Robert Heinlein

Robert A. Heinlein seemed like a natural for induction into the Alliterates. With a career spanning most of the twentieth century, his reputation as a master of the science fiction form remains undisputed and nearly unparalleled. So, it was with high hopes that the Alliterates Nomination & Induction Committee took the cross-town bus to the library to peruse the prospective nominee’s works.

Heinlein’s reputation as an original mind, though, turned out to be greatly exaggerated. Many of his ideas about space travel seem to have been cribbed directly from NASA scientific manuals. Most readers expect more originality from a Grandmaster of SF! Where are the lightsabers? The Wookiees? The Millenium Falcons? The Jar Jars?

He did a bad job of adapting Starship Troopers into novel form, as well. The book is filled with political and philosophical ranting and entirely missed the essential bug-hunt element of the SFX-filled movie. And why would anyone need power armor to fight giant insects? He should have stuck with what was in the film.

His adaptation of The Puppet Masters proved equally weak and highlights Heinlein’s other ongoing weakness; there’s just no delicate way to put this—the man is a pervert. Why, his characters spend the whole last part of The Puppet Masters novelization running around naked! Where’s the need for that? Good thing he didn’t do the novelization for Star Wars!

Likewise, there’s a surplus of stripping, nudity, profanity, and just plain shagging in Heinlein’s supposed “masterpiece,” Stranger In A Strange Land. Good thing they didn’t do a movie of that! And let’s not even get into the male/female brain/body switching stuff going on in I Will Fear No Evil. The man is clearly shameless and sex obsessed!

Sure, his “juvenile” work is fairly harmless (even with the NASA advertising stuff)—but the rest . . . ?!

The nomination committee suggests that “master” Heinlein undergo several years of intense therapy before being allowed to fraternize with other human beings—never mind raising a glass with such an illustrious group as the Alliterates.