Sam Hall (UNCLASSIFIED)

[Mullins, Bill AMRDEC]

Classification: UNCLASSIFIED
Caveats: NONE

I don't think so.  Heinlein was personally interested in all of these
political movements.  He was active in the Sinclair movement in CA in
the mid-1930s, he ran for the state assembly as a Democrat in 1938 and
attended the 1940 Democratic Party convention in Chicago, he spent money
out of his own pocket to pay for an ad against the SANE movement in
1958, he identified himself as a libertarian in the 1970s (and also as a
"rational anarchist", I believe, whatever that is).  He actively
supported the Strategic Defense Initiative when Reagan was spinning it
up.

But your point is well taken.  Larry Niven:  "We in the writing
profession have a technical term for people who believe that the authors
believe everything their characters believe. We call them 'idiots'."

> -----Original Message-----
> From: American Dialect Society [mailto:ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU] On
> Behalf Of Joel S. Berson
> Sent: Tuesday, November 03, 2009 10:32 AM
> To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
> Subject: Re: Sam Hall
>
> ---------------------- Information from the mail header
---------------
> --------
> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       "Joel S. Berson" <Berson at ATT.NET>
> Subject:      Re: Sam Hall
>
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
> --------
>
> Are some of us conflating the author with his narrator?
>
> At 11/3/2009 11:22 AM, Mullins, Bill AMRDEC wrote:
> >Classification: UNCLASSIFIED
> >Caveats: NONE
> >
> >Heinlein was all over the map.  His first novel, unpublished until a
> few
> >years ago, was _For Us, the Living_ and it was a treatise for Social
> >Credit.  He had been a writer for Upton Sinclair's newspaper "EPIC
> News"
> >during the 1930s. "Misfit" was his second published story, and it was
> >essentially the Civilian Conservation Corps in space -- straight up
> New
> >Deal politics.  He had libertarian elements as early as his 1942
> novel,
> >"Beyond this Horizon".  _Starship Troopers_ is often called fascistic
> >(wrongly, I think).  _The Moon is a Harsh Mistress_ is indeed a
> seminal
> >document of the American Libertarian movement.
> >
> >One continuing theme in Heinlein's writing, from his pre-war stories
> >through his death, is a condemnation of slavery (and he includes the
> >draft as slavery).
> >
> > > -----Original Message-----
> > > From: American Dialect Society [mailto:ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU] On
> > > Behalf Of Robin Hamilton
> > > Sent: Monday, November 02, 2009 8:38 PM
> > > To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
> > > Subject: Re: Sam Hall
> > >
> > > ---------------------- Information from the mail header
> >---------------
> > > --------
> > > Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> > > Poster:       Robin Hamilton <robin.hamilton2 at BTINTERNET.COM>
> > > Subject:      Re: Sam Hall
> > >
>
>----------------------------------------------------------------------
> -
> > > --------
> > >
> > > > Not entirely true.  Heinlein was fairly far left when he began
> > > selling.
> > > >    The same for Poul Anderson.
> > > >
> > > > Mack Reynolds and John Brunner were leftists to the end.
> > > >
> > > > Dan Goodman
> > >
> > > Brunner I'd agree, but I'd tend to see Anderson and (especially)
> Mack
> > > Reynolds as libertarian rather than leftist.  (Ditto with Heinlein
> in
> > > _The
> > > Moon Is A Harsh Mistress_.)  But this may be a matter of
> perspective,
> > > Brit
> > > vs. USAmerican.
> > >
> > > Then again, which I suspect is more likely, I may just be entirely
> > > wrong.
> > > I'm working with thirty year old memories here.
> > >
> > > Robin Hamilton
> > >
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