Posted on 08/19/2007 6:06:46 AM PDT by tpaine
Heinlein the Libertarian
"Ayn Rand is a bloody socialist compared to me," shows yet another side to the Heinlein paradox.
As a literary influence on the emerging libertarian movement, Heinlein was second only to Rand.
Yet his statement about self-sacrifice and duty to the species seems as un-Randian as you can get. Heinlein, a human chauvinist, always believed freedom and responsibility were linked. But he would never have thought it proper to impose the duty he saw as the highest human aspiration.
Heinlein once told a visitor, "I'm so much a libertarian that I have no use for the whole libertarian movement." Although never in lockstep with every libertarian attitude, Heinlein's fictions seemed derived from libertarianism before the modern movement even fully existed. Before books like Rand's Fountainhead and F.A. Hayek's Road to Serfdom sparked the modern libertarian movement in the mid-'40s, Heinlein had published a novelette, "Coventry," about a world whose government was based on a freely entered covenant that said that "no possible act, nor mode of conduct, was forbidden to you, as long as your action did not damage another."
Heinlein's other contributions to the libertarian zeitgeist include one of the epigrams of the gun rights movement, "an armed society is a polite society" - a line first published in his 1942 serial Beyond This Horizon.
He was also a direct intellectual influence on many important libertarians. David Friedman, author of the anarcho-capitalist classic The Machinery of Freedom, considered Heinlein's 1966 novel The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress vital to his intellectual evolution. (One of Moon's heroes was a professor advocating "rational anarchy," partially based on Heinlein's one-time neighbor, Robert LeFevre, founder of the libertarian Rampart College.) David Nolan, founder of the Libertarian Party, got his start in political activism in 1960 sporting a self-made "Heinlein for President" button. Another Heinlein devotee was Robert Poole, longtime editor of Reason and founder of the Reason Foundation, one of the first institutions to try to effect libertarian change in the real world in a practical manner. Poole's efforts could be seen as a legacy of Heinlein's interest in the nuts and bolts of how his imagined societies would actually function.
Even though he adopted the Milton Friedmanite phrase "there ain't no such thing as a free lunch" as a slogan for his revolutionaries fighting colonial oppression in Moon, Heinlein was not deeply embedded in the economic strain of libertarianism, which stresses the importance of spontaneous order, the failures of central planning, and the efficiency of free markets. As the economist Robert Rogers has argued, Heinlein's fiction seemed to believe that it took Great Men or a single mind (sometimes human, sometimes computer) to make sure economies ran well. In a 1973 interview with the libertarian writer J. Neil Schulman, Heinlein was doubtful when Schulman referred to the greater efficiency of free markets. "I don't think the increase in efficiency on the part of free enterprise is that great," Heinlein said. "The justification for free enterprise is not that it's more efficient, but that it's free."
Heinlein was, then, his own kind of libertarian, one who exemplified the libertarian strains in both the Goldwater right and the bohemian left, and maintained eager fan bases in both camps. A gang of others who managed the same straddle, many of them Heinlein fans, split in 1969 from the leading conservative youth group, Young American for Freedom, in what some mark as the beginnings of a self-conscious libertarian activist movement. In a perfectly Heinleinian touch, the main sticking point between the libertarian and conservative factions was one of Heinlein's bêtes noires: resistance to the draft, which he hated as much as he loved the bravery of the volunteer who would fight for his culture's freedom or survival.
Heinlein the Iconoclast
The prominence of his juvenile novels and his galvanizing effect on so many adolescent fans have led many critics to condemn Heinlein's work as inherently unworthy of serious adult attention. As one scholar, Elizabeth Anne Hull, has written, "In an attempt to account for the extraordinary popularity and influence of the novels of Robert Heinlein, it would be all too easy to assert that the masses are asses and let it go at that. Those of us academics who read Heinlein are likely to admit it with an apology [and consider] our weakness in enjoying his work a minor character defect."
Heinlein is indeed best approached when young, because his work appeals to that eternal youthful question: How should you live as you grow into a culture you did not make?
Heinlein does this best via his defining characteristic, one that bridges the apparent divides in his work. As William Patterson, the author of a forthcoming two-volume biography of Heinlein, told me, the best way to understand Heinlein in toto is as a full-service iconoclast, the unique individual who decides that things do not have to be, and won't continue, as they are.
That iconoclastic vision is at the heart of Heinlein, science fiction, libertarianism, and America.
Heinlein imagined how everything about the human world, from our sexual mores to our religion to our automobiles to our government to our plans for cultural survival, might be flawed, even fatally so.
It isn't a quality amenable to pigeonholing, or to creating a movement around "What would Heinlein do?" As Heinlein himself said of his work, it was "an invitation to think-not to be-lieve." He created a body of writing, and helped forge a modern world, that is fascinating to live in because of, not in spite of, its wide scope and enduring contradictions.
BUMP
So, what are some recommends from the RAH fan club? Not necessarily Heinleinesque, but good authors of the genre that provoke new thought or inspire you to check out other works by the same person.
I'll start:
Neil Stephenson, Snow Crash, The Diamond Age, The Baroque Cycle, and, his best, Cryptonomicon. Brilliantly written and plotted, with wonderful characters.
Tim Powers, The Anubus Gates, Strange Tides, Last Call, Declare. Weird fantasy, different from anything else I've read.
Daniel Keys Moran, The Armageddon Blues, Emerald Eyes, The Long Run, The Last Dancer. More obscure, undeservedly so. He didn't seem to catch an audience, but I really liked his stuff. If you're out there Daniel, FINISH THE CYCLE!
BFL?
“Big Fat Log”?
Please translate for those that speak ENGLISH.
I agree. Great quote.
Heinlein was always a favorite. I didn’t begin thinking politcally for a decade or 2 after reading Heinlein. Maybe I should read him again. I do know that Laz Long was my favorite of his characters.
Well, if you had not done all those rain dances this summer, gotten sick on that cruise, got the new boat ready sooner, had Jan not made Donnie feel like a bastard stepchild, etc... We would'a caught a lot more crappie!
BTW Ya'll got the motorhome moved yet? Margy got bit on the bum by some insect on her cruise and I've been playing nursemaid for her, but before too long, I'm getting in the mood for some "all you can eat" fish and roast beef at Furr's. Just give me a start time!
BFL = Bump for Later
Where you 'grew up' aside, what do you really, really want to be when you grow up?
I wanted to be Laz Long's sidekick...
But these past 60 years I just cannot seem to grow up...
On the subject of DKM, he has resurfaced. He has a blog now, and has put all of his old stuff online as PDFs for free. Go to http://danielkeysmoran.blogspot.com/ for all the info.
Okay, assuming we got together all the Heinlein fans here on FR, gathered up 100 million bucks to make a film of The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress, we would need a surefire Producer and Director and I, of course, offer myself for a very reasonable fee...
Now, we need to cast the film. Who would we have play our characters?
Manuel Garcia O'Kelly "Mannie" Davis
Mycroft Holmes, Mike the computer & Adam Selene
Wyoming "Wyoh" Knott
Professor Bernardo de la Paz
Stuart Rene "Stu" LaJoie
Mimi "Mum" Davis
Hazel Meade
Warden Mortimer Hobart
Authority Security Chief Alvarez
My choices off the top of my head this morning would be as follows:
James Caviezel or Dean Cain as Manuel Garcia O'Kelly "Mannie" Davis
James Woods as Mycroft Holmes, Mike the computer & Adam Selene...
Ron Silver as Professor Bernardo de la Paz...
Angie Harmon as Wyoming "Wyoh" Knott
Bo Derek as Mimi "Mum" Davis...
Kelsey Grammer as Warden Mortimer Hobart
Bruce Willis as Authority Security Chief Alvarez
Okay, what do ya'll think?
Great post. It’s already caused an hour of procrastination! I’m the father of two young sons(2 and 1). While I enjoy their toddler years, I can’t wait to introduce them to my favorite books, many written by the master. He’s brought me hours of joy.
Like others have said he was also required reading(Starship Troopers)while I was at Norwich University (ROTC). Throughout my career in the military I have passed his books along to other officers. While Troopers is my favorite, The Moon is a Harsh Mistress is right up there. Just a brilliant work of literature.
In an old story, Lazarus Long had founded a colony, and eventually founded a bank and printed money. People prospered under his adept financial management. Then one day they caught him outside the bank burning bills and set upon lynching him for destroying their money. He had to do some quick explaining to get out of it.
That explanation was the first good, memorable lesson on monetary policy I ever had. It was far better than anything I’d learned in school.
Don't feel too bad, these illiterate hacks didn't even know about the novel when they started making a cheap sci-fi action flick called "Bug Hunt at Outpost Nine." For me the saddest thing is that Clancy Brown and Michael Ironside, both good actors, sullied themselves by being in that movie.
21 RH first editions!!! I'd have been first in line if you'd made your intentions known here on FR.
My favourite Heinlein quote of all time:
“A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects.”
- Lazarus Long, in Time Enough for Love by Robert A. Heinlein
It describes my worldview to a tee.
__________________________________________
Mine too.
Yes, Verhoeven Starship Troopers is a sore subject to me. First and foremost they did away with the powered armor which made the Mobile Infantry mobile! I understand how difficult it would have been to create the cgi special effects for this in 1997, however today's SFX it would be doable...
I had no problem with making "Dizzy" Flores a gal and even having her and Rico have an affair. Even making Carl a 'Special' Officer, keeping him alive and making him more central to the plot was not out of bounds. I realized making a film from a book bring some change...
But the majority of the cast, plot and the Nazifying of Federal Service was sicking!
They complete cut out Jean V. Dubois and Fleet Sergeant Ho and these two set up the storyline...
Gadzooks! I need to halt here before my blood pressure cause steam to shoot out my ears!
BTW I did very good on selling my collection and know the person who bought it will keep it and pass it on to his six children...
BTW I did very good on selling my collection and know the person who bought it will keep it and pass it on to his six children...
I have some kids, and the library they'll inherit is approaching 2,000. Sadly, the only valuable first-edition sci-fi I have in the collection is an old signed Roger Zelazny short story.
Excellent quotes!! :)
I like it! :)
The most visible proponent of these views is probably Paul Verhoeven, whose film version of Starship Troopers portrayed the Terran Federation wearing Nazi-like outfits and using fascistic propaganda; but Verhoeven admits that he never finished reading the actual book.[48]
The footnote: 48 ^ Peterson, Robert (2000). Starship Troopers: Film and Heinlein’s Vision. Space.com. Retrieved on 2006-03-04.
I went to http://www.space.com/sciencefiction/movies/troopers_contrast_000610.html listed in the footnote and found a really strange ‘Special to Space.com’ about Starship Troopers. It never actually says Verhoeven never finished reading the book but it does offer up some hit and miss observations on the flick.
In it Robert Peterson comments on Clancy Brown breaking a boot’s arm:
Other flaws are minor and relate to the lack of efficiency we see in the film. Sergeant Zim (Clancy Brown) is all wrong. Heinlein’s boot camp is tough, fair and, most importantly, real. Verhoeven played the boot camp, and especially Zim, for psychotic laughs, as when Zim breaks a new recruit’s arm to illustrate a point.
Patterson notes that “the arm break is nowhere in the world of the book,” and I agree.
Evidently neither of these two clowns ever read the novel either!
If I recall the novel correctly, Zim broke boot Sutherland's arm at the first formation and said in an aside he was sorry as the boot hurried him.
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