Robert A. Heinlein: Stranger in His Own Land

by George Edgar Slusser

Dr. Slusser charts the course of Heinlein's development as a writer, from his days as a pulp hack to his enshrinement as a hero of the counter-culture.
Introduction
Twins & Doubles: Time for the Stars & Double Star
The Two Smiths: Stranger in a Strange Land & I Will Fear No Evil
The Deification of Lazarus Long: Time Enough for Love & Methuselah's Children
Heinlein in His Own Land: Have Space Suit-Will Travel
Afterword
Biography & Bibliography

64 pages, Paperback

First published May 1, 1977

Reviews

[Erik Graff · Rating 2 out of 5]

Author Slusser is not a fan of Heinlein. Nor am I. True, I started reading Heinlein in grade school and clearly remember going through Starship Troopers while visiting my aunt Else's summer home on the Oslofjord at age ten. Back then I liked books like that, Have Spacesuit Will Travel, The Green Hills of Earth and, especially, The Door into Summer (I thought it hilarious as a gradeschooler, even reading portions outloud to my grandmother) all made significant impressions. But, growing older, and with the exception of the cult-favorite Stranger in a Strange Land, I started having broader grounds for comparison, finding Heinlein inferior to authors like Dick, Sturgeon, Le Guin, Sargeant, Ellison, Vonnegut and others--even politically offensive. The last book by him I even tried was in seminary, his Time Enough for Love striking me as so neurotic as to be unfinishable. Slusser seems to agree, having good things to say only about some of Heinlein's earlier works, particularly some of his juveniles, they being more plotted than the later, obsessively didactive books.

[Stephen · Rating 2 out of 5]

Recieved as a bonus with an online purchase, this slim volume (55 pages) is from The Milford Series: Popular Writers of Today. Published in 1976, the analyses included of Heinlein's work end with the publication of Time Enough for Love. The book compares and contrasts several of Heinlein's earlier works (Double Star, Time for the Stars, Methelusah's Children and, of course, Stranger in a Strange Land) as well as Time Enough for Love to each other and to Heinlein's overall body of work to that point. While many of the opinions expressed by Mr. Slusser are not new to me, I found the overall tone of the essays so overwhelmingly negative that it was difficlut to even finish reading each chapter. Heinlein was not a great writer. His ideas were often not very well thought out and were presented in a grating manner in many of his books. All of this is true and Mr. Slusser explicates these points interminably. Unfortunately, in not a single instance does he address why Heinlein was so popular throughout his career, even as the quality of his writing continued to nosedive as he neared the end of his life. A more balanced view of the works reviewed would have made for a more enjoyable and illuminating read.