Podkayne of Mars by Robert Heinlein

Nowhere in the book is it
suggested that Podkayne
dresses like this.

I regret that the mighty Heinlein has struck out. So far I have greatly enjoyed every Heinlein book I’ve read until this one. With Podkayne of Mars (1963), Heinlein breaks many other patterns as well. The hero, Podkayne, is a girl. She is not in the military or in training for that. The book involves a political intrigue that Podkayne is only tangentially connected to. I have to admit, though, that by the end of the book, I liked it. I had to put aside my “modern” womanist values and be patient (book is quite slow up until the last 50 pages) in order to see the charm of this book.

Podkayne is 16 years old and is from Mars, though of Swedish/Maori descent (!). Her life on Mars is pretty tame, livened up by a bratty genius brother. At the beginning of the book she is committed to becoming a space explorer, piloting her own ship out into the universe. In the course of the book, however, she “grows up” and realizes that maybe she could just be a crew member on a ship…piloted by her husband…at least until she devotes herself to motherhood. In the crisis that develops in the plot, it is the genius brother who saves the day and in fact he takes over the first person narrative that has been in Podkayne’s words all along. Podkayne’s voice is taken away. The old Podkayne is pretty much burned to a crisp…she didn’t follow her brother’s orders.

These harsh lessons are learned as Podkayne goes on her first interplanetary journey. She is supposed to go from Mars to Venus to Earth. She doesn’t make it to Earth, so I don’t know why it was even in the book. The plot self-aborts on Venus. There is some cool science in the book, like how to plan an interplanetary journey given the various orbits and rates of rotation of the various space bodies. There’s also a somewhat obligatory sequence of everyone in the space ship cooped up in a radiation shelter during a solar flare event. I’m glad Heinlein allowed for the existence of solar flares, but the main lesson that Podkayne learned was that taking care of babies in space would be more fun than being a pilot.

The lengthy diaper-changing-in-space sequence was somewhat preposterous, especially given the careful science with which Heinlein treats space travel. No mention of feces and urine flying free in the low-grav environment or of the diapers themselves floating off en masse. There is mention of baby vomit spheres floating around but other rules of gravity seemed to cover poop and pee. Burping the babies was not discussed. This part of the book makes me value more highly than ever the invention of Velcro--you could really nail those babies down with Velcro.

I was shocked by the unbridled sexualness
of almost every image that came up for the
search "girls in space."

Podkayne is a typical 1960s teenage girl, a bit vain, worried about clothes and boys. Her science-orientation sets her apart until her conversion to traditional womanhood later in the book. It is the broadening effect of traveling to other planets that helps her see the error of her ways. Her mother, a famous engineer responsible for the terraforming of whole moons and the establishment of civilizations thereupon is criticized in the end for not spending enough time with her children…her neglect is seen as responsible for Podkayne’s insufficient attachment to infants.



Heinlein went with the cannister
model of spaceship



I am not upset with this book. It is just funny now and majorly out of date, as it should be 50 years later. I had more trouble with its slow pace. A hundred pages of roaming around a space ship preceded the 40 or so where the plot actually happened. The word “dithering” comes to mind.

 Hei

I’m sure Heinlein faced some pressure to write a girl’s book. This book, though, seems high-jacked in the middle, veering into a different book altogether. I would love to know the story of the writing of this book.

Sci-fi and the Status Quo


I did not add the circle. Later in the series
Troi's hemlines dropped, but then her
neckline also did.



Science fiction almost always reinforces the status quo, even as it claims to go beyond any known world. Traditional (antiquated) sex roles almost always prevail, even in the most up-to-date sci-fi with the most liberal values--I’m thinking of Counselor Troi’s wardrobe from Star Trek Next Gen.

The 21^st century Battlestar Galactica finally pushed back on these stereotypes and it broke open all sorts of amazing possibilities. The crucial moment was the decision to cast ace pilot Starbuck as a woman. But generally, women are passive nurturers in science fiction--the same role they are cast in in most portrayals in film, TV, and literature. Being a female sci-fi fan is a hard road to travel.



Starbuck



Another thing I appreciated about Battlestar Galactica was that they didn’t focus on an “alien creature of the week.” There were no Klingons or Vulcans. Because, you know, if there are other sentient life forms out there in space, they are not at all likely to be close together. We probably won’t encounter them in any near-earth neighborhood. Battlestar Galactica saw space as bleak and empty, hostile to life. (And, of course, there are amazing implausibilities in Battlestar Galactica--I simply choose to ignore them in this blog post.)

Images of Women in Science Fiction
 Princess Leia
 Katniss
 Nurse Chapel
Hermione--regular, prom
 Linda Hamilton from Terminator
 President Rosslyn of Battlestar Gallactica
 Tasha Yar of Star Trek NexGen
Starship Troopers, another Heinlein title

Starship Troopers, by Robert A. Heinlein

Here you see the full-body
suit and the spider
creatures.

Heinlein strikes again with a compelling first-person narration of the training and maturation of a space warrior. Starship Troopers (1959) tells the story of Johnnie Rico, who enlists in the military on a whim. In this world, only veterans of the military who serve two years or more can become full citizens with the right to vote, but that isn't Johnnie's prime motivation. He just goes along with a friend and then gets caught up in it.

As Johnnie moves through his basic training and then begins service in the mobile infantry (ground fighters who are transported by spaceship), he gains a deeper and deeper understanding of the the role of a warrior and finds that he is maturing into one. I liked Johnnie. I felt like I knew him.

The main enemy Johnnie is fighting is a spidery creature with an ant-like social organization. The infantry drops from the spaceship in multi-layered spheres. As they fall through the atmosphere, layers burn off one by one until finally there is a parachute and then free fall. Each soldier is encased in a huge armored fighting suit that allows him (they are all hims) to jump or bounce, so the final drop to the ground is cushioned by a firing of the bounce thruster--you hit the ground moving. The suit is fitted to the soldier and enhances all of his senses and physical prowess. Pretty cool.

In the movie, the full body armored suit
gives way to mere physique. The spider
is highly exaggerated.

Heinlein really is the master of first-person narration. The style is conversational and self-disclosing, like reading someone's journal or letters home or hearing them tell their story around a campfire or something. I was hooked almost immediately. The book opens with a scene of action and then flashes back to Johnnie's enlistment. The opening action made me eager to read on and find out how this character came to be in this predicament. So, within a few paragraphs, I knew I would finish this book and, truly, I could hardly put it down.

Now, I know I am a science fiction geek, but nothing in the description of Starship Troopers would indicate that I would particularly like it. Indeed, much science fiction writing is bad, bad, bad. But I've loved every Heinlein book I've read (see earlier posts). I attribute to this to Heinlein's terrific writing.

Heinlein justifies restricting the vote to military veterans by citing their willingness to put the needs of the many above their own needs. That places them above the regular everyday Joe. They also have a fantastic desire for survival--after all, dead soldiers don't vote. In the context of this book, that made some sense. Other of Heinlein's ideas for successful government were harder to swallow. He really does think that most people should not vote, for example. I skimmed through most of those sections of the book. However, you can see the author's ideas moving toward Stranger in a Strange Land. Interesting.

I have one more Heinlein book coming in through inter-library loan. I can't wait to get it. Another boost and cheerlead for Robert A. Heinlein.

Someone is grimacing in
almost every image from
the movie.

The 1997 Movie Starship Troopers
The same day that I finished this book, I scrolled through the TV listings and found that the 1997 movie of the same name was being shown that afternoon. The movie was loosely based on this book, but the movie was terrible, an adolescent nightmare of hormones and bravado. The magic of the book was its exploration of one soldier's response to his experiences; the book is not even very action-oriented. Not so the movie. Action was front and center. Every character was beefed up on steroids. Everyone overacted. There was none of the quiet camaraderie of the book. Alas.

The Year 1959

Paul Drake from the TV show Perry Mason
--no hair oil on top, but the sides are
plastered.

I was interested to find that this book was written the same year I was born. However, being set in the future, none of it takes place in 1959. I don't know what insight I might gain about my own life, the mindset into which I was born. If I use Heinlein as a guide, voting rights are not very high on the priority list. Everyone is white, although Johnnie is of Hispanic origins. Surprisingly, women are permitted in the military in Starship Troopers, but only as pilots--they have particular skills in this area, apparently. So, I guess this pretty much sums up 1959. Military solutions are in vogue, as is (as usual) dehumanizing (or buggifying) your enemies. Poor people are invisible.

Danish modern

I am fascinated right now by movies that were filmed in the years my parents were born or got married or the year I was born. I love looking at the fashions and the themes. Earlier in this blog, I reviewed a Perry Mason novel by Erle Stanley Gardner and became re-enamored of this TV series that was set in the very early 1960s and was considered to be somewhat fashion forward. I know that whatever is fashionable NOW seems like reality, so it's fun to see what the reality of my parents and their parents looked like. In the early 1960s, it seemed that we would all always smoke, we would all always have large cars (with running boards!), and Danish modern would prevail. Men would always have their hair oiled (except for Paul Drake) and women would have permanent waves and wear shirtwaists. Perry Mason was ahead in technology, using reel-to-reel tape recorders and other gadgets. My mom liked this TV show. I'm sure it influenced her.

Love the love beads, Janis,
but not the drugstyle.

The expectations of that world also shaped me. We were just coming out of the "man in the gray-flannel suit" period. Retail was everything and my dad managed a shoe store. Conformity was good, but not mandated. Maybe this toe in the 1950s is what makes me think that even if I had been a bit older and therefore qualified to be a hippi, I wouldn't have done it! I just wouldn't buy in to the lifestyle (drugstyle--another new word), even if I bought into the beliefs and the fashions. Who knows?

Today, my expectations are moderate. I no longer worry too much about the fate of the world. I try to practice "here-and-now-ism." What am I doing right now? Where I am I right now? What is happening at this time in this place and what role am I playing? Those are my questions.

Space Cadet, by Robert A. Heinlein

Acting Ensign Wesley Crusher could never
escape his goody-two-shoes reputation on
Star Trek: NexGen

No, there is no irony in the title of this book--Heinlein wrote his book Space Cadet long before "space cadet" became synonymous with "airhead." And, really, I wonder if this book wasn't the inspiration for the most noteworthy of space cadets--acting Ensign Wesley--Wesley Crusher from Star Trek: Next Generation. The main character Matt Dodson shares only a certain earnestness and respect for authority with Wesley. Unlike Wesley, he is not that great at science and math (but is a natural as a pilot), hangs out with people mainly his own age, and he travels without his mother.

Space Cadet, written in the late 1940s, is the tale of teenager Matt's training for the Space Patrol--a peace-keeping force created to prevent the use of nuclear weapons on Earth and its neighboring planetary bodies. The story follows him from newbie to independent young officer. With his friend Tex, Matt goes through many agonizing tests in a boot-camp setting, during which many applicants are winnowed out. These tests include a ride through the too-many-G-forces/too-little-G-forces gizmo (Matt withstands 7 Gs and passes the test); personality challenges (there's a faked tragedy for the applicants to respond to); academic tests; and even ethical tests.

The 1948 cover--see below
for other covers with
other goals

Matt and Tex pass the tests and move on to a training ship and further study. Eventually, they move out into space as junior officers attached to a working ship. Eventually, they move into increasingly dramatic settings and adventures--especially when they crash land on Venus. On Venus, you see the impact that the training has had on these young men--the resources they have to draw on, the principles they follow. (And, of course, there is a counter-example, a cadet who washed out of the program early and scorns its values.)

But, the charm of this book is not particularly in its plotting. It's in the details. It's in the pace. Once again (see my blog entry on Rocketship Galileo), Heinlein pulls me right into the world of the book. Although nothing dramatic happened for pages on end, Heinlein created enough hooks on Matt for the reader to feel attached, to slide into Matt's spacesuit with him (that sounds kinky), to face the challenges, wonder at the new systems and knowledge, hope for success, fear failure. 

Slide rule--yet another wet dream
of science in the 1950s and 1960s--looks
like a tool for WASPs only

Heinlein is adept at drawing enough details into the picture to make it real without overdrawing or over-explaining. He gives enough for your imagination to complete the environment but does not worry if what I picture is not exactly what he meant. I was amazed, because I was hooked into this obsolete boy's adventure  novel right away. I struggled with moving through weightlessness and with magnetic boots and with trying hard not to need to use the airsick bags. I fretted over "astrogation" and the mathematics it required (and the slide rule!). I worried over my fitness for such an elite corps. (see the video at <iframe width="420" height="315" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/MiRlJSttQuc" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe> for a tutorial on weightlessness, which makes it look embarrassingly easy.)

Young Matt is a great character--fun, but not dangerous; flawed, but not a loser. I was most interested in what happened to him during his Earth-leave, when he visited his home in Des Moines for the first time after entering the Patrol. What he found was a total disconnect. He found that his family could not understand anything he talked about and that it was all too complicated to explain. It was not discussed in the book, but I saw it as a critical moment for Matt--when his life in the Patrol became more real to him than his life on Earth.

This beautiful photo of Venus uses
color to indicate the concentration of
various chemicals in the atmosphere

The Venus part of the book was charming in its antiquated vision of Venus. For now, scientists do not believe that any life can exist on Venus--not only is the atmosphere thick with poisons, but the air pressure is so great that it exerts a dramatic crushing force. The surface is barren. If life might be there, we would have a hard time detecting it--our apparatus would need to be so thick to avoid being crushed that any delicate maneuvering would be difficult.




For more information, go to  http://library.thinkquest.org/18652/venus.html.

Matt and Tex, however, find a tropical dangerland with swamps and creepy critters and alien intelligence. This is their lab for putting into practice all of their training--their training in values and self-control as much as in any particular subject. They find that as a group they have more intelligence that any of them individually.

So, another thumbs-up for Heinlein. I don't think I've been to Venus with Matt, but I do feel like I went to some other world that was mistakenly called that. I have a feeling of movement, of time, of growing up. That's cool. And, that's good, because I have three or four more Heinlein books to read from my Easy Reader children's literature list.

Me and Space: Evolved Lemur

This is the tech-guy cover
from the 1980s or so, I'd
guess

I was a child in the 1960s (I turned 10 the year the moon landing took place in 1969), so maybe it's not a surprise that I have so much interest in space and space travel and the interaction of humans with unearthly conditions (such as weightlessness) and with others unlike themselves (such as Republicans). How do we solve the problems? Are there human characteristics that truly define us as a species? One of the most defining characteristics of humans is the sense of wonder, the tendency to gawk and to explore that which puzzles and amazes us. What lies beyond the horizon? What lies beyond the end point of the solar wind? But does this define just some of us? Is hide-boundedness another trait of humans--the desire for stasis and certainty?

See, these are issues that my submergence in the genre of science fiction have awoken in me. Because I did (and still do) submerge. My inner self resonates with the themes and imagery of sci-fi. It is abiding, and I know that because it has abided. There are episodes of Star Trek I have seen dozens of times, but I am still somehow intrigued. One of these is an episode of NexGen in which the crew started to devolve because the inactive content of their DNA was triggered by a virus. Troi was turning into a fish. Riker became a Neanderthal. Even scarier, Worf turned into a Neanderthal Klingon. But most touching was Captain Picard devolving into a lemur, acutely aware of sounds and sights, ever fearful. Could his humanness reach through the genetic programming to rescue the ship?

This is the soft-focus warm and fuzzy cover, probably
from the 1990s. Makes science fiction safe for kids--
although this is a distinctly adolescent book--not
for children.

I have seen Godzilla in the original. I have seen Hitler's hand creeping across the gangway of a submarine. I have made first contact with species so radically different that communication was nearly impossible (Republicans again!). I've been on so many different planets and spaceships that I cannot count them. What has this done to me? First, I know that it leads me to see humans as a species like any other on Earth, subject to the same survival pressures as any other. We are not divine. We are not the chosen ones. We are not on top. Second, it has increased my likelihood to see events from many points of view, to see that there are as many priorities as there are people. It has led me to attempt to lead with peace, not hostility.

There. That's my space manifesto. I am most touched by the Voyager space probes, which have now reached the endpoint of the solar wind, the outer edge of our solar system. And yet they travel on. They continue to gather information and will even after they can no longer communicate it to us. The Voyager probes mirror the journey we are all on--we are curious and communicating beings and we will keep looking...for what? For whatever comes.

So, weird, dweeb, nerd, geek? I'll accept the title of "evolved lemur," thank you very much.

Rocketship Galileo by Robert A. Heinlein

The 1947 cover--telegraphs the fact that
the science might be a bit out of date

          I'm going to discuss a lot of negative features of this book, so I want to be clear at the outset: Rocketship Galileo, by Robert A. Heinlein, was a great read. It was a fast, funny, exciting adventure story that had my hair standing on end more than a few times.
          Rocketship Galileo is the story of three teenagers who make up the Galileo science club. Through a combination of happenstance and connections, the trio gets hooked up with a pioneering ex-professor who has a plan for a rocketship that will go to the moon. (Funny that rocketship is not accepted by spell-check--fifty years ago it would have been, except for the non-existence of spell-check at that time--two ships that never did pass in the night.)
          The tone of the book is very much "Hardy Boys Go to the Moon" but with a didactic science backdrop. The teachable moments, when the professor would teach and/or quiz the boys on technology, mathematics, astronomy, computer science (!), physics, electronics, welding, and materials science, were a bit dry. The basic science was solid, but the implications for technology, computers, and space travel were hilariously out of date. At least within the context of the book, however, there is scientific consistency. The biggest boner was that no mention was made of the tendency of objects to burn to a cinder when they pass into or out of Earth's atmosphere. The team's ship had no heat shields and took off as a nuclear jet plane and just flew off into space from the New Mexico desert.

Robert and Virginia Heinlein on the set of
Destination Moon in 1949; the film was based
 on his novel Rocketship Galileo. 

          These inconsistencies did not bother me. I knew when I saw the cover of this book that it was from the immediate post-World War II era (1947), a time when nuclear science and its implications for the future were in their infancy. It was more the slow start than the quaint science that bogged me down. 
          Rocketship started slow--the early scene-setting was tedious and did not have enough tiny hints to indicate that something exciting was about to happen. The boys end up traveling with the professor to a camp at, yes, ground zero at Alamagordo, where the first large-scale nuclear test occurred in 1945. Our team of unlikelies were in New Mexico to build a nuclear rocketship. Nuclear power is like a cloud of question marks to the book's characters. The characters express horror and sadness over the way nuclear power was introduced to the world--Hiroshima and Nagasaki. They are determined to find productive uses for this schizo-wunderkind of science. The aftereffects of radiation, genetic damage, long-term poisoning of  test sites, these are not yet or bad-dreamed of--although nuclear terrorism is seriously discussed among the professor and the boys.

Alamagordo, New Mexico: Now am I become death.

          All caveats aside, after the first two chapters, I was completely hooked and didn't let go of this book. The story-telling process was wonderful; the pace was perfect. And, if you've read my blog much you'll know how important this is to me: the ending was great; I don't mean the outcome of the plot, but the design of the last chapter itself. When the adventure was over, the book was over. That's the way to do it. No need for some corny wrap-up chapter. Throughout the book, the characters imagine what will happen to them if they meet their goal, if they make it to the moon and, more importantly, make it back to Earth. If readers need to imagine more, they have plenty of material to work with. If only J.K. Rowlings and Suzanne Collins had done this. Just stop. Stop when the book is over. A book is not a sitcom that has to have a 3-minute follow-up after the last round of commercials to let us know that everything is OK or a drama that has to hook us for the next episode. When the action concludes, please just stop. And, I may need to send this message to editors also, because I think it might be the editors or publishers who want that extra chapter of pap. Enough ranting...

A comic book knocking the stuffing
out of a Nazi--and this is from 1980!

          One of the funniest things in this book (funny to someone in her fifties), is the sudden appearance of excaped Nazis in a very surprising place. I laughed out loud, because I had forgotten the number of comic books, TV show episodes (I think of "Hogan's Heroes" and many episodes of "Mission Impossible"), and movies featuring escaped Nazis I had encountered in my media consumption as a child. The Nazis were convenient villains for almost any situation and at any time. They would never give up on bringing Hitler's vision to fruition. I thought, "oh, we used to HATE them," and giggled.
          Now we've gotten so apologist about everything. I've forgotten how fun it was to have an evil enemy to fool, outsmart, trip, spit on, shoot, toss into precipices, and be righteously superior to. Please note that I have grown out of this black/white vision of the world, but it sure made things easier. And, it puts this book in the context of many of the books on my list that develop a dehumanized enemy to allow the "good" characters to justify their "courage." I'm thinking particularly of the Redwall books now. Even Narnia somewhat dehumanizes the enemies to make them hurtable.

Culture of science wet dream of the 1950s

          The only female presence in this book is three marginalized moms, mothers of the three teenagers. After Chapter 2 or so, no females annoy the proceedings. And, although the movie version apparently had a darker-skinned person (probably playing the Italian boy), there is no color but white in this book. The team is cooperative and constructive and their genius is peculiarly suited to the task at hand--building a nuclear rocketship by hand. But, the characterization is fresh--no one is perfect and they all pitch in to cover the consequences of fallibility of each other--and almost idyllic. So, idyllic is white, male, and scientific. Well, that's nothing new! Again, I took this book in its 1947 context, but that doesn't mean I didn't note the details.
          Was Rocketship Galileo a hero journey? The boys evidenced some degree of maturation, but this book was not much of a hero journey--more of a thrill ride. The boys were pretty much fully formed from the start. Still, there is a 1950-esque version of the hero journey--the mastering of technology to find wealth and fame. But the tone of this book (if not the action) doesn't support this myth well either. I'll stick with the "thrill-ride with scientific pretentions" idea. 
          The actual moon landing 22 years after this book was written pales in comparison--it was so over-planned and over-imagined that nothing bad could hardly happen on the moon (although it could in the capsule itself and on take-off and landing). Compared to Rocketship Galileo, the real moon landing lacked drama. Sorry NASA. No brag, just fact.
          One last observation: My enthusiasm about this book points out to me that I am not just a nerd; I am also a geek.

Sidebar: Destination Moon

Here is a link to the trailer for the movie "Destination Moon," released in 1950 as an adaptation of Rocketship Galileo: http://www.imdb.com/video/screenplay/vi3181445401/

The professor and "the boys" in the 1950 film adaptation
of thebook, released as "Destination Moon" 

          The book is darned progressive and liberal compared to the movie, which added more representatives of the military-industrial complex, which were pretty much absent from the book. In the book, the professor was the only authority figure and he was pretty fallible. And, from the IMDb website, I could not determine if Nazis are a part of it. The costumes were terrible, but the sets were pretty good. Makes "Lost in Space" seem a marvel of special effects. However, author Robert Heinlein was actively involved in the production and the script. I wonder if he was really happy with the results.


Here is some dialogue from the IMDb site that takes place nowhere in the book and is way more rah-rah industry than the book is. Propagandists had clearly gotten involved.


[Why the government isn't involved if it's so important] 
Jim Barnes: Here's the reason. The vast amount of brains, talents, special skills, and research facilities necessary for this project are not in the government, nor can they be mobilized by the government in peacetime without fatal delay. Only American industry can do this job. And American industry must get to work, now, just as we did in the last war! 
Industrialist: Yes, but the government footed the bill! 
Jim Barnes: And they'll foot this bill, too, if we're successful; you know that. If we fail, we'll take a colossal beating. So we can't fail! Not only is this the greatest adventure awaiting mankind, but it's the greatest challenge ever hurled at American industry. And General Thayer is going to tell you why. 
General Thayer: The reason is quite simple. We are not the only ones who know that the Moon can be reached. We're not the only ones who are planning to go there. The race is on - and we'd better win it, because there is absolutely no way to stop an attack from outer space. The first country that can use the Moon for the launching of missiles... will control the Earth. That, gentlemen, is the most important military fact of this century.