Re: Worst Hugos Ever?

On Mar 16, 2:49 pm, Will in New Haven
<bill.re...@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
On Mar 16, 1:05 pm, "David E. Siegel" <sie...@xxxxxxx> wrote:





On Mar 14, 11:23 pm, "dwight.thi...@xxxxxxxxx"

<dwight.thi...@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
On Mar 14, 10:07 am, "David E. Siegel" <sie...@xxxxxxx> wrote:

On Mar 13, 9:25 pm, Quadibloc <jsav...@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:

On Mar 13, 7:27 am, Bill Patterson <WHPatter...@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:

On Mar 13, 5:21�am, Quadibloc <jsav...@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
On Mar 12, 8:45 pm, "David E. Siegel" <sie...@xxxxxxx> wrote:

(I suppose it is constant
with the idea that Heinlein was grossly mistaken about what was
publishable as a juvenile �in 1959).

Given the arguments, substantiated by correspondence, that Heinlein
expected the work to be accepted as a juvenile, I suppose that is the
only position left, but I find it hard to accept that so successful an
author could be so far out of touch.

If, however, Starship Troopers as we know it today is the product of
at least a few last-minute revisions to make it less like a juvenile
when it was clear that the publisher that did finally accept it would
accept it as mainstream adult fiction and not as a juvenile, then that
would explain why there are a few traces in it of its origins.
Actually, the sequence was that Walter Minton at Putnam's heard there
was a Heinlein juvenile on the market and instructed his acquiring
editor (probably Howard Cady) to get it with no other instructions and
no conditions attached.  Heinlein separated the last couple of scenes
from the juvenile version and wrote the 20,000 word OCS section to
make it "more adult" (though it looks to me more like a clarifying
exposition rather than a change of orientation of the book, but
Heinlein may have seen it as taking the gloved (of juvenile taboo)
off).  Putnam's thought even with the addition it could be released
either as a juvenile or in the adult line.  So apparently they knew
something about juvenile publishing in 1959 that I don't -- not
entirely surprising, of course.

In 1959, novels for general readership that weren't specifically
identified as "racy" or "spicy" wouldn't be... unsuitable... for
children in the sense of having four-letter words or sexual content
and the like. Heinlein's acknowledged juveniles didn't talk down to
their readers like many juveniles did, and they raised serious topics
as well. So the line between a Heinlein juvenile and a "normal" novel
of that period would be a thin one.

But, in 1959, the list of things then considered "unsitable" for
children was far longer than things containg sex or sexually
suggestive scenese or four-letter words. In particualr, books that
appered to inculcate "unaceptable " doctrines were taboo as juvenile ,
or so i understand it. Excessive violence of a graphic sort might have
been out also. (Consider, In Red Planet, merely having a character
arguing against gun registration in a frontier colony was considered
unaceptable. In The Star Beast, a reviewer for Library Journal felt
that the idea of 'divorce' for children was unaceptable, and ought to
be edited out before the book was released.)

I hadn't thought of ST as a juvenile, it didn't suggest itself to me
as one, but when the idea was mentioned, upon reflection I could admit
that it showed traces of that structure. So, since you've noted that
it *did* get some rewriting, what it was *before* that rewriting might
well have been what I would recognize as a juvenile. The gulf between
ST and a juvenile is one that could be bridged by a few tweaks here
and there, not one that would have required rewriting from beginning
to end.

And, of course, 1959 was before Political Correctness, and so some
things that would be taboo today in anything aimed even at older
children were not then.

John Savard-

In Grumbles from the Grave, the section on ST and Podkyane is headed
'The Last of the Juveniles'. I always thought of ST as fitting into
the other juveniles (such asTtunnel in the Sky, The Star Beast, etc)
in style and  structure.

-DES

Er, no, there may have been a longer list of subjects considered taboo
back then, but - trust me on this one - violence was most definitely
not on that list.  Heck, for Christmas, tots regularly demanded (and
received) the Red Ranger BB gun, machine gun look-alikes, cap pistols,
tommy-gun facsimilies, etc, up to and including a bazooka toy I
received one year on the day celebrating the birth of the Prince of
Peace.-

Which leaves rather hard to explain just why Scribners thought the
book completely unacceptable as a juvinile, and did not offer to
puiblish it as an adult novel instead. Indeed in view of the
significant profits that RAH's books had previously brought in, and
the view of the Putnam editor that ST, even with the editions (the OCS
section), would be fine as part of their juvinile line, just why did
Scribner's reject it so firmly and with so little discussion? AFAIK
this has bever been well explained.

They had an option on the _juveniles_ Once they rejected SsT as a
juvenile, he was a free agent. I don't know if any of their other
editors tried to get the rights to it but they wouldn't have had any
more right to it than any other publisher and I imagine that they
would lose in any close decision.

--
Will in New Haven

"It is criminal to teach a man not to defend himself when he is the
constant victim of brutal attacks. It is legal and lawful to own a
shotgun or a rifle. We believe in obeying the law."
-Malcolm X, March 12, 1964- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -

Option in this case only meant first-look; Heinlein was obligated to
submit first to them. I haven't closely read any of the Scribner's
contracts, but in point of fact, Heinlein did write other, "adult"
books during the time the option string was running at Scribner's and
did offer them to other publishers without offering them first to
Scribner's. so I infer that there must have been some way in the
option language that differentiated juveniles from non-juvenile
books. Might not have been "tight" language, though. . . just good
enough that both Heinlein and Miss Dalgliesh knew (up to a point at
least) what was intended.
.

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