Heinlein Archives Put Online

RaymondRuptime writes "Good news for fans of the late SF master Robert Heinlein, 2 months after his 100th birthday celebration. Per the San Jose Mercury News, 'The entire contents of the Robert A. and Virginia Heinlein Archive — housed in the UC-Santa Cruz Library's Special Collections since 1968 — have been scanned in an effort to preserve the contents digitally while making the collection easily available to both academics and the general public... The first collection released includes 106,000 pages, consisting of Heinlein's complete manuscripts — including files of all his published works, notes, research, early drafts and edits of manuscripts.' You can skip the brief article and go straight to the archives."

Comments

A practice that could save us from rereleases.

[CRCulver]

I wish more writers' archives would just be put online, so we can just simply see what they left out or what work was unfinished at the time of passing without a plethora of new material for purchase. For those of us who loved Stranger in a Strange Land as it was, the release of the uncut version turned something nice into something overlong. And don't get me started on the Dune sequels, where the notes of Frank Herbert, instead of just being shown as they were, were turned into dreck by his son and an airport paperback writer.

Re:A practice that could save us from rereleases.

[Anonymous Coward]

And don't get me started on the Dune sequels, where the notes of Frank Herbert, instead of just being shown as they were, were turned into dreck by his son and an airport paperback writer."

Does anyone have any proof that this "notes" actually exist? The prequels are so chock-full of contradictions with the original series and - to put it bluntly - flat-out stupidity that I've always suspected that the notes were either too scanty to form a full work; largely ignored by Herbert & Anderson in favour of their own juvenile ideas; or a complete fiction invented to make a quick buck.

Re:A practice that could save us from rereleases.

[ConceptJunkie]

There are exceptions to this, but frankly I can't think of any offhand.

I can: Terry Pratchett.

While the Discworld books have evolved significantly from essentially a ripoff of Douglas Adams to the best fantasy humor ever written to painstaking social commentary and satire, even a spinoff into children's stories that are largely as good as the "main" series, after something close to 30 books, I think he's still doing a great job. Of course, they're not coming out twice a year, each thicker (and better) than the last like they were in the 90's, but I think man is still on a roll.

No Free Lunch

[norm1153]

Yeah, how depressing. Somehow from the news releases I also thought it'd be a freebie. After all, it's a publicly funded institution...

Grumble, mumble mumble.

Shoulda known.

Copyright concerns

[Rhinobird]

To avoid another Scribd-like fiasco, do they have permission from Heilien's estate to do this?

I'm a fanboy but...

[The Mutant]

I fear this is for the hard core only.

I was hoping to get downloadable versions of all his books that I read as a kid, especially some of the more obscure titles, and as I read them.

Don't get me wrong - this is very cool, but we're not talking the finished product here, but all drafts leading up to the galley that was submitted to the publisher.

So this would be very good to see how the plot, characters & books were developed. But you're not gonna curl up with one of these. I suspect they'll be dense reads.

And expensive! The complete, seven parts of Starship Troopers will set you back $21!!

Re:This links to a *STORE*, people...

[hercubus]

The whole paying money to a dead author thing is even weirder.

dead authors may have live heirs who need the money

it would be nice to think that one's work could benefit one's children for some time

OTOH, current corporate perversions attempting to lock revenue streams in perpetuity are abominations

OTTH, Admiral Heinlein, I salute you sir!

Re:For real?

[networkBoy]

True.
He also put in his bequeathing to UCSC that there was one work not to be published... Ever. I haven't the time to search the archive to see if it's there, and at the moment the title escapes me, so I'll have to dig in my annual collection and look up the title (My most prized copy of ?compton's SF? some rag that was carrying RAH's first serials.)

Anyway, I hope they honor his wishes about this. He declared it his single worst story ever, never to be re-printed. He's fairly spot on in his assessment.
-nB

It's a shame he renewed everything.

[Grendel Drago]

Heinlein (and his successors) were extraordinarily diligent about renewing every single thing he ever wrote. If they hadn't been, you could read some examples that had fallen through the cracks and into the public domain, such as the works of: Poul Anderson, Marion Zimmer Bradley, John W. Campbell, Lester Del Rey, Harry Harrison, Damon Knight, Andre Norton, H. Beam Piper, Frederik Pohl, E. E. "Doc" Smith and Kurt Vonnegut.

Actually, it appears there may be one or two available shorts, the ones that he really, really hated and prevented from ever being republished. I may hit up my interlibrary loan department for that.

Re:TANSTAAFL

[AshtangiMan]

Science fiction as a genre does not at all mean "stuff that can't happen". More often it is a genre that allows examination of the human condition in a new context, so that we can see what absurd animals we are, both individually and especially collectively. SF has in my mind gotten a bad rap in the last 3 decades, and even early on the pulp stuff that claimed to be SF was not. These others fall into more of the Space Western category. While I am a fan of the TV "SciFi" genre, Battlestar Gallactica, Buck Rogers, Space 1999, these are not related to SF of the likes of Heinlein, LeGuin, and others. But I also agree about novels, and more or less about fiction in general. My favorite Heinlein novel is "Job" . . . very funny, and, as I was raised Catholic, very rebelious feeling.

Re:For real?

[networkBoy]

Yes that would be it, but I fail to remember the title. My collection is sealed in an inert atmosphere*, so getting to it is dicey.
-nB

*Yes I'm a geek, but old ragstock is known for decay, thus a Lucite box, purged with argon.

Re:For real? - Copyright

[davidgreystahl]

I too was very disappointed to arrive at the archives and notice that payment was required. Did not follow through with the process to see what "rights" I was purchasing.

A friend of mine, now deceased, Amy Mahin was the copyright lawyer for Lassie. She was a wonderful person, thoughtful, and for the last ten years I've wondered often what her take on the copyright mess we are in would be. As many others have commented in the past - the current legal structure supports the distributors - with each individual artist often being required to audit the distributors to recoup their payments. The system also has made it almost impossible for any works to come into the public domain.

As a photographer I want to support the artists and creators of work, but the current system does not do that. To defend a copyright I must locate anyone who is using my work and sue them. That is an expensive process, most artists cannot do, including myself. If I don't defend my copyright, I have nothing, there is no "copyright" police or enforcement.

So thank goodness the Archives were scanned. Too bad that the works are not search friendly and in the public domain were they could inspire a new generation of forward thinking authors. Very sad will be the day if the archives are not profitable and the digital format the files are in are no longer supported [say 30+ years from now].