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Theodore Sturgeon had a similar
approach (he called it "asking
Throughout Heinlein's the next question"). Sturgeon
life, questioning taboos got to incest first: "If All Men
(asking "Why not?") was Were Brothers, Would You Let One
one of his standard Marry Your Sister?"
approaches to problems,
in his later (and _Time Enough for Love_
unfortunately lesser) (cf. "Da Capo", the
novels he started concluding
attacking sexual taboos, time-travel/incest
including incest. fantasy).
One of the reason these
things seem like such weak
novels to me is that there's
no recognition that such
social experiments can fail.
Heinlein heroes often seem
to be perfect entities who are
almost always in charge of
their emotions, are never
unreasonably jealous...
However, in _To Sail Beyond
the Sunset_, we're shown the
other side of these things.
Maureen's open relationship
leads to a divorce. Her husband decides
he prefers the
Living in a family where younger woman in Or... at least
recreational incest is the the menage et trios. that's the way
norm leads to a jealous Maureen seems
rivalry between two of her to see it.
sons fighting for the
attentions of a daughter. A close reading
suggests that
Brian (her
Maureen is left with at least husband) has
some doubt about how she's some reason on
lived... his side:
In effect
Writing your own rules Brian is a man
for living is diving off with two
into an unknown sea where wives, one of
you may win big or lose which is past
horribly. child-bearing
age.
Heinlein, at last, seems
to be dealing with the It must seem very
real issue. Of all the awkward, if not
later works, this one dangerous, for the
seems the strongest. woman he's not
legally married to
Usually Heinlein's heroes to be bearing his
have to contend with children, living
Mrs. Grundy's of the in the United
world, but here they also States around the
have to deal with the turn-of-the-
flaws within themselves. century.
STRANGER
It's the difference Note, Maureen
between writing a novel mentions in
and an advertisement. passing that
neither of the
other two
Had Heinlein lived a little longer, expected her
maybe he could've gotten beyond the to move out:
level of softcore sexual fantasy,
and gotten back to the sort of In other words, in
thing he could do best: Brian's mind, this
was just a change
Imagination tempered by realism. in legal
technicalities.
If Maureen doesn't
see it that way,
maybe Brian just did
an astoundingly bad
job of explaining
the idea --
Or maybe Maureen
has done a bad job
of representing
his side.
Heinlein is not
usually given
credit for being
capable of
subtlety,
but here's a clear
counter-example.
A better might be
Algis Budry's
reading of the
end of "The Moon
is a Harsh
Mistress".
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