Dr. Stover also maintained that Leslyn was so unhappy with enforced “wife swapping” and nudism that she took to drink. This is not an altogether credible conclusion, given that her alcoholism emerged during the war years, thirteen or fourteen years later, but since such a conclusion, if factually grounded at all, could only have been based on input from Cal Laning, together with the complete volte-face of Leslyn’s attitude toward Robert after their divorce (suggesting that she may have been accommodating herself to expected behaviors rather than engaging in behaviors she desired for herself), it is not unreasonable to conclude that Leslyn may have been less happy with the pattern of the marriage than Robert was (an unfortunately not-uncommon pattern).
There is no evidence one way or another, so it is impossible to say whether Leslyn simply never intended to have what we now call an “open” marriage or whether she did but found it less to her taste once in the lifestyle and either did try to communicate this to Robert, without success, or did not make the attempt but kept it bottled up—a pattern she did manifest (among others) during the crisis period immediately before the divorce in 1947.
The psychological stresses of the war years, the falling off of her central role in achieving and maintaining Robert’s prominence as a writer, and a possible dissatisfaction with the lifestyle of their marriage may all have contributed to the unhappy person Leslyn (Heinlein) Mocabee was to become.
Virginia Heinlein, IM with author, 05/28/2000.
Heinlein struggled with this insight for many years, until he reached a satisfactory articulation with Stranger in a Strange Land in 1961. His explanatory letters to his agent, Lurton Blassingame (10/21/60), and his editor, Howard Cady (04/09/61), suggest these themes had been in his mind for a very long time—and in fact, the first attempt to articulate them may well have been in For Us, the Living.
RAH, letter to Ralph Gould, 11/17/73.
RAH, letter to L. Sprague de Camp, 10/26/52.
RAH, letter to George Warren, 07/25/83.
Jack Woodford, Trial and Error: A Dithyramb on the Subject of Writing and Selling , rev. ed. (1933; repr., New York: Carlyle House, 1938), 327–28.
18. And the Next (pages 224–235)
The Works Progress Administration, or WPA (in 1939 renamed Works Projects Administration), was a New Deal program that provided employment in the middle of the Great Depression by underwriting socially useful work. In addition to construction projects, the WPA had a program that employed writers and artists to create comprehensive guides to each state. California’s was edited by noted science-fiction writer Mildred Clingerman. In the case of the art classes Heinlein refers to, the WPA probably employed artists to teach beginners’ classes.
Leon Stover, on what evidence is not known, claimed that Heinlein’s first novel, For Us, the Living, was written in 1937 as part of a WPA writer’s project; however, the timing and circumstances of the writing of the book do not support this claim.
RAH, letter addressed to “Red [Rex], Kathleen, Tish, Karen, Lynnie, Charcoal, et Cie,” 10/09/54.
RAH, letter to Bjo Trimble, 11/21/61.
RAH, letter to Poul Anderson, 10/02/61.
Pronounced Kah-SHIB-skee.
For this and the following remarks, see Heinlein’s 1941 speech “The Discovery of the Future,” printed in Requiem, ed. Yoji Kondo.
Curiously, Heinlein never made specific reference to Manhood of Humanity, though he must have read it in order to be knowledgeable about time binding.
Again, see “The Discovery of the Future.” In this speech, Heinlein attempted to convey what he found important and exciting about Korzybski’s General Semantics.
Robert Heinlein’s Application for the Los Angeles General Semantics Seminar held on June 2–4, 1939.
Leslyn Heinlein’s Application for the Los Angeles General Semantics Seminar held on June 2–4, 1939.
On Leslyn’s Application for the 1939 Los Angeles General Semantics Seminar, she had started the book and was reading it “slowly.” A year later, on her application for the 1940 seminar in Chicago, she had “partially” read Science and Sanity.
See, for example, RAH’s letter to Daniel F. Galouye, 02/05/69.
Leon Stover, on what evidence is not known, insisted in Before the Writing Began that Leslyn had acted unofficially as a story doctor at Columbia Pictures before her marriage, though how that might have worked in practice is not clear. The information may have come from Cal Laning; Columbia’s business records from that period give no hint that might help to interpret this claim; nor is she credited or acknowledged in any of the surviving industry directories of the period consulted at the Beverly Hills Public Library.
RAH, letter to John W. Campbell, Jr., 12/21/41.
Leslyn (Heinlein) Mocabee, letter to Frederik Pohl, 05/08/53.
All these story ideas are taken from the “Story Notes” file in the RAH Archive, UCSC.
Heinlein did write a tongue-in-cheek stream-of-consciousness sample of his creative process, published in a condensed form in Harry Warner, Jr.’s fanzine, Spaceways, in 1941, as “How to Write a Story.” The article was reprinted in its longer manuscript form in the Robert A. Heinlein Centennial Souvenir Book, July 7, 2007, and is included in the nonfiction volumes of the Virginia Edition.
There is no direct evidence on Leslyn’s reaction to “Life-Line.” From passing remarks later it is clear that Leslyn saw and approved the story; there is no suggestion of an unusual procedure for this first short effort, so I have assumed that the working relationship he talked about later held for this one, too.
It is very likely that direct remarks were made in Heinlein’s contemporaneous correspondence—but virtually all of his papers relating to this period of his life were burned in 1947, when he was clearing out his possessions at the time of the divorce from Leslyn.
Heinlein later told both Sam Moskowitz and Leon Stover that he had submitted “Life-Line” to Collier’s, but the documentary evidence contains no confirmation of this, and the timing makes it unlikely in any case; the cover letter submitting the story to Campbell was dated April 10, less than a week after it was finalized, and the story was accepted by Astounding on April 19, 1939. The most likely conclusion is that Heinlein was confusing this story with other early stories he did, on the evidence of the documentation, submit to Collier’s, possibly “‘My Object All Sublime.’”
Virginia Heinlein, letter to author, 05/31/99.
RAH, letter to John W. Campbell, Jr., 01/17/42.
There are two versions of this story. The basic version, given as “how long has this wonderful racket been going on,” is given by James Gifford in Robert A. Heinlein: A Reader’s Companion, (Citrus Heights, Calif.: Nitrosyncretic Press, 2000), 111, possibly referring to one of Heinlein’s recountings in the Xignals interview (in the December 1985–January 1986 issue). Virginia Heinlein, in conversation with the author in 2001, added the second part.
“If This Goes On—” file, RAH Archive, UCSC. The drafts are dated May 12, 1939.
RAH, letter to Gorham Munson, 05/24/39.
There are no surviving drafts for this story, offered as “Prometheus ‘Carries the Torch’” and then as “‘Let There Be Light,’” in Heinlein’s archived files. The story development sketched here is implied by the published story figures and their relationship to story devices common in science-fiction magazines of the 1930s.
RAH’s Accession Notes dated 04/02/67 for Opus 4, “‘Let There Be Light’” (“Prometheus ‘Carries the Torch’”).
John W. Campbell, Jr., letter to RAH, 05/16/39, in the Opus 5 manuscript file for “Misfit” in the RAH Archive, UCSC. In his Accession Notes, Heinlein misremembers the date as May 20, 1939.
RAH, letter to John W. Campbell, Jr., 05/21/39.
RAH, letter to Gorham Munson, 05/24/39.
See the marked-up first submission draft in the Opus 5 manuscript file for “Misfit” in the RAH Archive, UCSC.
See RAH’s letter to Frederik Pohl, 10/23/40.
RA
H, letter to Frederik Pohl, 11/01/40.
Miles J. Breuer, Astounding (May 1930).
John W. Campbell, Jr., to RAH, 05/31/39. Marvel was a new science-fiction pulp with a reputation for sexual titillation that classed it (perhaps not entirely fairly) as one of the sex-and-sadism “shudder pulps.”
And indeed the character of Mary Lou Martin is extraordinary in the context of its times. In this very early story, Heinlein built up a portrait of a couple with one character trying to enforce codependency while the other tries to move the relationship to a level of greater intimacy. Codependency would not become a feminist issue for another thirty-five years, but Heinlein has, without the guidance of theory, performed the task we rely on art fiction for: turning raw, personal observation into illuminating fictional characters.
19. Not Quite Done with Politics (pages 236–251)
This description is taken from Heinlein’s Guest-of-Honor Speech at the 1941 World Science Fiction Convention (“Denvention”), published as “Discovery of the Future” in Requiem, ed. Yoji Kondo, 166.
James Gifford points to the resemblance of the names of Cleve Cartmill and Cleve Carter in Robert A. Heinlein: A Reader’s Companion, 132. He also speculates that “Carter” might also refer to Austin Carter, Heinlein’s ringer in Anthony Boucher’s mystery Rocket to the Morgue—but that mystery was not written until two years later (and not published until three years later).
William Sloane, letter to RAH, 06/20/39.
Heinlein said this and expressed related sentiments often in his early letters to Campbell, but see, for example, Heinlein’s letter to Campbell dated 08/29/39.
Ackerman’s recollections of his first meeting with Heinlein were recorded in a taped interview of Forrest J. Ackerman by Robert James, Ph.D., on June 7, 2000. Dr. James kindly provided a transcription of his interview.
However, Heinlein’s own recollection, in his 10/25/73 letter to LASFS congratulating them on their new clubhouse, was, “I joined December 1938 or possibly January 1939,” and in various letters he pegs it to 1939 (letter to Bjo Trimble, 03/08/62) and “spring 1939” (Virginia Heinlein letter to Leon Stover, 11/04/85, relaying a note written by Heinlein).
In response to some random gossip that Heinlein had wanted to become a Jesuit, Virginia Heinlein remarked: “One of his [Robert’s] favorite expressions, which I don’t believe you heard, was ‘Become a monkey in a monstrosity [monastery?].’” Virginia Heinlein, letter to Leon Stover, 05/01/89. Speaking of Rosicrucianism, The Watchtower Society, and “the more ordinary religions,” Heinlein told John Campbell, “They all look wacky to me and I avoid them.” RAH, letter to John W. Campbell, Jr., 09/27/40; consider also the emotional tone of Heinlein’s discussion of religious faith in his letter to Howard Cady, his editor for Stranger in a Strange Land, dated 04/09/61. Jubal Harshaw’s almost visceral disgust for formal religions may well be an exaggeration for fictional purposes of Heinlein’s own private attitudes.
RAH, letter to John W. Campbell, Jr., 01/20/42.
RAH, letter to John W. Campbell, Jr., 01/20/42.
RAH, letter to John W. Campbell, Jr., undated but between 12/06/39 and 12/14/39.
RAH, letter to Gorham Munson, 08/02/39.
RAH, letter to M. Isip (by way of John Campbell), 08/03/39.
In a letter dated 07/23/60 to Willy Ley, Heinlein says only that he got the idea from Sinclair Lewis. No discussion of writing methods was found in Lewis’s books of the period, but very few of his articles for periodicals have been collected. A major radio interview in 1935 is mentioned in Mark Shorer’s magisterial biography of Lewis, in which Lewis is said to have discussed his working methods, and this radio interview may be the source. Research has not yet turned up a copy or transcription of the interview.
In the navigation-chart version of the Future History, all the entries are handwritten; another (slightly later) version of the chart in the RAH Archive, UCSC, is on the back of a cardboard campaign poster; the version sent to John Campbell for publication in 1941 was adapted from the later version.
The manuscript was not submitted until December 1939, when it was sent first to John Campbell.
John W. Campbell, Jr., letter to RAH, 08/25/39.
RAH, letter to John W. Campbell, Jr., 08/29/39.
John W. Campbell, Jr., wrote a letter to RAH, dated 08/31/39; the letter does not specifically mention the sale of “Requiem” but does encourage him to work in longer lengths; nevertheless, Heinlein’s contemporaneous records on the archived envelope in which the manuscript materials for the story are stored show that as the date on which “Requiem” was purchased by Street & Smith; the letter formally accepting the story as an experiment for Astounding’s readers is dated 09/11/39.
John W. Campbell, Jr., letter to RAH, 08/31/39.
Memorandum in “Wartime” file, RAH personal papers, RAH Archive, UCSC. It should be noted that the current Archivist has undertaken a project of reorganizing the papers, and it is not possible to predict where the document will be finally placed.
RAH, letter to John W. Campbell, Jr., 09/07/39.
This anecdote is fleshed out from a brief recounting of the incident in a letter from Virginia Heinlein to Leon Stover, dated 04/19/89, concluding: “Leslyn was furious about it, and managed to make Robert furious, too.” Since this is an event that happened before Virginia Gerstenfeld knew the Heinleins directly, the description can only have come from with Heinlein himself (or another family member—Virginia Heinlein may have been told the incident in 1949 when she helped negotiate a reconciliation of the brothers—a story that will be told in its context); there are a few, scant additional details in casual mentions of the incident by Heinlein in other correspondence.
This incident is told by Virginia Heinlein, taped interviews by the author, Second Series, Tape B, Side A; see also Virginia Heinlein, letter to Leon Stover, 04/19/89.
RAH, letter to John and Doña Campbell, 01/17/42.
This letter was not preserved in Heinlein’s correspondence; we know of it only because Heinlein mentioned it in a letter to Asimov in 1984, telling him he was essentially a godfather to Job: A Comedy of Justice because of that letter.
The full text of the Initiative may be found at http://holmes.uchastings.edu/cgi-bin/starfinder/9212/calprop.txt . No print version of the text was located.
Mentioned in RAH’s letter to John W. Campbell, Jr., 12/21/41; the letter from Governor Olson has not been preserved in Heinlein’s files and may have been destroyed in 1947.
RAH, letter to John W. Campbell, Jr., 10/16/39.
RAH, letter to John W. Campbell, Jr., 12/21/41.
Application for Social Security Card dated 10/24/39 in RAH Archive, UCSC.
RAH, letter to John W. Campbell, Jr., 10/16/39.
The information is archived online at http://holmes.uchastings.edu/cgi-bin/starfinder/9212/calprop.txt, “Abbreviated Listing, Record 344.”
Pages of “Lost Legacy” at its “Fire Over Shasta” stage with the election of the young progressive President are preserved in the RAH Archive, UCSC, “Lost Legacy” manuscript file; it is impossible to say whether the entire story was written, or just this ending, as Heinlein occasionally did write (as well as plan) the beginning and end of a story.
RAH, letter to Frederik Pohl, 10/23/40; these stories stayed in circulation for quite some time and were even offered a second time to John W. Campbell, Jr.; the October 1940 submission to Pohl, however, carries the strongest summaries of the marketing history of these still-unsold stories.
Frederik Pohl, letter to RAH, 11/15/39.
RAH, letter to Frederik Pohl, 11/28/39.
RAH, letter to John W. Campbell, Jr., undated but between 12/07/39 and 12/14/39.
John W. Campbell, Jr., letter to RAH, 12/06/39.
RAH, letter to John W. Campbell, Jr., 12/18/39.
Leslyn Heinlein, letter to John W. Campbell, Jr., 01/27/41. They are discussing Heinlein’s reactions to a proposed edit of “Solution Unsatisfactory,” which he likened to Campbell’
s end-edit of “Requiem.” When Heinlein was writing, Leslyn often wrote business letters for him.
RAH, letter to John W. Campbell, Jr., 02/07/41.
RAH, letter to John W. Campbell, Jr., 09/06/41.
Heinlein made these observations in several places, but see RAH’s letter to Lloyd Biggle, 09/30/76.
Woodford, Trial and Error, 1938, 328.
Robert A. Heinlein: In Dialogue With His Century Page 70