Letter to Brad Linaweaver
14 July 1987
Dear Brad,
Re. your post card on To Sail Beyond the Sunset. I guess
I'm not inclined to review it publicly, as I did with Job,
because I have the awful feeling--from the ending--that this
might be Heinlein signing off fiction writing, and I don't want
to contend with this. I will say, privately, that I think this
novel demonstrates that Heinlein has successfully showed his
critics that he can, indeed, write female characters with the
best of them.
As for the swipes at revisionism contained therein, I
noticed them too, but I would like to note the following.
As you recall, Bob Wilson wrote an article in NL chiding me
for a sign in Alongside Night that read, "No Dogs or Welfare
Parasites," and used my inclusion of this sign in my novel as
evidence that the author hated the poor. Neal Wilgus brought
this up again in my SFR interview. And what I said in both cases
is that one should not hold an author responsible for opinions
expressed by a fictional character in that author's novels. You
might also recall that in my author's note beginning Rainbow
Cadenza, I explicitly state, "The opinions ... of the characters
in this book should not be taken as being the author's own or
those of any real person. If there's anything I want to pin
myself down on, I'll do it in my own voice." I certainly pinned
myself down in the glossary on a number of points "in my own
voice" and, since Rainbow was written third person, my own voice
was heard in some places in the novel's exposition as well.
I'm extending to Mr. Heinlein the courtesy I asked Wilson
and Wilgus to extend me. To Sail Beyond the Sunset is written
first person in the voice of Maureen; Heinlein's own voice is
never heard. Maureen is characterized as expressing anti-
revisionist viewpoints by her first-person statements. This is
therefore as much the author's statement about that character as
it is a statement of that character's view on a particular issue.
Maureen is on record regarding revisionism; to the best of my
recollection, Heinlein is not.
If we want to know Mr. Heinlein's viewpoint on revisionism,
we'll still have to ask him.
[Some personal material deleted.]
All best,
Neil