I think I know what is eating her about Red Planet. It is not any objection on her part to fantasy or fairy tales as such; she is very proud of having published The Wind in the Willows. Nor does she object to my pulp-trained style; she accepted it in two other books. No, it is this: She has fixed firmly in her mind a conception of what a "science fiction" book should be, though she can't define it and the notion is nebulous-she has neither the technical training nor the acquaintance with the body of literature in the field to have a clearly defined criterion. But it's there, just the same, and it reads something like this: "Science has to do with machines and machinery and laboratories. Science fiction consists of stories about the wonderful machines of the future which will go striding around the universe, as in Jules Verne."

Her definition is all right as far as it goes, but it fails to include most of the field and includes only that portion of the field which has been heavily overworked and now contains only low-grade ore. Speculative fiction (I prefer that term to science fiction) is also concerned with sociology, psychology, esoteric aspects of biology, impact of terrestrial culture on the other cultures we may encounter when we conquer space, etc., without end. However, speculative fiction is not fantasy fiction, as it rules out the use of anything as material which violates established scientific fact, laws of nature, call it what you will, i.e., it must [be] possible to the universe as we know it. Thus, Wind in the Willows is fantasy, but the much more incredible extravaganzas of Dr. Olaf Stapledon are speculative fiction-science fiction.

I gave Miss Dalgliesh a story which was strictly science fiction by all the accepted standards-but it did not fit into the narrow niche to which she has assigned the term, and it scared her-she was scared that some other person, critic, librarian, or whatever, a literary snob like herself-would think that she had published comic-book type of material. She is not sufficiently educated in science to distinguish between Mars as I portrayed it and the wonderful planet that Flash Gordon infests, nor would she be able to defend herself from the charge if brought.

As a piece of science fiction, Red Planet is a much more difficult and much more carefully handled job than either of the two books before it. Those books contained a little straightforward descriptive astronomy, junior high school level, and some faked-up mechanical engineering which I could make sound authoritative because I am a mechanical engineer and know the patter. This book, on the other hand, has a planetary matrix most carefully worked out from a dozen different sciences all more complicated and esoteric than descriptive astronomy and reaction engines. Take that one little point about how the desert cabbage stopped crowding in on the boys when Jim turned on the light. A heliotropic plant would do just that-but I'll bet she doesn't know heliotropism from second base. I did not attempt to rub the reader's nose in the mechanics of heliotropism or why it would develop on Mars because she had been so insistent on not being "too technical."

I worked out in figures the amount of chlorophyll surface necessary to permit those boys to live overnight in the heart of a plant and how much radiant energy would be required before I included the incident. But I'll bet she thought of that incident as being "fantasy."

I'll bet that, if she has ever heard of heliotropism at all, she thinks of it as a plant "reaching for the light." It's not; it's a plant spreading for light, a difference of ninety degrees in the mechanism and the point that makes the incident work.

Between ourselves there is one error deliberately introduced into the book, a too-low figure on the heat of crystallization of water. I needed it for dramatic reasons. I wrote around it, concealed it, I believe, from any but a trained physicist looking for discrepancies, and I'll bet ten bucks she never spotted it! -- she hasn't the knowledge to spot it.

Enough of beating that dead horse! It's a better piece of science fiction than the other two, but she'll never know it and it's useless to try to tell her. Lurton, I'm fed up with trying to work for her. She keeps poking her nose into things she doesn't understand and which are my business, not hers. I'm tired of trying to spoon-feed her, I'm tired of trying to educate her diplomatically. From my point of view she should judge my work by these rules and these only: (a) will it amuse and hold the attention of boyst (b) is it grammatical and as literate as my earlier stuff? (c) are the moral attitudes shown by the author and his protagonists-not his villains-such as to make it suitable to place in the hands of minors?

Actually, the first criterion is the only one she need worry about; I won't offend on the other two points-and she knows it. She shouldn't attempt to judge science-versus-fantasy; she's not qualified. Even if she were and even if my stuff were fantasy, why such a criterion anyhow? Has she withdrawn Wind in the Willows from the market? If she thinks Red Planet is a fairy tale, or a fantasy, but gripping (as she says) to read, let her label it as such and peddle it as such. I don't give a damn. She should concern herself with whether or not boys will like it. As a matter of fact, I don't consider her any fit person to select books to suit the tastes of boys. I've had to fight like hell to keep her from gutting my first two books; the fact that boys did like them is a tribute to my taste, not to hers. I've read a couple of the books she wrote for girls-have you tried them? They're dull as ditch water. Maybe girls will hold still for that sort of things; boys won't.

I hope this works out so that we are through with her. I prefer pocketing the loss, at least for now, to coping with her further.

And I don't like her dirty-minded attitude over the Willis business. Willis is one of the closest of my imaginary friends; I loved that little tyke, and her raised eyebrows infuriate me. [Willis is the young Martian adopted as a pet by the hero; it's Willis who often gets him out of trouble.]

March 15, 1949: Robert A. Heinlein to Lurton Blassingame

First, your letter: the only part that needs comment is Miss D's remark about getting a good Freudian to interpret the Willis business. There is no point in answering her, but let me sputter a little. A "good Freudian" will find sexual connotations in anything-that's the basis of the theory. In answer I insist that without the aid of a "good Freudian" boys will see nothing in the scene but considerable humor. In Space Cadet a "good Freudian" would find the rockets "thrusting up against the sky" definite phallic symbols. Perhaps he would be right; the ways of the subconscious are obscure and not easily read. But I still make the point that boys are not psychoanalysts-nor will anyone with a normal healthy sex orientation make anything out of that scene. I think my wife, Ginny, summed it up when she said, "She's got a dirty mind!"

Somebody around this controversy does need a psychoanalyst-and it ain't you and it ain't me and it ain't Willis.

March 18, 1949: Lurton Blassingame to Robert A. Heinlein

Book will have to be changed before it can go on the recommended library list. There is a certain amount of censorship in the juvenile field. Publishers must sign an affidavit when asking for books to be purchased by libraries, saying there is nothing in them which will offend either youngsters or parents. Dalgliesh is sending list of changes needed in Red Planet. Once those changes recommended by the juvenile librarian are made, Scribner's will take book. Scribner's is a respected house and excellent connection for RAH.

EDITOR'S NOTE Around this time, Robert was looking for an idea for the story ' 'Gulf," which he had promised ta John W. Campbell, Jr. for the special November 1949 issue of Astounding. We approached this task in a fashion today known as brainstorming. I would put up an idea and Robert would knock it down.