For amusement purposes only. Moderator of !13thFloor@kbin.social
Main account: @arotrios@kbin.social.
Mission: seek out and find the creative and brilliant across the Fediverse.
Your question intrigued me, so I had to go and take a look. It looks like Heinlein isn’t published in many anthologies, possibly because he was an editor of one himself (according to Wikipedia):
The science fiction writer Robert A. Heinlein (1907–1988) was productive during a writing career that spanned the last 49 years of his life; the Robert A. Heinlein bibliography includes 32 novels, 59 short stories and 16 collections published during his life. Four films, two TV series, several episodes of a radio series, at least two songs (‘Hijack’ by Jefferson Starship and ‘Cool Green Hills of Earth’ on the 1970 album Ready to Ride and as the b-side of a single by Southwind) and a board game derive more or less directly from his work. He wrote a screenplay for one of the films. Heinlein edited an anthology of other writers’ science fiction short stories.
He also fell out of favor in the 80s to large extent:
After a seven-year hiatus brought on by poor health, Heinlein produced five new novels in the period from 1980 (The Number of the Beast) to 1987 (To Sail Beyond the Sunset). These books have a thread of common characters and time and place. They most explicitly communicated Heinlein’s philosophies and beliefs, and many long, didactic passages of dialog and exposition deal with government, sex, and religion. These novels are controversial among his readers and one critic, David Langford, has written about them very negatively. Heinlein’s four Hugo awards were all for books written before this period.
I think that all of these factors combined to his exclusion in Dozio’s anthologies. By that time, Heinlein was already considered one of the three holy men of the Golden Age of Sci-Fi (Clarke and Asimov being the other two), so I’m not surprised he didn’t make it into these volumes, which were focused on the new talent of the time.
@jerzydyd@mastodon.social - I felt the same - I couldn’t put them down as a kid. It’s definitely got some 70s era prejudice in how it was written, and in the strict cultural divisions based on race and religion that it portrays, but I never felt that it was overtly or deliberately racist - rather the author portraying a barbaric world ruled by gods who were very close at hand and fiercely protective of their people. I still get chills remembering the god Mara wailing in the ruins for the slaughtered Maragor.
That’s one of the reasons I posted the source material as available (free) downloads as well - Day has come under criticism before by Tolkien scholars. I personally found most of his mistakes and liberties in this work to be minor, but I’m not a Tolkien scholar. Nonetheless, the work has a unique artistic touch that regardless of its accuracy, brings the novels to life in a way that surpasses later catalogues, and it was responsible for getting young readers of my generation interested in reading them.
I’ve always dug it because it was one of the first explorations of a successful invasion from another species, and it was an excellent scifi deconstruction of colonialism, one that was groundbreaking for the time it was written (right before WWII).
A happy synchronicity - had no idea that had been posted, but off to upvote @MC_Lovecraft@lemm.ee.
If you need it in other formats, this link has a great selection of free alternatives - you can filter by your preferred file format. There’s a azw3 version here that should work with Kindle.
Another great one - here’s a link to get a free .pdf copy if you’re looking to add to your library:
https://annas-archive.org/md5/ae962cb11c50e00ecdc2b50d2d813b54
I agree, Still Life is the stronger novel. I usually choose Cowgirls as the work of his to to introduce new readers to, as it’s more accessible and lighthearted, but Still Life is where Robbins really shows his chops.
Here’s a link to a free copy (.pdf download) from Anna’s if you’re looking for one: https://annas-archive.org/md5/85333852ce8e0b37dc4918f59cfb5bb1
I agree. I’m probably gonna post this to the !13thFloor@kbin.social with more of a synopsis another night, but here’s an early screening for you.
Wut?
The internet archive lit the fire, or whomever posted the video collection did. I just found the smoke, and invited y’all around the campfire. There’s no need get snippy, Zorak.
No.
Shhhhh… the corpodrones will hear you. They haven’t relinquished the copyright - they’ve been hunting Space Ghost to extinction everywhere on the internet.
Seriously though, licensing and an aggressive anti-piracy campaign have pretty much wiped Space Ghost from most places online, and the daft motherfucker is a cultural icon. So it sure sure is great that the Internet Archive, knowing it’s days were numbered, absolutely doesn’t have a full download link for all the episodes in the lower right hand panel so you glorious bastards can do what you do best and make sure it doesn’t get locked away behind a corporate paywall or vault for the next 30 years… because that would be illegal and wrong and cost a couple of pennies to the assholes who have every writer in Hollywood out on the street striking.
In fact, I’d say recent developments towards the centralization, sterilization and capitalization of our culture have become so extreme that subversive action is not just justified, but inevitable at this point.
In other words, surf’s up, mateys! Time to ride the waves and sail the high seas again… Space Ghost needs our help!
Sorry - these are all table top games.