Now, working on an English degree tends to take away most opportunities to read for pleasure, and when they do arise, you're a bit more particular (i.e. snobby) about what you'll read. Don't get me wrong, I never thought science fiction was puerile or "greasy kids' stuff"--after all, it's all text, hence valid in and of itself--it's just that I was more likely to read Thomas Pynchon or Thomas Mann in my downtime than Spider Robinson or Larry Niven.
Since I've graduated, I've been able to relax a bit and enjoy both science fiction and regular fiction, being entertained by both literary merits where I've least expected them and speculative ideas in a straight literature setting. Within the past year, I went back and reread all the Heinlein I have in my library. In general, I found it lacking something. No slight on ol' Bob--he was a great and influential science fiction writer with many amazing ideas--but, with the exception of Time Enough For Love, his utopian settings and bubbly, rational characters left me feeling a little flat.
Of course, that didn't stop me a couple of weeks ago, when I came across For Us, The Living at the Borders on Wisconsin Ave. Written in 1939 and billed as "Heinlein's first novel," it's really a parable that manages to encapsulate just about every single one of the ideas he later fleshed out in his Future History series. Set in the utopian U.S. of 2086, it takes the form of a series of often obtuse dialogues in which the peppy, well-adjusted inhabitants attempt to explain to a man from 1939 just how they got to be so peppy and well-adjusted, and their country got to be so damn swell.
Still, the book does highlight Heinlein's perceptiveness. The following passage--written in 1939, mind you--sounds like it could come from a future textbook entry detailing George W. Bush's 2004 campaign:
The churches had great political power. It was almost impossible to be elected to office if the churches disapproved. It is a matter of fact, easily checked, that every public leader of every corrupt political machine was invariably a prominent member of a large, powerful sect. He always contributed heavily to the church, especially to its charities. On the other hand every church stood publicly for honesty in government. At the same time they demanded of the government that there be suppressed all manner of acts, harmess in themselves, but offensive to the creeds of the churches. Churches and the clergy were usually willing to accept the word for the deed. Protestations of integrity, combined with tithing and psalm singing, plus a willingness to enact into law the prejudices of the churches, were usually all the churches required of a candidate.I know! It's eerie. Written 65 years ago, to boot.
Why the fuck do we still tolerate it?