Posted on 02/01/2010 12:31:22 PM PST by JoeProBono
Is Stranger in a Stranger Land by Robert Heinlein the Catcher in the Rye for the science-fiction set? Yes, I think you could say that about the 1962 Hugo winner in one important sense.
When author J.D. Salinger died this past Wednesday, I must confess it was convenient for me (if not for him), because it got people talking about his most famous novel. The Catcher in the Rye occupies an interesting position in the literary landscape: It's inarguably a classic, and inarguably a popular classic at that — a book that a lot of people have not only heard of but read, and that has touched them on a real emotional level. But for all that, it's also a book many of those same people are sort of embarrassed of.
Catcher in the Rye is famous as a book that means so much when you read it as a young person — your mileage may vary, of course, but that's what it's famous as, nonetheless. It's full of confusion and anger and easily bruised cynicism, and other adolescent emotions, and climaxes in a kind of sublime but immature optimism. It's a story that carries you away — or has carried many of us away, anyway — when you're somewhere between, say, 15 and 20, but leaves you feeling a little foolish the older you get, especially because of the tendency among allegedly cooler, smarter people to dismiss it or scorn it.
Stranger in a Strange Land does not trade in the same kind of emotional content — it's a much more detached book, except right at the end — but I think it suffers from the same kind of treatment as Catcher. At least, when it came up last weekend while I was out with some of the io9 powers that be, they were mild groans all around, and admissions that while, yes, it was certainly an important part of the canon, well, still. And that was certainly not the first time I've encountered such a reaction to it.
For the record, I don't want to give the impression that anyone from io9 said anything derogatory about the book, because they didn't — there was just some eye-rolling. Which I get. For one thing, it's Heinlein, and even his most die-hard fans ought to agree that he's earned his share of eye rolls. And for another thing, Stranger really is a hokey book.
In case anyone reading this hasn't read it, the story goes as follows: The first manned mission to Mars, consisting of four heterosexual couples, radios back that it has arrived on the planet and then is never heard from again. Years later, the second manned mission to Mars discovers that the fourth planet is inhabited by a native species, that two members of the first mission had a child before dying, and that the odd, inscrutable Martians have raised the kid as one of their own. The astronauts bring the young man, Valentine Michael Smith, back to Earth, where his presence shakes things up, to say the least. The first problem is that the world government wants to control him because he's the heir to an unearthly fortune. The bigger issue is that Michael's Martian heritage has given him a very different outlook on life from most of humanity's, as well as some godlike abilities.
Martians think differently than we do, in large part because they live much longer and because they don't really die — they just lose their bodies and evolve into what they call Old Ones. The upshot of this is that they're not in a hurry, and so instead of deciding anything quickly, they think about it long and carefully and from every possible angle — they grok it, to use their word.
To get an idea of the impact Stranger in a Strange Land and Heinlein had, consider that "grok" is listed in most modern dictionaries, from the OED to Webster's. (By comparison, "orc" still isn't in my Webster's 11th Collegiate, despite having been coined and popularized a quarter century earlier.) But it was not so much the idea of grokking that resonated with readers as what it leads to in the story. As Michael teaches his Earthling friends to grok and to think like Martians, their human patterns of thought fall away, freeing them from shame and guilt and jealousy and repression. Naturally, this leads to nudism and group sex.
And because it's Heinlein, the group sex is warm and touchy-feely, but ultimately just as heterosexist and chauvinistic as a Penthouse Forum letter. Beyond that concern, there's the fact that successfully applying Michael's philosophies seems absolutely unrealistic outside of the world of fiction. It's easy to gloss over these problems with the book, though, especially if you're young and reading it for the first time, because so much of the setup and philosophy is not just appealing but logical, if highly idealized, in the abstract. It's only upon a more critical reexamination that one sees that gosh, maybe the stuff that sounded so wise and deep isn't so pat; maybe it's so overly simplified as to be a little ridiculous.
And I think that it's the feeling of having been taken in so hard, and then finding out that what you thought was brilliant might be kinda silly, that leaves people rolling their eyes at and dismissive of Stranger in a Strange Land. Or just the fact of all the SF that came along later that grapples with sexuality and morality in a much more complex way.
Likewise, there are plenty of works out there that deal with much more sophisticated issues than The Catcher in the Rye does. And we have this tendency to rank works that are more complex or more sophisticated as better than those that are simpler. I get why — if it works, a more complex piece of art by definition took more skill to pull off than a simpler piece.
But if we stop and grok it, that's not a judgment about the merits of the pieces of art — it's a judgment about the ability of the artist. A more complicated piece of art isn't better than a simpler piece; rather, it was created by a better* artist — maybe even the same artist who created the simpler piece, at an earlier time......
You won't be alone.
I think you need to do a lot more reading then before you opine. The Old Testament consists, early on, gives Gods rules for living the life He wants us to. The rest is how it was applied by His Children, the Jews.
Most items detailing ‘immorality’ as you point out, also detail the consequences when immorality is followed.
Stranger is a fictional work, the Old Testament is not. It SHOULD be read by all, because morality IS important.
Personally, I thought this was just fantastic. I make a point of reading it at least one time per year, just to see if I can find anything that I missed the last time.
The only book of his that I like better is "Past Through Tomorrow", the compilation of short stories omnibus.
In other words he became George Lucas.
I don’t disagree. I don’t really care what folks read. I have read things like Mein Kampf which I find personally frightening and offensive. I don’t find anything of value in porn and I am underwhelmed by stories such as Lolita. I was only commenting on Heinlein’s viewpoint within the book itself. (and he probably personally felt that way). I disagree with Ayn Rand on so many things but I can still read things like Atlas Shrugged and come away knowing that I have been challenged.
Fact is reading a wide variety of things is good for the mind. If your faith and your ability to differentiate good from evil is somehow challenged by a book then perhaps you don’t have a very solid foundation
Perhaps you are the one who needs to read more before you opine. there was nothing in any of my comments that suggested that the Old Testament was fiction. The Old Testament tells us about The Law. The Nazarene fulfilled The Law. Like paul, I am no longer bound by it. All things are lawful is completely Pauline and New Testament. Not all things are useful.
So the OT is now, not only immoral, but not useful either? While not BOUND by it, it is still the Word of God and is supremely useful, as well as moral.
You are a lunatic. I said nothing of the sort.
“Lolita” isn’t what most people think it is - they tend to be spooked by the subject, or get sidetracked by its conceit. Humbert is definitely not a hero and Nabokov didn’t like his character nor did he mean others to like him either, and every form of misbehavior gets its just deserts in the end. I find it a very conservative work in fact.
A character that Nabokov did like he treated very differently - see “Pnin” for one of them.
“Lolita” is indeed a great book, and deserves its reputation.
Nabokov just isn’t my cup of tea. I understand that the Russian angst tends to brutalize much of life. I find it more thn a little distasteful that Humbert is a pedophile of the worst sort. The idea of drugging and raping a young girl is not my idea of a plot twist. To then take the story down a road that basically makes it all okay because after all ‘she seduced him’ and was no virgin is some delusional fantasy.
It is really not much better than tess of the D’Urbervilles.
But its not in fact “OK”.
Humbert, the character, has deluded himself, and continues in his delusion. We can see and appreciate the truth behind the delusion. Its sort of like watching a spectacular crash caused by stupid driving.
Lolita herself is human, flawed, complex and deluded. She also crashes. It does not excuse Humbert.
Nabokov was a superb observer of humanity, besides being a master of language. I compare his ability to get into the complexities of a character to Tom Wolfe, matching Wolfe’s rich structures of irony and layers of hypocrisy. I find Nabokov less cruel than Wolfe though, and superior in his English prose.
Just to bring this all back to the subject -
Compared to Heinlein, Nabokov and Wolfe (to name just a few), Salinger was a child.
Yes it does stink. Begins well, breaks down in one chapter, goes gaga for 500 pages.
The stinkers -
I Will Fear No Evil - very stinky, poor writing way too often, lost in weird monologues.
Time Enough for Love - stinky, should have been a collection of much shorter stories.
The Number of the Beast - An insane mess; should also probably have been a collection of short stories.
Friday - The best of this bad lot, though half the pages in this should have been cut.
Cat Who Walks Through Walls - The most self-referential of these; it reads like Heinleins doodling with his characters and concepts, pointlessly. And the cat business is mawkish.
To Sail Beyond the Sunset - Sex, more sex, and sex yet again, even compared to the others here. And did I mention the sex ? And lectures about, well, sex. A plot may or may not be buried in there somewhere in the sex.
Lolita’s life was absolutely ruined by adults who abused her in horrible ways. She is punished ( as you have described it) because others misused her.
I am not arguing whether this book should be ‘available’ for reading. I do not like Nabokov’s writing style ( it is terribly Russian) and it is ( as I have already said) not my cup of tea. I have explained why I don’t like it and all you want to do is convince me that you are correct. Don’t bother I don’t like the book. I don’t like the story.
Re Grok!
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Folks don’t use the word Grok...cuz they don’t Grok it!
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;)
Re Grok!
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Folks don’t use the word Grok...cuz they don’t Grok it!
+++++++++++++
;)
Re
Re Grok!
**********
Folks don’t use the word Grok...cuz they don’t Grok it!
+++++++++++++
;)
58 posted on 12/27/2017, 12:35:57 PM by gunnyg (”A Constitution changed from Freedom, can never be restored; Liberty, once lost, is lost forever...)
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YEAH!
Gunny G
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