Heinlein reference?

        Okay, I'm stumped on this one.  There was an episode
where Martin and some other kids were talking about starting a
sci-fi book club, when someone mentioned Heinlein, Martin
brushed it off and said, "Yes, I'm familiar with the work of
Robert Heinlein."
        Does anybody remember this or is my brain just fuzzy?

Erik F wrote:

It�s actually Ray Bradbury and not Heinlein. The line is from 7F19 "Lisa�s Substitute".

Chris

On Sun, 06 Oct 2002 12:00:33 GMT, Erik F wrote:

[7F19], Lisa's Substitute:

   Martin: As your president, I would demand a science-fiction
library, featuring an ABC of the over[something] genre.  Asimov,
Bester, Clarke!
   Student: What abouy Ray Bradbury?
   Martin: [dismissing]  I'm aware of his work...
           [orating] Thank you, and... Keep watching the skies...
   -- Martin's campaign speech for class president, ``Lisa's
Substitute''

Hmm, SNPP is missing a line. It goes "featuring an ABC of the overlords of the genre. Asimov, Bester, Clarke!" And the "Student" is Wendel. And that's "about", not "abouy".

It was definitely Bradbury. I don't recall Heinlein ever being mentioned by name on the show... can anyone thing of any indirect references? (ie: stolen plot points or quotes?)

I would be a bit surprised. He wrote a couple of influential books, but also heaps of pulp.

fishy wrote in message news:...

I wouldn't describe Heinlein as writing pulp. He (and Asimov and some others) helped to make science fiction more than pulp. If you look before Heinlein's time, you will see plenty of pulp; huge spaceships that cross the galaxy in an hour, amazing stunts that have no scientific basis, lousy writing and one dimensional characters. Think Doc Smith. And John W. Campbell who helped to put more into the fiction as editor of Astounding, but who wrote his share of real pulp before turning to editing (and writing better stuff). I once read an early book by L. Ron Hubbard (who I believe came after Heinlein hit the scene) and it was terribly pulpish; he'd be a nobody if he hadn't founded a cult.

As for Heinlein's books, a large bulk of his work has to be influential. His juveniles, which showed up in so many libraries, were well written and were the entry point for many who went on to read other science fiction. I'm one of them. It was Heinlein that I bumped into, at about the age of ten, not other authors that I later went onto read.

If you are talking in terms of getting out of the ghetto, yes, probably "Stranger in a Strange Land" is the only one of his books that the average person might have read or known about (apart from the books that made it into film in recent years). But I think with even one book, he did better than many science fiction authors. Bradbury might be an exception, but his stuff isn't particularly science fiction.

No Heinlein references in the Simpsons come to mind, however.

The only thing popping into my mind at the moment is the reference to "When Worlds Collide" (a book, but it was made into a movie in the fifties), in that episode where Lisa (and Marge) go off in a rocket ship, which I think is the episode where Homer fumbles on the Y2K problem. It's not a Heinlein book, but it's the only science fiction book reference that comes to mind at the moment. (Yes, there have been plenty of references to science fiction films, but those are more a case of popular culture than science fiction.)

Michael

I agree. Heinlein was a terrific SF writer, especially in that era.

"Michael Black" wrote in message news:[email]...

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"jmartin92" wrote in message news:...

City on the Edge of Forever, the famous Star Trek episode, was written by Heinlein. That was the episode where Kirk, et. al., jumped through a time portal that looked like Fred Flintstone's television set and wound up shacking up with Joan Collins in 1930s Chicago.

Space

Harlan Ellison wrote that one.

BTW, I feel Heinlein is highly overrated!

Aaron Hirshberg wrote in message news:[email]...

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R H Menzel wrote:

I read most of what Heinlein wrote when I was younger. At the time, I loved most of it. The big disappointment for me was that there are a few classics that I thought were great literature, but they swim around in a mass of lesser works.

I can't recall the title of it, but there was a book about an old man who get's his brain transplanted into the body of his sexy young secretary. Simply terrible.

fishy wrote in news:[email]:

It's _I Will Fear No Evil_.

Found this interesting bit at

http://www.dahoudek.com/heinlein/reviews/iwillfearnoevil.htm

"The novel I Will Fear No Evil was almost fit for publication when in January 1970, peritonitis almost ended Robert Heinlein's life. Just before hospitalization, he completed the first cut of his draft. The author gravely ill and unable to make business decisions, his wife and agent exercised their authority over his affairs and decided upon publication in unfinished form. The result is said by one commentator to be 'a rather rambling and murky story line that almost certainly would have been shortened and tightened up considerably had Heinlein been able to edit the draft before publication.' Heinlein remained very ill and underwent other surgeries for the entire next two years. Because it lacks this supposed needed final polish and contains what many then and now consider bizarre subject matter, it has been one of his least appreciated works--a sad fate considering current social history and, also, what I believe is its true intent."

Be aware that this page contains lots of spoilers.

Jim

fishy wrote in message news:[email]...

I had once read a commentary from a minor sci-fi writer in which he stated that anyone over the age of twenty-five who reads sci-fi is retarded. I mulled this over a while and realized that most sci-fi (and most everything) is written for an adolescent mind. The trouble with most sci-fi is that it is mainly an excuse for "cool" fight scenes and CGI.

-Bob

"R H Menzel" wrote in message news:...

I had read a few of his books, which all left me cold. Then I plodded halfway through "The Number of the Beast" and threw it across the room swearing never to read another word by him ever again. I think a lot of those SF "greats" are dreadfully over-rated, because when they came out first, it wasn't that they were doing it well, it's that they were doing it at all. Of Martin's ABC, Azimov falls into that category for me; I just find the entire premises of "Foundation" and the robot stuff to be, well, dumb. Clarke had moments of genius but a grating habit of failing to finish what he started, but Bester ... there was a writer. "The Stars My Destination" and "The Demolished Man" were written in the 50s and remain fresher, less dated and more alive than a lot of what was published two decades later. I'd take him over Bradbury any day.

ben

[email] (ben w) wrote in message news:...

But the authors you mention were among the prime authors in the forties and fifties, and demark the shift from pulp to a more serious form of fiction.

What I will say against Heinlein is that his later books are not as good (I'm not sure if that's the word) as his earlier work. I liked "I Will Fear No Evil" and have reread it and all his previous books plenty of times. But of the books after that, I've read them only once (or maybe one or two, twice). I suspect part of it is that I was older. The juveniles I first read when I was eight and nine, and they were significant books. The ones I read first as an adult, like just about anything else, had to compete with everything else that could come into my world, as opposed to the limited input when a kid.

But those later books, I think Number of the Beast was the first one, tended to mix many of the previous books all together. It was almost as if Heinlein couldn't come up with new ideas, and so he went to his earlier books and put the characters into new situations. But he didn't stop there, he meshed characters from different stories together.

Other authors from the Golden Age have done the same thing in their latter years. I liked the Foundation Trilogy, but the later additions to the series are far less worth reading. Worse, Asimov suddenly decides that the robot stories intersect with the Foundation stories, in effect saying that the previous stories weren't real.

In both cases (and I think there may be other examples), I didn't notice the writing deteriorating. I noticed the stories that were no longer interesting.

Michael

ben w wrote in message news:[email]...

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Well put!

Of Martin's ABC, Azimov falls into that category for

Too true!

Clarke had moments of genius but a grating

I never found that to be the case with his short stories. But, I must confess to liking "open-ended" stories, if they actually leave you thinking about them as opposed to saying, "Oh, that was odd. Oh, well!"

but Bester ... there was a

I must admit, I have read little Bester, but must concur that some things written in the fifties and even the sixties had "soul" (for lack of a better word) that is lacking in most of today's sci-fi.

And to me, another under-rated writer was Philip K. Dick! Although "Bladerunner" is a cult classic, it pales in comparison to the book. And, I feel the ending would've made Dick spin in his grave.

-Bob

On Sat, 2 Nov 2002 11:28:40 -0800, "R H Menzel" wrote:

i was wondering if there were any dickheads out there. his stuff is not for adolescents.

your pal, joe chip

"blake murphy" wrote in message news:[email]...

I

About once a year, I dig out the VALIS books and read them all over. Then I go to the doctor and get an antidepressant.

Mercutio Jones wrote in message news:[email]...

And,

I

It's been years since I've read anything by Dick. I think I need to take some time off to sit with a few good books! Maybe it'll give me some renewed inspiration for my art.

-Bob

fishy wrote:

Did Heinlein invent the word "grok"? I wouldn't be surprised if Comic Book Guy had said "grok" at some point.

AFAIK, he did.

That would have been entirely in character:-)

You're right!!!

Michael Morbius wrote in message news:apt6rl$7fd$[email]...