Any Heinlein freaks here?

[Bebeslut]

This could go in the can of worms thread, as well: What do y'all think the purpose of all the incest in the World as Myth series was? Let me also note the "soft" swipes RAH took with incest in Time for the Stars and Stranger.

 

[Bebeslut]

Has anyone else ever noticed how many twins populate Heinein's stories? What was the fascination with twins for him?
Here's a list of stories in which twins appear:

The Rolling Stones
Double Star
Time for the Stars
Stranger In a Strange Land
Universe
Common Sense
If This Goes On
Time Enough for Love (more than one pair)
The Number of the Beast
The Cat Who Walks Through Walls
To Sail Beyond the Sunset
By His Bootstraps (OK, this one's shaky)

 

[Bebeslut]

Having just read a few entries on The Heinlein Society website, I want to add another character to my favorite female Heinlein character list, one I had forgotten: Caroline from Tunnel in the Sky.
Caroline is a BBW teen and black, and had to be way out of the box for a heroine in the Fifties.
Along with Mr. Kiku and Mr. Greenberg in The Star Beast and the Jewish kid in Rocket Ship Galeleo, Heinlein blazed the way, quietly, for racial tolerance in that era.

 

[trysail]

Has anyone else ever noticed how many twins populate Heinein's stories? What was the fascination with twins for him?
Here's a list of stories in which twins appear:

The Rolling Stones
Double Star
Time for the Stars
Stranger In a Strange Land
Universe
Common Sense
If This Goes On
Time Enough for Love (more than one pair)
The Number of the Beast
The Cat Who Walks Through Walls
To Sail Beyond the Sunset
By His Bootstraps (OK, this one's shaky)

It's not an uncommon literary device. John Barth is another author who frequently employs twins as a satirical trick and as a means of examining the duality of man.

Mark Twain's Puddn'head Wilson: Those Extraordinary Twins features Luigi and Angelo Capello as twins who were their parents' "only child."

 

[Bebeslut]

It's not an uncommon literary device. John Barth is another author who frequently employs twins as a satirical trick and as a means of examining the duality of man.

Mark Twain's Puddn'head Wilson: Those Extraordinary Twins features Luigi and Angelo Capello as twins who were their parents' "only child."

I read Puddn'head Wilson about once a year. "Only child": the use of the singular never got my notice until now. Thanks! ('Course, Luigi and Angelo aren't the only "twins" in that novel! Strange that hadn't occurred to me, either! Or had it?)

 

[Weird Harold]

This could go in the can of worms thread, as well: What do y'all think the purpose of all the incest in the World as Myth series was? Let me also note the "soft" swipes RAH took with incest in Time for the Stars and Stranger.

RAH was fond of poking sticks in Mrs Grundy's cage. I'm not sure that he was interested in incest, as such, as much as he was interested in shocking people into thinking about -- and/or rethinking -- cultural taboos.

Of course, he was a dirty old man with an oedipus complex, too

 

[Bebeslut]

RAH was fond of poking sticks in Mrs Grundy's cage. I'm not sure that he was interested in incest, as such, as much as he was interested in shocking people into thinking about -- and/or rethinking -- cultural taboos.

Of course, he was a dirty old man with an oedipus complex, too

Yeah, I always figured it was the rethinking cultural tabbos thing, too, but I wanted to see what everyone else thought.
Contrast the incest of the family around Lazarus Long with the story of the brother and sister who weren't.

 

[trysail]

"The greatest productive force is human selfishness."

-Robert A. Heinlein
Time Enough For Love
New York, N.Y. 1973

 

[Bebeslut]

I joined the Heinlein Society yesterday. Not sure what my privileges are, but $35 to promote RAH's legacy seems reasonable.