89 Facts About Robert Heinlein

Robert Anson Heinlein was an American science fiction author, aeronautical engineer, and naval officer.

Robert Heinlein's published works, both fiction and non-fiction, express admiration for competence and emphasize the value of critical thinking.

Robert Heinlein's work continues to have an influence on the science-fiction genre, and on modern culture more generally.

Robert Heinlein was one of the best-selling science-fiction novelists for many decades, and he, Isaac Asimov, and Arthur C Clarke are often considered the "Big Three" of English-language science fiction authors.

Notable Robert Heinlein works include Stranger in a Strange Land, Starship Troopers and The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress.

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Robert Heinlein's work sometimes had controversial aspects, such as plural marriage in The Moon is a Harsh Mistress, militarism in Starship Troopers and technologically competent women characters that were formidable, yet often stereotypically feminine—such as Friday.

Writer of many science-fiction short stories, Heinlein was one of a group of writers who came to prominence under the editorship of John W Campbell at Astounding Science Fiction magazine, though Heinlein denied that Campbell influenced his writing to any great degree.

Robert Heinlein speculated on the influence of space travel on human cultural practices.

Robert Heinlein was named the first Science Fiction Writers Grand Master in 1974.

Robert Heinlein anticipated mechanical computer-aided design with "Drafting Dan" and described a modern version of a waterbed in his novel Beyond This Horizon.

Robert Heinlein was a sixth-generation German-American; a family tradition had it that Heinleins fought in every American war, starting with the War of Independence.

When Robert Heinlein graduated from Central High School in Kansas City in 1924, he was initially prevented from attending the United States Naval Academy at Annapolis because his older brother Rex was a student there, and regulations discouraged multiple family members from attending the academy simultaneously.

Robert Heinlein instead matriculated at Kansas City Community College and began vigorously petitioning Missouri Senator James A Reed for an appointment to the Naval Academy.

In part due to the influence of the Pendergast machine, the Naval Academy admitted him in June 1925; Robert Heinlein later said that Reed told him that he had 100 letters of recommendation, 50 for other candidates for nomination and 50 for Robert Heinlein.

Robert Heinlein ranked fifth in his class academically but with a class standing of 20th of 243 due to disciplinary demerits.

At the Philadelphia Naval Shipyard Robert Heinlein met and befriended a chemical engineer named Virginia "Ginny" Gerstenfeld.

Robert Heinlein was a chemist and rocket test engineer, and held a higher rank in the Navy than Heinlein himself.

Robert Heinlein was an accomplished college athlete, earning four letters.

Isaac Asimov believed that Robert Heinlein made a swing to the right politically at the same time he married Ginny.

In 1934, Robert Heinlein was discharged from the Navy, owing to pulmonary tuberculosis.

Robert Heinlein supported himself at several occupations, including real estate sales and silver mining, but for some years found money in short supply.

Robert Heinlein was active in Upton Sinclair's socialist End Poverty in California movement in the early 1930s.

Robert Heinlein himself ran for the California State Assembly in 1938, but was unsuccessful.

Robert Heinlein was running as a left-wing Democrat in a conservative district, and he never made it past the Democratic primary.

Robert Heinlein's first published story, "Life-Line", was printed in the August 1939 issue of Astounding Science Fiction.

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Robert Heinlein was the guest of honor at Denvention, the 1941 Worldcon, held in Denver.

Robert Heinlein published four influential short stories for The Saturday Evening Post magazine, leading off, in February 1947, with "The Green Hills of Earth".

Robert Heinlein had used topical materials throughout his juvenile series beginning in 1947, but in 1958 he interrupted work on The Heretic to write and publish a book exploring ideas of civic virtue, initially serialized as Starship Soldiers.

Robert Heinlein found another publisher, feeling himself released from the constraints of writing novels for children.

Robert Heinlein had told an interviewer that he did not want to do stories that merely added to categories defined by other works.

Robert Heinlein was the guest of honor at the Worldcon in 1976 for the third time at MidAmeriCon in Kansas City, Missouri.

At that Worldcon, Robert Heinlein hosted a blood drive and donors' reception to thank all those who had helped save lives.

In 1980, Robert Heinlein was a member of the Citizens Advisory Council on National Space Policy, chaired by Jerry Pournelle, which met at the home of SF writer Larry Niven to write space policy papers for the incoming Reagan administration.

Robert Heinlein assisted with Council contribution to the Reagan SDI spring 1983 speech.

Robert Heinlein's posthumously published nonfiction includes a selection of correspondence and notes edited into a somewhat autobiographical examination of his career, published in 1989 under the title Grumbles from the Grave by his wife, Virginia; his book on practical politics written in 1946 published as Take Back Your Government; and a travelogue of their first around-the-world tour in 1954, Tramp Royale.

Robert Heinlein's archive is housed by the Special Collections department of McHenry Library at the University of California at Santa Cruz.

Robert Heinlein published 32 novels, 59 short stories, and 16 collections during his life.

Robert Heinlein edited an anthology of other writers' SF short stories.

Robert Heinlein began his career as a writer of stories for Astounding Science Fiction magazine, which was edited by John Campbell.

Isaac Asimov said that, from the time of his first story, the science fiction world accepted that Robert Heinlein was the best science fiction writer in existence, adding that he would hold this title through his lifetime.

I'm not about to suggest that if Robert Heinlein had been able to publish [such works] openly in the pages of Astounding in 1939, SF would have gotten the future right; I would suggest that if Robert Heinlein, and his colleagues, had been able to publish adult SF in Astounding and its fellow journals, then SF might not have done such a grotesquely poor job of prefiguring something of the flavor of actually living here at the onset of 2004.

Robert Heinlein was a nudist; nudism and body taboos are frequently discussed in his work.

Over time, Robert Heinlein wrote many novels and short stories that deviated freely from the Future History on some points, while maintaining consistency in some other areas.

Novels that Robert Heinlein wrote for a young audience are commonly called "the Robert Heinlein juveniles", and they feature a mixture of adolescent and adult themes.

Robert Heinlein's protagonists are usually intelligent teenagers who have to make their way in the adult society they see around them.

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Robert Heinlein was a vocal proponent of the notion that juvenile readers were far more sophisticated and able to handle more complex or difficult themes than most people realized.

Robert Heinlein was always aware of the editorial limitations put in place by the editors of his novels and stories, and while he observed those restrictions on the surface, was often successful in introducing ideas not often seen in other authors' juvenile SF.

Robert Heinlein seems to have known from the beginning, as if instinctively, technical lessons about fiction which other writers must learn the hard way.

Later, in Expanded Universe, Robert Heinlein said that it was his intention in the novel that service could include positions outside strictly military functions such as teachers, police officers, and other government positions.

Fans of Robert Heinlein were critical of the movie, which they considered a betrayal of Robert Heinlein's philosophy, presenting the society in which the story takes place as fascist.

Robert Heinlein thought it was a bad book and asked Ed Neumeier to tell him the story because he could not read it.

From about 1961 to 1973, Robert Heinlein explored some of his most important themes, such as individualism, libertarianism, and free expression of physical and emotional love.

Robert Heinlein did not publish Stranger in a Strange Land until some time after it was written, and the themes of free love and radical individualism are prominently featured in his long-unpublished first novel, For Us, the Living: A Comedy of Customs.

Robert Heinlein stated that he was influenced by James Branch Cabell in taking this new literary direction.

Spider Robinson, a colleague, friend, and admirer of Robert Heinlein, wrote Variable Star, based on an outline and notes for a juvenile novel that Robert Heinlein prepared in 1955.

Complete collection of Robert Heinlein's published work has been published by the Robert Heinlein Prize Trust as the "Virginia Edition", after his wife.

Robert Heinlein contributed to the final draft of the script for Destination Moon and served as a technical adviser for the film.

Robert Heinlein's wife suggested that the child be raised by Martians instead of wolves.

Robert Heinlein described himself as being influenced by George Bernard Shaw, having read most of his plays.

Robert Heinlein denied, though, any direct influence of Back to Methuselah on Methuselah's Children.

Robert Heinlein's books have inspired considerable debate about the specifics, and the evolution, of Heinlein's own opinions, and have earned him both lavish praise and a degree of criticism.

Robert Heinlein has been accused of contradicting himself on various philosophical questions.

Brian Doherty cites William Patterson, saying that the best way to gain an understanding of Robert Heinlein is as a "full-service iconoclast, the unique individual who decides that things do not have to be, and won't continue, as they are".

Robert Heinlein made an unsuccessful bid for a California State Assembly seat in 1938.

Robert Heinlein called for the formation of the Patrick Henry League and spent the next several weeks writing and publishing his own polemic that lambasted "Communist-line goals concealed in idealistic-sounding nonsense" and urged Americans not to become "soft-headed".

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Robert Heinlein grew up in the era of racial segregation in the United States and wrote some of his most influential fiction at the height of the Civil Rights Movement.

Robert Heinlein explicitly made the case for using his fiction not only to predict the future but to educate his readers about the value of racial equality and the importance of racial tolerance.

Robert Heinlein repeatedly denounced racism in his nonfiction works, including numerous examples in Expanded Universe.

Robert Heinlein reveals in Starship Troopers that the novel's protagonist and narrator, Johnny Rico, the formerly disaffected scion of a wealthy family, is Filipino, actually named "Juan Rico" and speaks Tagalog in addition to English.

Robert Heinlein summed up his attitude toward people of any race in his essay "Our Noble, Essential Decency" thus:.

Robert Heinlein believed that an appropriate level of adult competence was achieved through a wide-ranging education, whether this occurred in a classroom or not.

Robert Heinlein claimed to have written Starship Troopers in response to "calls for the unilateral ending of nuclear testing by the United States".

Robert Heinlein suggests in the book that the Bugs are a good example of Communism being something that humans cannot successfully adhere to, since humans are strongly defined individuals, whereas the Bugs, being a collective, can all contribute to the whole without consideration of individual desire.

Robert Heinlein is a problematic case for feminists; on the one hand, his works often feature strong female characters and vigorous statements that women are equal to or even superior to men; but these characters and statements often reflect hopelessly stereotypical attitudes about typical female attributes.

For example, in Time Enough for Love Robert Heinlein describes a brother and sister who were mirror twins, being complementary diploids with entirely disjoint genomes, and thus not at increased risk for unfavorable gene duplication due to consanguinity.

Robert Heinlein was strongly affected by the religious philosopher P D Ouspensky.

Robert Heinlein was fascinated by the social credit movement in the 1930s.

Robert Heinlein referred to this in a number of other stories, although sometimes just saying to pay a debt back by helping others, as in one of his last works, Job, a Comedy of Justice.

Robert Heinlein was a mentor to Ray Bradbury, giving him help and quite possibly passing on the concept, made famous by the publication of a letter from him to Robert Heinlein thanking him.

In reaction to this trend, hard science fiction began to be distinguished as a separate subgenre, but paradoxically Robert Heinlein is considered a seminal figure in hard science fiction, due to his extensive knowledge of engineering and the careful scientific research demonstrated in his stories.

Robert Heinlein is often credited with bringing serious writing techniques to the genre of science fiction.

Robert Heinlein was significantly influenced by Kipling beyond this, for example quoting him in "On the Writing of Speculative Fiction".

When fellow writers, or fans, wrote Robert Heinlein asking for writing advice, he famously gave out his own list of rules for becoming a successful writer:.

Robert Heinlein later published an entire article, "On the Writing of Speculative Fiction", which included his rules, and from which the above quote is taken.

Robert Heinlein has had a pervasive influence on other science fiction writers.

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Robert Heinlein gave Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle extensive advice on a draft manuscript of The Mote in God's Eye.

Robert Heinlein was influential in making space exploration seem to the public more like a practical possibility.

Robert Heinlein has inspired many transformational figures in business and technology including Lee Felsenstein, the designer of the first mass-produced portable computer, Marc Andreessen, co-author of the first widely-used web browser, and Elon Musk, CEO of Tesla and founder of SpaceX.

Robert Heinlein was the Ghost of Honor at the 2008 World Science Fiction Convention in Denver, Colorado, which held several panels on his works; nearly seventy years earlier, he had been a Guest of Honor at the same convention.