STRANGER IN A STRANGE LAND
Registered by GrammarBroad on 6/22/2004
2 journalers for this copy...
Hardback, 1st ed., 1961.
"If any work of fiction will earn Robert Heinlein a permanent place on the collective bookshelf, it is going to be STRANGER IN A STRANGE LAND, for the impact it has made on American society. If a person has not managed to read STRANGER by now, then he has at least absorbed a bit of it osmotically, for it flows throughout our cultural consciousness. Perhaps least of all, it anticipated Nancy Reagan's reliance on astrology and spawned the water bed and the neologism 'grok,' (Heinlein's Martian verb for a thorough understanding), though 'grok' would never have taken hold, had the young rebels of the 1960s not discovered STRANGER as their counterculture bible. Some went even further and formed 'nests' and churches based on what they found in STRANGER; perhaps the most famous instance of that is the Church of All Worlds, a pagan group who lifted its name and logo intact from the book. STRANGER has also begun to be included in many canonical college reading lists, and Billy Joel saw fit to mention the title in his 1989 Top-40 hit about history, 'We Didn't Start the Fire.'"
Better than average to a non-sci-fi fan.
#167.
"If any work of fiction will earn Robert Heinlein a permanent place on the collective bookshelf, it is going to be STRANGER IN A STRANGE LAND, for the impact it has made on American society. If a person has not managed to read STRANGER by now, then he has at least absorbed a bit of it osmotically, for it flows throughout our cultural consciousness. Perhaps least of all, it anticipated Nancy Reagan's reliance on astrology and spawned the water bed and the neologism 'grok,' (Heinlein's Martian verb for a thorough understanding), though 'grok' would never have taken hold, had the young rebels of the 1960s not discovered STRANGER as their counterculture bible. Some went even further and formed 'nests' and churches based on what they found in STRANGER; perhaps the most famous instance of that is the Church of All Worlds, a pagan group who lifted its name and logo intact from the book. STRANGER has also begun to be included in many canonical college reading lists, and Billy Joel saw fit to mention the title in his 1989 Top-40 hit about history, 'We Didn't Start the Fire.'"
Better than average to a non-sci-fi fan.
#167.
Donating to 1001-Library for 1001 books-to-read-before-you-die shelf.
Journal Entry 4 by 1001-library from Helsinki, Uusimaa / Nyland Finland on Thursday, February 26, 2009
Thanks so much for your donation GrammarBroad!
This book is now part of the 1001-library. If you want to take this book from the library but don't know how to proceed, please refer to the 1001-library bookshelf.
