Canonize This: Why We Should All Read Heinlein
...Heinlein was born. He would go on to write science fiction. He would win an unprecedented four Hugo awards, for Double Star, Starship Troopers, Stranger in a Strange Land, and The Moon is a Harsh Mistress. He would also win the first ever Grandmaster of Science Fiction Nebula Award, even though he never won a regular Nebula.
But why canonize him, with people like Thoreau and Frost? Should Robert Heinlein's work be considered part of American Literature? The answer is yes it should. Of course this begs the question "What is literature?" but I'm going to avoid it simply try to show why Heinlein's writing is literature.
Heinlein's writing, or at least some of it is worthy of the moniker literature for numerous reasons. When Stranger in a Strange Land hit the shelves in 1961 it met critical praise and massive fan support. This is due to the coming social upheaval of the time, and the ideas in the book, especially the idea of the leader of the free world running the government on advice from his wife's astrologer. The book now exists in a nearly unique situation; it is in print in two different versions. The original version can be bought new today, and the newer "uncut" version can be too. The "uncut" version is significant since it nearly doubles the size of the original. This all I'm going to mention about his most famous work because it is unique for Heinlein, he never wrote anything else like it and it doesn't fit into any of his "universes" (They are "Future History" and "World-as-myth").
The most significant of his early works is Starship Troopers. It came out post World War II and is bleak vision of the ultimate military nation told along with the coming of age story of Juan "Johnnie" Rico. In Johnnie's world only veterans can vote, and this, along with peer pressure, is what drives him to join up. But more important than Johnnie's...
View Full Essay
