddavitt: Like drinking cocktails?
Major oz: similar
Merfilly8: anything that draws attention to the lips of a woman...
Major oz: yes, yes, yes.........
Merfilly8: as explained to me by an older male friend
Reilloc: Doesn't her non smoking go more to purity than anything else?
ddavitt: Err....sorry bill, my female POV prevents that...plus I'm a non
smoker; it's a
nasty habit to me
ddavitt: I can see the lips bit i suppose.
BPRAL22169: Personally, I agree with you -- but as a visual image I don't
have to smell, I can
see what Oz and Ron are saying.
Dehede011: Jane, the difference is that for you it is unhealthy, and I
agree, to them in the forties
it wasn't ladylike.
BPRAL22169: And it was still a symbol of liberation at that time, though
not as strongly as it
had been 20 years earlier.
ddavitt: So the idea was to make Maggie seem even more of a tempting
forbidden
fruit?
GHMyst: at least in John's eyes
Major oz: yes
ddavitt: Of course.
BPRAL22169: No - I think it stresses her availability, not her
forbiddenness.
Major oz: But also her self-determination
GHMyst: but there is the way he reacted to it.
Dehede011: I thought it was to mark her as a freethinker.
Major oz: ......which is, in itself, a sexy image
BPRAL22169: john Lyle doesn't disapprove of her smoking any more than he
disapproves of
Zeb.
GHMyst: It does not fit in with he 40's image
ddavitt: But he was still a bit tangled up in his beliefs...smoking was a
sin
GHMyst: you just discussed
GHMyst: Lyle says that he had never seen a woman
ddavitt: He did disapprove of Zeb
GHMyst: smoke up to that point in time
BPRAL22169: True. it showed the Theocracy values he held onto and let us
see him letting
them go.
Major oz: exactly
ddavitt: It was a symbol; he smokes himself by the end
Major oz: It was interesting for each of these walls' destructions to be
narrated.
BPRAL22169: One of the remarkable things about Heinlein is his idea --
darned near unique
now -- that people can change themselves and get better. Don't have to be
victims of their
upbringing.
ddavitt: Interesting that Zeb knows it will give him lung cancer in light
if the recent
tobacco cases...
Major oz: everyone ALWAYS knew -- don't get me started........
ddavitt: GHMyst: beat me to it
Dehede011: Jane, when I was a very small boy in the early forties we were
perfectly aware
cigarettes were "Coffin Nails."
Merfilly8: Jane, you're the stirrer of the pot! :)
ddavitt: Didn't some of the adverts promote them as healthy tho?
GHMyst: and your point is?
ddavitt: Well, I am shocked to see ciggie adverts in magazines here; been
banned in
UK for years
Merfilly8: If I just went by my army buds, I'd swear they increased
lung performance :)
Dehede011: Healthy in the sense that the particular brand wouldn't give you
a sore throat.
ddavitt: I am stirring a bit ,wicked grin>
Merfilly8: many of our best runners were smokers
BPRAL22169: They also advertised based on their calming effect.
Merfilly8: I've seen some old ads for early menthols...soothing for
ther nerves and throat
Major oz: I set multiple swimming records in the 50's and 60's while
smoking
Dehede011: And Baby Ruth bars for their "quick energy."
ddavitt: But the advets I see today still seem to indicate you'll be fit
and sexy with a
cigarette in youyr mouth so i guess some things never change
GHMyst: Bill, before I depart. How goes #7?
ddavitt: Yes; good question :-)
Major oz: but they appeal only to VERY stupid people
ddavitt: Plenty of those around OZ; the fol crop never fails
ddavitt: fool
Reilloc: Thanks for letting me attend tonight.
Major oz: And it's my right to make money off them.
BPRAL22169: I've been holding it for one last contribution, but I'm going
to take it to the
printer Friday
ddavitt: Where are you from btw?
Major oz: .....improves the breed
BPRAL22169: So it will go out next week.
Reilloc: Kansas
Reilloc: Goodnight.
Reilloc has left the room.
ddavitt: Do you lurk afh?
ddavitt: Too late...
GHMyst: OK thanks.
ddavitt: Look forward to it Bill
Dehede011: me too
GHMyst: Good night, all.
Merfilly8: nite
BPRAL22169: 'night.
GHMyst has left the room.
ddavitt: I have to go now; 11.00 pm for me...night everyone
Dehede011: See you Saturday afternoon.
Merfilly8: nite Jane
BPRAL22169: By coincidence, the Study this time is on ITGO.
ddavitt has left the room.
Major oz: nite
Dehede011: Good night.
Dehede011 has left the room.
BPRAL22169: My goodness, we're decimated.
Merfilly8: hmmm
Merfilly8: and we didn't get to Stories
Major oz: Well, the convention is over, also.
BPRAL22169: We also didn't get back to the psycho-conditioning subject.
Major oz: good speech
Major oz: never made it to stories never told
Merfilly8: nutz
BPRAL22169: The second shift should be showing up shortly, though.
Major oz: I am absolutely unfamiliear with SNT.
Major oz: Merfilly8: The Sound of His Wings, detailing the rise of Scudder
Major oz: well, folks, I'm out. Probably won't be available Saturday.
Merfilly8: Eclipse, dealing with the break away of Mars and Venus
Major oz: Where does it appear, Filly
Major oz: ?
Merfilly8: take care, Oz
Merfilly8: the postscript is in Revolt
Major oz: hokay, gotta go.
Major oz: nite
Merfilly8: nite
Major oz has left the room.
Merfilly8: Well?
BPRAL22169: My goodness!
Merfilly8: Well, Bill. I think I will take the life boat too.
BPRAL22169: Well -- shall we do it ourselves?
Merfilly8: Didn't expect an early night like this
BPRAL22169: Eeyore, you will have to delurk!
Merfilly8: Probably looking for his tail
Merfilly8: :)
BPRAL22169: This is the first time this has happened.
BPRAL22169: Always a surprise.
Merfilly8: I can't make Saturdays anymore, not from the get go
BPRAL22169: Time a problem for you?Well, have a good night.
Merfilly8: you too
Merfilly8: I might see you in the last part of Saturday
BPRAL22169: I'll stay online in case people start showing up.
Merfilly8: ok.
Merfilly8 has left the room.
BPRAL22169: Well -- we've at least covered part of the material, so the
last part is probably
right for you.
Eeyore3061 has left the room.
labert8 has entered the room.
labert8 has left the room.
maikoshT: Log Officially Closed at 11:41 PM Thursday 8-03-2000
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