Manny's Reviews > Sixth Column

That sounds like an interesting book... please post again if remember the title!

Considering how we view Japan now: the land of Hello Kitty, manga, reliable cars and really hot female pop stars - one might be encouraged that we can find amicable peace in the Middle East one day.

I am trying to think what the Islamic equivalents might be. There's definitely a novel in this too!

Bird Brian wrote: "Considering how we view Japan today: the land of Hello Kitty, manga, reliable cars and really hot female pop stars..."

Ouch.

Bird Brian wrote: "I'll be with you momentarily; I'm just digging the few last pieces of tongue out of my cheek."

Oh goodness! Don't choke!

Bird Brian wrote: "Scribble wrote: "Ouch."

I'll be with you momentarily; I'm just digging the few last pieces of tongue out of my cheek."

Oh goodness, you mean it wasn't yours?

I saw you recommend this book to one of your friends yesterday, Manny, and decided to give it a try. What can I say, one-star books excite me. Between the overt racism and the fact that it's a sci-fi novel, a genre I've essentially ignored, I figured it would be easy for me to scoff at. And while the racial aspect was repugnant, the characters completely flat, and the plot little more that one long concatenation of dei ex machina, I'll be damned if I didn't enjoy it! Since the Goodreads rating system is based on how much you liked something, not how worthy you feel it is of literary praise, I have to be honest that this is at least a 3-star book for me. It was candy floss, true, but a good flavor. So while I was hoping that I'd be reading a real stinker, I ended up with a fun little read. Guess either way I couldn't lose with this one. Thanks!

P.S. Got any other recommendations for a Truly Terrible Novel? Since I'm not a big sci-fi reader, perhaps I should stick with that genre. I have a real conspicuous lacuna on my reading CV, and that is one-star books.

Much appreciated, Brian! I think I may have the Hemingway book, so perhaps that will be my first attempt to delve into your Shit.

I'm kind of embarrassed noticing you gave "Congo" one star and I gave it four. I feel like someone too easily impressed, like one of those guys who thinks every girl with a short skirt is a 10.

BB, I really look forward to the day we can read your shit together.

Steve, if BB's ones are your fours, your ones must be BADDD.

Ian - Haha, perhaps! Though among my collection of two-star authors are such literary luminaries as Dostoevsky, Melville, Nabokov, Camus, two of the Bronte sisters, and Philip Roth. So maybe there's some circuitry in my brain that's wired in reverse.

Brian - Sex with dinosaurs? Now THAT I might give one star! I'll have to get on this immediately...

I always wanted to spend a night with the Bronte sisters, but I was worried about what would happen if Mrs Bronte saw us.

Steve, I'm glad to hear you liked it! Since I've read most of Heinlein's books, it would be somewhat disingenuous of me to pretend that they aren't embarrassingly readable.

If you're looking for more politically incorrect RAH, you might want to check out his opinions on blacks (Farnham's Freehold) and women (I Will Fear No Evil)...

I just looked at the Wikipedia article for "Farnham's Freehold," and I must say, this caught my eye:

"Some have argued that the portrayal of the black ruling caste as cannibalistic, polygynous, drug-providing tyrants with a preference for Caucasian women uses most of the available racist stereotypes about Africans and African-Americans."

Certainly seems worth a look! Although the drug peddling and sex fiendishness is pretty bad, the "preference for Caucasian women" just pushes the racial caricature over the top, doesn't it?

Actually, the book is even more politically incorrect than your quote suggests. If you're searching for toe-curling, don't-know-where-to-look inappropriateness, it really offers value for money.

Well, they (not surprisingly) don't have this book at my library. Thankfully, I can get it on an interlibrary loan. So my request has been sent, and I look forward to this adventure! Some perfunctory googling has turned up lots of forum chatter among survivalist types who sing high praise for this little book.

If your library has banned the book because of its generally offensive nature, I take my hat off to them. Unfortunately, they probably just decided not to stock it because it's kind of old-fashioned and lacks vampires and werewolves.

It's interesting to see which people hold RAH in high esteem. You may recall that the Manson family were huge fans of Stranger in a Strange Land.

Oh you're right about them not banning due to its nature. Hell, they have plenty of Ann Coulter and Rush Limbaugh books, which must be even more morally offensive than anything Heinlein could come up with. And of course any library worth its salt better have important pieces of hate, like "Mein Kampf."

I didn't know that tidbit about the Manson family, actually! I was born a couple of decades after Manson, Squeaky, et. al. gained their notoriety, and since then, the media just hasn't seemed to be able to keep up much of an interest in him. I did read a couple of books on the Beach Boys, though, that contained some interesting information about the connection between the Wilson brothers and the soon-to-be criminal mastermind.

I do remember growing up having the basic knowledge of Charles Manson that all good American children have: that he was a murderous, evil individual. When I learned he never actually killed anyone with his own hands, though, I remember feeling oddly dismayed that he got so long a sentence. To be honest, I still feel it's a bit odd that a conspirator gets life, while rapists do less than a dime (that sounds like criminal lingo, doesn't it?) and "petty" murderers get a couple of decades, max.

I didn't know that Manson was only guilty of conspiracy to murder! Though I'm guessing that the judge also took into account the fact that he frequently used the word "grok" in a non-ironic sense. That must be worth at least another five years.

I know this is pointless, but here goes. The book was written just after WWII and during the earliest part of the Cold War. Japan had just been the enemy and Communist "Red" China was one of the huge threats at the time. You can't judge books from one era by the values of another. Try reading it simply as a book. There are many, many good books that would today be considered racist but it wasn't recognized as such at the time.

It says on Wikipedia that it was originally published as a serial from Jan to Mar 1941, and that it's based on a story by John W. Campbell Jr.

I have often wondered why the hero of Kurt Vonnegut's novel Mother Night is called Howard W. Campbell Jr. It seems like too much to be a coincidence, and that Vonnegut was making some comment about John W's attitude to the Third Reich...

It is amazing how people think that something written in a different time should somehow reflect the values so important to us now. Yes, it is offensive to me; however, I understand that it reflects where our society was then and helps me appreciate and celebrate how far we have come.

You confuse racism in the novel as making the novel and its author racist. I guess by this measure Mark Twain was a racist too.

Huckleberry Finn is one of my favorite books, and I've read it many times. There's no reasonable doubt that its racism is deeply ironic. If you look at my review, you'll see that I in fact quote a passage which makes that very point.

I must say that it had never even occurred to me that the racism in this book could be ironic. Could you quote a corresponding passage?

Heinlein was basically a libertarian. If you read his later work he is about as far from racist, sexist or any other "ist" as anyone could be. That said I doubt there's a lot of real irony here. I'd guess it's an attempt to reflect the WW2 and before East vs. West attitude of the time. When this was written it was still the era of Sax Rohmer.

The book is (literally) from 75 years in the past. That is on the other side of a lot of change. If you read books from that period you'll find that writings of the most vehement advocates for change in race relations of the era used language that today is considered racist.

The fiction of H. Rider Haggard, P.G. Wodehouse and Sir Arthur Ignatius Conan Doyle among others use racist language (Mark Twain who was sneering at racists by his use of racial assumptions has already been mentioned). When I review books from the past I usually try to mention if language which may bother/insult some readers is used. I suggest that people simply be aware going in. We don't want to lose literature (or other art) from the past because attitudes and understanding were different.

Mike (the Paladin) wrote: "Heinlein was basically a libertarian. If you read his later work he is about as far from racist, sexist or any other "ist" as anyone could be. That said I doubt there's a lot of real irony here. I'..."

Well... as noted higher up the thread, that's not so clear. For example, take Farnham's Freehold and I Will Fear No Evil. But yes, I agree on "basically a libertarian".