Conference noted::sf

in Glory Road, the protaganists are a fairly dumb male type (who achieves
a measure of self-improvement by the end of the book) and a very powerful
(and very female) heroine who keeps him (Oscar) from being wiped out
pretty much throghout the story.

Heinlein strikes me as not so much Male Chauvanist as (if you will)
Military/Technology Chauvanist. Perhaps this is due to his advanced years.

The impression I get is that Heinlein believes that in a male/female
relationship, someone is going to dominate.  In "Star Beast" and
"Revolt in 2100", the female has the stronger personality and/or
clearer idea of goals and means.  In "Stranger in a Strange Land",
the secretaries (including a True Witness, who should have the status
and rarity to go her own way) seem to stick to Harshaw to learn at the
master's feet; then Michael becomes the new guru.  In "Revolt...",
it is stated pretty explicitly that 2 characters, who have very similar
personalities, are in fact too similar; they are both "dominant" types
who would drive each other crazy.

Offhand, only "Rolling Stones" has characters who sometimes get what
they want and sometimes have to give in to others.  They each try to
dominate in different ways; the mother is dominant by submission (usually);
the mother-in-law is dominant by overpowering personality; the twins by
fast-talking; etc.  I wish he'd written more like this.

					John

	For classic chauvanism, see anything by E. E. "Doc" Smith.
	While Heinlein's females have their way of getting what they want,
	they achieve this through subserviance. In "Glory Road", the female
	is Empress of the galaxy or something similar, but the male lead
	does not hesitate to dominate her. The obvious chauvanism is revealed
	when the soldier-husband paddles his empress-wife.

	How can this be justified? Not only is this wife-beating, it's
	empress-beating. A capital offense? No, says Heinlein, because it
	is within the perogative of the male to abuse his spouse. Nonsense.

	There is no equality of the sexes in Heinlein - I take it as a symptom
	of his era; and read his books for the political intrigue. But never
	confuse someone who accepts violence against women as a friend to
	the feminist cause.

Actually, until Heinlein started his recent model of the women who will
jump into bed with anyone (and then insist on discussing it...) I always
thought his representation of women was pretty good and complementary.
In his book, the women are always much, much more rational then the men.
The also seem to appreciate this situation and tend to "humour" the
irrational little boys who populate their worlds. The women are usually
getting everything they want out of the situation... For example, in
2100, it takes the muscles of John Lyle and Zeb to save Judith from the
Prophets rape, but it's Judith and Magdelene that do all the planning.

Actually, 2100 is a nice example of the Heinlein that could never have
written "Friday", since Judith - and everyone else - gets very upset over
the idea of the Prophet having his way with Judith. The folk that don't 
care (and take it in stride in a manner more like his later books) are
very clearly the enemies here.

Anyway, I've always liked Heinleins women. They were always people you
could respect... None of them seemed to ever have been scarred too 
badly by the experience of being a woman in a chauvanist world.

		bob wyman

Re .3:
Have you ever read any of E.E. (Doc) Smith's Family D'Alembert series?  
There the women (of the Family, at least...) have equality with the men...
In fact, some of the women are better at what they do than the men are!

Re Heinlein:
I sort of liked "Friday".  Friday herself seemed like a woman who could
take care of herself in a rough world.  There is nothing wrong with a woman
supervised by males admiring some of the qualities of these supervisors.
The only chauvinistic thing I saw in this book was the fact that she
(and Janet, too!) kept jumping into bed with every man that happened along;
somehow I can't call that TOO chauvinistic, because I have known women like
that.  It isn't because some man forces her to bed with him, it's because
she likes to think that the act gives her some power over him, or she finds
it pleasurable.  Of course, this is only one woman's opinion (and a somewhat
naive one, too, I'm sure...).

					-- FMW --

re:.5 One cannot use the Family D'Alembert series to point out E.E. Smith's
non-chauvinism for the plain reason that Smith didn't write that series.
The first book in the series is expanded from a novelette that Smith wrote
(I have read either, so I can't really say what Smith might have said about
women in them). The rest of the books, however, are at best written from
notes that Smith left. I would say that at least 90% of the series is
Stephen Goldin. The "E.E. SMITH with Stephen Goldin" by-line has to rank up
there with the most misleading by-lines in publishing history (along with
ghost-writers posing as famous celebrities).

--- jayembee (Jerry Boyajian)

re:.6  I meant to say "I have read neither", not "either". My keyboard is
acting up on me. Sometimes it doesn't want to print "e", sometimes "c",
and now "n". ARRRRRGGGGGHHHHH!

--- jayembee (Jerry Boyajian)

I have read the original D'Alembert novelette and the books follow the
spirit of what Smith wrote.  The female characters are shown as intelligent
and capable.
					John

RE: .2

I did not pick up the impression that the paddling was wife-beating.  The poor
fellow just got frustrated that he could not mentally control her and took the
physical route.  Also, I think she could have prevented it if she wanted to,  but
I think she was pushing him to develop this self-assurance to act on something,
anything.  And he does not accept violence to women for any reason (see
Friday when Friday killed the oficer for threatening a women with a gun).

(This should be re: .3)
NOW RE: .2

He apparently seems to see neither gender as dominant but that personalities
can be, regardless of gender.

RE: sexuality

No one can say why Heinlein writes of such a sexually 'liberated' behavior,
but I do not think it makes him chauvinistic.  Perhaps preoccupied for 
whatever reasons.

Heinlein's chauvinism is definately debatable (obviously, considering the
fact of this on-going debate!).  Just to throw in some more remarks on the
digressions about E.E. Smith, however (from someone who's read everything
by Smith and as much as I could stand of Goldin's stuff).  Smith was somewhat
chauvinistic ... however I believe this was more due to the times in which
he wrote.  His female characters WERE assertive and usually intelligent,
though rarely dominant.  Even in Triplanetary (the first Lensman book) there
are several important female characters who are not treated condescendingly
or poorly.  Throughout the series, women (particularly the Kinnison and
Samms line, of course) tend to be intelligent, capable, and quite independent.
In Children of the Lens (the final book), we have the two sets of Kinnison
twins who are very definately (and explicitly) the equal of their brother
in all ways and far superior to anyone else.  In Masters of the Vortex (which
is normally ordered after Children but is in a different plot stream and
actually takes place before Children), the women characters actually take
the lead and dominant position for most of the book until Cloud finally
comes into his power towards the end -- which is also when the equal partner-
ship between he and (her name momentarly escapes me) develops.

There are a lot of poorly done women in the series -- particularly in the
early books.  I have a somewhat unfounded idea that Smith figured he could
get away with real women in his main characters (which were after all not
completely human, being the result of controlled breeding by the Arisians),
but figured he had better stick to more conventional characters outside
those lines (at least among the goodguys).  I got my wife to read Lensman
once -- she didn't even make it through Triplanetary, she thought the women
were handled so poorly.  Sigh -- looking over the events, I really can't
figure that out, so I suppose in the final analysis it's a matter of
personal taste, and how you perceive and interpret the described events.

By the way, Lensman is definately the most 'progressive' (in this sense)
of Smith's works -- if you think Lensman is chauvinistic, don't even bother
trying to get through anything else.  I happen to like Skylark a lot, but
until the final book, there's just no way of saying the treatment of the
women characters is much better than terrible -- although at that I've seen
far worse much more recently (not that that excuses it -- but he did have
to try to sell this stuff back in the 1920s and -30s!)

	/dave

	.10 - My impression of EE Doc Smith might be skewed by what I've read -
	Skylark of Valeron and Triplanetary - I haven't read more because,
	frankly, I can't choke down more of that hokum. I think there should
	be some redeeming value in a SF novel, and if you're not going to get
	your science straight then you'd better be a philosophical masterpiece,
	i.e. "Lord of Light". EE Smith is more of a "blasters and cruel aliens"
	fantasy than a serious SF work - just my opinion, mind you. And his
	treatment of women (particularly Dot) is deplorable - if forced to, I'll
	type in some examples that should prove my point.

	.9 - Well, perhaps I overstated my case, but I think that Heinlein
	often portrays his males as dominant, and his women as intellegent and
	wiley children. His males appease them, humor them, sometimes respect
	them - but they never get equal treatment. In "Glory Road" and in
	"I Will Fear No Evil", I think, his female leads are spanked like
	children when they assert themselves - and in "Stranger..." Jubal makes
	a lot of threats to do the same. That's blatant chauvanism, in my book,
	and really does no credit to Heinlein or his era.

	I've read somewhere a short treatise on Heinlein written by Spider
	Robinson - he takes the ten most frequent complaints about Heinlein,
	and tries to refute them. The complaints include Chauvanism, "He's
	too preachy", etc. If I can find the article, I'll post it here...
	it's really quite good. I think Robinson convinced me on all points
	except the chauvanism. I mean, really... John Wayne might give his
	novels a run for the money in the "Que es muy Macho?" contest.

	(that's a reference to a Saturday night live contest: Que es muy Macho?
	Who is more Macho? "Sen~or Fernando Llamas o la Sen~or Lloyd Bridges?!"

re .10 - I agree with your theories about Smith.  I do think though that
         he protrayed women well in more than the Lensman books.  In
         "Subspace Explorers" particularly, I thought the lead female
         character was on an equal level with heads of the other major
         corporations.

re .11 - Smith had a doctorate in chemistry.  He really did just "bend"
         rather than "break" physical laws, as they were known in his
         day.

					John

    Forgive my nitpicking but....
   Que' es muy macho  means What is very macho.
   Quien es mas macho means who is more macho.

   The answer to that question must be Fernando Llamas because evidently 
Lloyd Bridges is effeminate enough to warrant use of the feminine article 
la instead of the masculine el.

   As far as Heinlein being chauvanist... Sure sometimes.  Other times not.
What law is there that all characters must be perfect? Or even likeable? 
There really are chauvanosts out there in the real world.  Why can't some of 
his characters be chauvanists?  I don't particularly like this trend in his 
characters, but I've seen worse.  (Much worse.) (I've also seen worse female 
chauvanism.)  I like the stories that he tells.  If along the way his characters
do something I don't like, that's my problem. They are characters do with as he
wishes.  
   Time enough for Love has some exapmles I can think of right off the bat of
non chauvanism.  On secondus,  You will note that that the "sur-names" of the
characters are their *mothers* names.  (about damn time, I say.) (He makes the 
point that you know who the mother is but not always the father.  Considering 
that it is now 40 odd years since he wrote that and we are still(most of us)
naming our kids after the father,  I think he compares favorably with us on 
chauvanism.)  (Before you write to me telling me you named your kids after their
mother,  I'll admit there are exceptions in every age. Heinlein was one in his.
I think those who accuse him of being chauvanistic are taking his works out of
context.  You can't judge them by todays standards!  They are not contemporary 
works. (Most of them anyway)  Yet in a time when all heros were men and all the
imprtant jobs went to men and women were rarely considered competent, he had
female heads of government(One of the chairmen on Secondus), Female scientists,
(Hazel in the Rolling Stones(who by the way said she quit the business because 
she was tired of having incompetent men promoted over her!)), and competent
women (Pick just about any of his books.)  (Oh drat I lost track of the paren-
theses!!)
   My personal opinion is that he is no worse in respect than most other 
authors.  It's just that he is so good of a story teller that we wish he could
transcend the limitations of his era and his heritage to write works that are
perfact (or as close to it as possible).  Think about it.  I'm sure we are 
all aware of much wrose transgressions by other authors yet we insist on pick-
ing on Heinlein. 

More ramblings brought to you by..
   tlh

The very little of Heinlein I've read, which includes "Stranger... " and 
"Friday" seemed to be not so much chauvanistic (sp?) but simply self-conscious
about sex roles. Too much made of them. Probably not favoring one sex over the
other, but sometimes pointing it out too much. I guess this makes me suspicious
of the motives- a chauvanist trying to be non-chauvanistic? Actually, one can
hardly criticize a laudable effort to overcome one's social background. I 
recently had pointed out to me that a true alien being on Earth would assume
that men and women were two separate species, not one, and that the "English"
language would not help any with it's vague translation of "man".

Consider... If a friend tells you that "Lee Jones is going to drop by," the
first question about Lee is not whether they are tall,short,black,white,
rich,poor,Republican,Democrat,Communist, but rather is Lee man or woman?
True? The effort to rid the language and culture of chauvanizm (all kinds)
is worthy enough, but that doesn't make it very easy...

John O.

Hmmm... Tracy is right in 72.13: Maybe the reason we complain about Heinlein
is because he's so good.

You see, the guy has written the history of the future and it's a darned
believable history at that! (with a few exceptions...) But while I like
the idea of living in some of the times he describes, I don't like the
idea that the truck of sexism we've carried around for so long will still
be with us. Now, I know that because of the way I was brought up, I'll 
never be free of it. I just wish I could believe that one day we could have
the sort of world Heinlein describes, without all the suppressed, scarred
females and "macho" males running around.

One of these days I'm going to get a wife... I don't want our daughter (if
we have one) to live through what my sisters did. I wouldn't mind if they
had most of the rest of Heinlein to deal with.

		bob wyman

While there were few women in Smith's Lensman books, they were generally far
more level headed, and often more intellegent than the men were. In one of the
books, Smith explains that only men could wear the lens due to biochemical
reasons, not due to any inherent flaws in women; in fact because women such as
the Red Lensman have more inherent empathy than men, they don't need lenses.

As far as Heinlein is concerned I don't think he is chauvinistic though he is
offensive in a number of his books, such as Number of the Beast. Writing about
chauvinists dosen't make him a chauvinist, any more than writing about a 
murder makes a murder.

In EXPANDED UNIVERSE, in a story about how things could turn out well in the
future, he writes about the first black woman president. She manages to solve
all the country's problems in her six year term. Granted, I disagree with the
methoods that Heinlein thinks will work (such as returning to the gold
standard) but the point is that he has a woman doing what he thinks is what
will save the country. Realize too, that this is a story embeded in a
non-fiction essay - it illistrates how he thinks things could be put right, if
all the mistakes made in the past were corrected.

On the other hand, Heinlein clearly does not think the women need any help.
In a quote from the above mentioned article, the president says "I am a woman
. . . We women are a majority, by so many millions that in an election it would
be a landslide.  And it WILL be a landslide, on anything, any time women really
want it to be. So women don't need any favors; they just need to make up their
minds want they want - and then take it."  That doesn't sound like something
that would be written by someone who thought women were dependant on men.

Actually, in reference to .16, it wasn't true that women couldn't wear the
lens.  In fact, the lens required certain mental characteristics which
were basically very rare in women, and only slightly more common in men.
There was one "official" female lensman, and the "girls" (her children)
could not only _wear_, but _make_ lenses.

Back to .11, Smith's stories (at least Lensman) did tend to be very action
oriented.  They were the cutting edge in sophisticated science fiction at
the time, however.  You have to consider the historical perspective.
The aliens were not all evil slavering monsters (in fact, the only aliens
described that way were imaginary ones, created by the main characters
for various purposes).  Also rare at that time, it was not a humans vs.
aliens story.  There were as many aliens on "our" side as on "theirs;"
humans weren't even the driving force of our side; rather, the Arisians
were distinctly described to have far more in common (other than in
philosophy) with the Eddorians (the head baddies) than with humans.  The
badguys weren't being evil because they liked being evil and killing
people, although they did make use of characters like that (only at the
lower echelons, however, since they wouldn't trust such people any more
than we would).  They were simply acting from such different motives
that we perceived them as evil.  While many characters insisted on believing
in "absolute good" and "absolute evil" (including some of the major humans),
and that "we" were the former and the "enemy" were the latter, the Arisians
consistently argued that there is no such thing as either concept; that
the "Boskonian" civilization was simply different, and that we happened
to believe that our system was a more convenient and comfortable way of
doing things; and that since they believed that had the right and duty
to forcably convince us to adhere to their system, we had the right to
defend ourselves.  And I'm not infering that -- this is all spelled out
over and over again through the books.  Pretty sophisticated stuff for the
'20s to '50s, philosophically.

	/dave

I loved the Lensman series, and have read and reread several copies of them, 
but I despair at the notion that anyone could find them "sophisticated" as the 
last response did. Dave, you must have a very limited view of the 20's, 50's 
and philosophy. 

JimB

I'm comparing it to the typical humans vs bug-eyed monster and/or mad
scientist stories which dominated the era.  Sophisticated is a relative
term.  Smith was the groundbreaker for modern science fiction in writing,
as much as Campbell was in editing.

	/dave

Smith a GROUNDBREAKER for MODERN SF?  Can one assume your tongue has just
punctured your cheek, perhaps?

E. E. Smith was without question the archetype of space opera:  his work
blossomed along with it, and their heyday was the '30s.  Campbell is often
called the father of 'modern' SF due to his demands that authors examine
the social consequences of their postulated science along with the science
itself - a facet present barely even in passing in Smith's work, which is
in fact very much 'human vs. BEM' in character by comparison.

I find Smith enjoyable mostly due to nostalgia - and even that won't get me
through much but his LENSMAN series (later work than SKYLARK).  For what it
is, it is well done, but it's still almost embarrassingly primitive when
contrasted with the better Campbell-era stuff (not to blame Smith:  he was
after all writing about a decade earlier, in a time when a decade's advance
in the genre made a hell of a difference).

As for women, you can deplore Heinlein's chivalry (though it's hard to fault
his earlier work too much given the time it was written), but his women are
strong and competent - whereas Smith's women seemed to score a major triumph
every time they managed to act at all sensibly rather than just fade into the
background and let the male side take care of things.  Again, a difference in
times which can't fairly be blamed wholly on the author, but when we bring
both up to the present and examine them in our own context comparisons become
pretty ludicrous.
				- Bill

All "modern SF" does not write about the sociological consequences of
technology.  Some SF is almost entirely technology, with almost no
sociology (the best of these, like Hogan's Thrice Upon A Time, deal with
problem solving for and with technology, and only peripherally with
non-technical consequences).  Some modern SF is almost entirely sociology,
and has little or no technology in it -- there's a whole new crowd of
SF authors out there with almost no technical know-how at all (unlike the
old time Smith, Heinlein, Asimov, etc., who were all scientists or
engineers).  Their work is "SF" mostly because it claims to be -- it could
as easily claim to be many other things, with no relevant difference to
the work.  And, of course, a lot of "modern SF" is the same as SF -- and
all fiction -- always has been: adventures based in the particular type
of universe the reader expects, whether it be SF, Mystery, Gothic Romance,
whatever.

"Doc" Smith's stories are no different from the majority of modern SF --
they are entertaining fantasy, with no goal of including sociological value
(not that there is no such value, but it's obviously too subtle for you).

As for the claim that Lensman is "Human vs. BEM," if you think that, you
haven't read it.  Even on the surface, without looking into the meaning
and message of the stories, this claim is nonsense, for nearly all the
badguys encountered by the goodguys are human or humanoid, whereas many
goodguys (including some of the main characters' most trusted friends and
partners) are distinctly non-human.

Lensman was NOT "space opera."  In fact, Smith was (rarely subtly) making
fun of space opera (remember Kinnison's exploits as a "space opera" writer?).
The main characters firmly believed in "us" vs "them" pure good and pure
evil distinctions, while Smith and the Arisians continually tried to make
it clear that this was not at all the case.  While some badguys were "evil"
so were some goodguys, and most of the badguys were simply following their
own personal beliefs of the perfect society, which put them at deadly odds
with our heroes.  The Arisians lectured the Kinnisons at length, several
times, on the fact that Boskone was not inherently better or worse than
our Civilization, however they personally believed that our system provided
more freedom for individual expression, that this was a good, and therefore
that they must exert all due effort to ensure its continuity.  They did
not believe that the Eddorians were "evil," regardless of the fact that
the Kinnisons (until the Children) were incapable of understanding this.

Prior to this, "SF" was almost entirely "humans vs. BEMS" or "hero vs.
mad scientist."  Smith was one of the (if not _the_) first to introduce
the concept that our idea of "good" was not universal or necessarily even
right, and that the fact that someone disagrees does not make them evil,
though it may make it necessary to fight them to uphold your own belief.
It is this step out from the previous narrow-mindedness of the SF genre
to which I refer when I claim that Smith was a groundbreaker for modern
SF.  It was even a more important step than Campbell's, for with all his
emphasis on rounding out stories, Campbell was still firmly "human vs. BEMs"
and "absolute good vs absolute evil" in his outlook, with rare and minor
steps towards a middle ground.
                             

	/dave

I probably should resist getting sucked into such a useless debate, but it's
a slow night.  To address a few points strictly from memory and in no
particular order:

I would advance as a reasonable definition of 'space opera' the criterion that
it be primarily action-based in a universe whose principal distinguishing
characteristics from our own are technology-related (including organic
'technology' such as psi) rather than of the type that tends to take us into
fantasy (this distinction can sometimes be blurry).  The LENSMAN series
certainly fits such a definition to a T, and attempts to read in significant
depth in social/ethical values are pretty ludicrous.

Yes, the Arisians play a non-trivial role in the series, and yes, there is
some distinction they nominally draw between 'evil' and just 'different', but
the work as a whole clearly does not sympathize very much with said viewpoint.
Where, for example, do we see nobility, sincerity, or loyalty (none of which
are necessarily incompatible with these 'differences') in the Boskonian camp?
Rather, time and again Smith emphasizes that the 'differences' result in
across-the-board nastiness (to a degree that in fact makes the ability of the
Boskonian organization to function at all pretty unbelievable, given that it
supposedly encompasses many races whose members also are shown to react
favorably to the mechanisms/beliefs of 'civilization'):  if he isn't saying
that this is 'evil', it's a damn good substitute.

'Personal beliefs' for Boskonians?  Commitment to an ideal, however different?
Perish the thought:  we are constantly told that there is a single driving
force behind Boskone, and that it a purely selfish one - power.

If such constitutes social philosophy, it's about on the ten-year-old level
- similar to Jedi philosophy in SW, and comparably central (yeah, it's
certainly there in all its triviality, but ACTION is where both are at).

As for 'human vs. BEM', it's true that non-humans have significant roles on
the side of civilization, but they never threaten the Kinnisons' occupation
of center stage for long periods even though individually they are major
enough to be memorable.  On the other hand, finding humans above the fairly
low levels in the Boskonian hierarchy is difficult indeed:  scratch Eddore,
scratch Ploor, scratch the Eich, scratch the Overlords, scratch the Wheelmen,
(I'm sure I've overlooked some), and those you have left are fairly small
fry with fairly minor roles.  In sum, granting that exceptions exist, the
primary roles on the pro-civilization side are human (hell, Smith even had
the humans win the four-way final round in the 'who shall replace Arisia'
sweepstakes) and the primary anti-civilization roles are non-human.

'Modern' SF is another term subject to definition, of course.  From your
context, I assumed that you were trying to use it to differentiate Smith's
brand from its contemporaries and/or predecessors, since otherwise the
statement doesn't make much sense.

If you define 'modern' as 'similar to much of what is written today', Smith
certainly qualifies:  there's a great deal of space opera still being written,
though most of it is trash (it contributes more than its share to Sturgeon's
Law).  People like Hogan and Niven are in a different camp, however:  their
work centers strongly on technology rather than on action, and while the roots
of such styles certainly go back to Smith's era they certainly don't spring
from the LENSMAN series (where action reigns supreme even though technology
is definitely present).

If you want to define 'modern' in such a way as to differentiate more recent
SF from early SF, however, I don't think you'll be able to include Doc.  The
usual such definition involves mention of shedding some amount of light on
the human condition in one way or another (the type of content that tends to
lift the work out of the 'genre-specific' category), and this is where
Campbell came in.  By definition, expanding a work's breadth can blur the
distinction between 'SF' and something one might term 'future fiction' (take,
for example, Vidal's MESSIAH - a very good read with precious little science
in it that should still appeal to many SF types) - perhaps one of the reasons
for the emergence of the term 'speculative fiction' in more recent years
(though the connotations of this term may swing too far in the opposite
direction).

If you look at the work of the Big Three (Asimov, Clarke, Heinlein) over the
years, this influence is evident even if sometimes variable - while they still
retain the elements of technological speculation that place their work clearly
in the SF category.  In Smith's work, such influence is miniscule at best (one
must strain to call it anything but zero).  The LENSMAN series remains
enjoyable enough for me to re-read it every few years:  it is marvelous
escapism, but considered as literature it is content-free.  (I won't try to
make a case that A, C, & H write 'great' literature, but they DO have something
to say once in a while.)  The only thing that saves Hogan's stuff - though
somewhat different in slant - from a similar fate is that it takes place in the
sufficiently near future and is sufficiently well-grounded in current
technical knowledge that it may just offer some real insight into where
technology is going.

			- Bill

First, I agree with Bill Todd on most counts. Doc Smith is old-fashioned,  
action oriented, space opera, pure and simple. He almost defines the genre. 

Now, just to spark controversy, Smith DID provide us with about the most
scientific faster than light drive ever to grace SF. Pause and think. Know what
I mean? 



Of course, I mean the Skylark drive. Why?



If you will remember, our heroes build a space ship with a god-awful power
supply and start going. One of them asks how fast they're going. The other
replies several times the speed of light. Replies our hero, "Well, clearly his
theory was wrong, 'cause here we are going faster than light. Looks like we
need a new theory." 

There's the heart and soul of the scientific method for you. Don't argue
with observed facts, fix the theory.

JimB.

Smith's writing is the definition of space opera only if you define space
opera as "the writings of Smith."  If you want to make up your own definitions,
fine -- at least now I know what you THINK you're talking about.

The fact remains that Smith was a very non-typical author for his time
and that many of the differences are critical to the sequence from "old
SF" to "modern SF."

As for the argument about "humans vs. BEMs," the fact that humans rather
than aliens were the primary protagonists is irrelevant.  You can't
legitimately call "prejudice" just because an author uses one character
rather than another.  The books were written primarily for humans, and
almost certainly BY a human, so it makes at least as much sense to use
a human as a main character as to use an alien.  Many of the crucial secondary
characters, however, WERE aliens, and extremely non-human aliens at that.
Certainly the true leaders of Boskone were aliens.  The true leaders of
Civilization (the Arisians) were just as alien.  My point was that until
the very end, these non-human leaders took almost no active part in the
story, and the "good guys" were not actively fighting them (didn't even
know they existed, in fact).  They fought the Boskone-backed mobsters on
earth, the Boskone-backed human and humanoid "pirates," they fought Helmuth
(a humanoid who hid the Eich).  Aside from the first book, where the humans
had not yet left earth, the goodguys fighting these badguys were both human
and alien.

As for the technology/adventure argument: the primary purpose of any readable
fiction is entertainment.  In fiction, entertainment nearly ALWAYS means
action and adventure.  Whether it's space battles or Hogan's more subtle
laboratory scenes battling with data, it's still action and adventure.
SF where the adventure falls behind the technology tend to read like dry
textbooks of the author's favored notions, and are generally not very
enjoyable.  Certainly neither Hogan nor Niven fall into this trap.  Their
stories are based on action and adventure, and use technology and science
as tools to achieve them.  The fact that to us their technology may seem
more reasonable and better worked out is mostly due to the fact that Smith
was writing long ago.

Smith's books are not great literature.  They're not even great SF literature,
and I would certainly agree that Hogan and Niven (and many others) are
"better."  I was simply attempting to point out that Smith's work was important
to the evolution of SF, or at the very least represented an important milestone
in that evolution (a slightly different wording which doesn't necessarily
give him personal credit for the evolution).  It is also quite enjoyable
fiction, even now.

As for the suggestions that this argument is useless, I certainly agree,
since I already know the primary arguer isn't the sort to give up an argument
for mere logic or reason.  Oh well.  At least I tried.

	/dave

While I'd be a bit reluctant to concede Dave a monopoly on logic and reason,
I must also admit to an occasional temptation to place metaphorical thumbtacks
on his chair - just because he becomes so delightfully (and predictably)
indignant.  Does tend to make carrying on a reasonable discussion somewhat
difficult, though, so <Set Flame Off>.
						- Bill

Heinlein's latest effort just appeared in the bookstore in my town. It has
some *glowing* reviews on the jacket, some claiming that this is his best
book ever.

Has anyone plunked down the cash for this book yet?

BTW, it's called "JOB" (it has a subtitle but I forgot it...sorry).

-- Bill

Yeah, I plunked down the money (or rather, the plastic) for it, but then, it's
mostly for the collection (a first edition Heinlein, and all that). The full
title is JOB: A COMEDY OF JUSTICE, and it looks *very* strange. The price is
$16.95, but Paperback Booksmith in Harvard Square has it for 30% off. If you
are not inclined to travel all that way, I recommend a store in Marlboro that
gives 20% off on all books all the time. It's called United Book & Paper, on
Boston Post Rd. (Route 20) in the Marshall's shopping center near the Sudbury
line. I don't know if they have JOB yet, but I'm sure they'll have it soon.

--- jerry