It took me eight days to read through I WILL FEAR NO EVIL and it was painful going. I've only read STRANGER IN A STRANGE LAND and disliked FEAR for the same reasons. I'm not a teenager in the seventies (then it might have been right up my alley). The overemphasis on sex was, quite frankly, overkill.
I didn't know Heinlein was suffering from peritonitis when he wrote FEAR, nor that it was a first draft. But to my mind it shows. I was also not aware of Heinlein's attitudes toward his female characters. I, too, enjoy a strong female character (I've created a few of them myself) but I respect them, just as I would respect a strong woman of flesh and blood. I would not expect her to (as Heinlein seems to) “Be a strong powerful woman, that makes you sexy as hell—but know when to get back to your rightful place and let the man take over.”
Heinlein's attitude is almost ironic. Because if this is really what he wanted women to be, then what does it say for him as a man, that when he has the brain of a fully male man like Johann Sebastian Bach Smith, transferred into a fully female body, the “manly man” eventually becomes a fully feminine Heinlein woman? Did Heinlein know subconsciously that his attitude was bullshit? Was this his unconscious desire—to be changed into a woman, and shed the tough guy mode? Was it like in Monty Python's LUMBERJACK SONG—
Oh, I'm a lumberjack, and I'm okay. I sleep all night and I work all day. I cut down trees. I wear high heels, suspenders and a bra. I wish I'd been a girlie, just like my dear papa!
A far more realistic (in my opinion) treatment of what might happen to a male brain transplanted to a female body was done in the DC comic, All-Star Squadron #24, written by Roy Thomas in 1983. A villain called the Ultra-Humanite had had his brain transferred into the body of Dolores Winters, a popular actress of the 1940s. The now female Ultra-Humanite had a henchmen she called Deathbolt, who was obviously attracted to her in her female form. She had commanded a scientist to transfer her brain into the body of a robot.
DEATHBOLT: I still say, Boss, if I had a chassis like yours—one that used to belong to a movie star—last thing I'd want to do is junk it. ULTRA-HUMANITE: I'll explain it to you one final time, Deathbolt. I suggest you listen—if you know what's good for you. (She seizes his chin in her fingers and she does not look very pleased. He looks scared). ULTRA-HUMANITE: It was an accident that my brain had to be transferred into Dolores Winter's body—a most regrettable accident. DEATHBOLT; (ulp) ULTRA-HUMANITE: My thoughts, my desires, my ambitions, are still those of the middle-aged male scientist I feel myself to be—and I live in torment until my brain is housed in that robot shell over there. Now I trust I've made myself clear—once and for all? DEATHBOLT: L-like a bell, lady—I mean, Ultra!
Far as I'm concerned, that bit of dialogue is a far more likely and realistic expression of what a male brain transferred into a female body would feel. Though I can speak for no one else, if I found my brain had been transplanted into the body of a woman, I don't care what bodily sensations that body would be feeling, I would not listen to them. I'm male. I'm not gay and even if my body was now female, my brain would always be male, with a male's tastes and desires.
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I WILL FEAR NO EVIL
Date: 2023-05-18 01:47 am (UTC)I didn't know Heinlein was suffering from peritonitis when he wrote FEAR, nor that it was a first draft. But to my mind it shows. I was also not aware of Heinlein's attitudes toward his female characters. I, too, enjoy a strong female character (I've created a few of them myself) but I respect them, just as I would respect a strong woman of flesh and blood. I would not expect her to (as Heinlein seems to) “Be a strong powerful woman, that makes you sexy as hell—but know when to get back to your rightful place and let the man take over.”
Heinlein's attitude is almost ironic. Because if this is really what he wanted women to be, then what does it say for him as a man, that when he has the brain of a fully male man like Johann Sebastian Bach Smith, transferred into a fully female body, the “manly man” eventually becomes a fully feminine Heinlein woman? Did Heinlein know subconsciously that his attitude was bullshit? Was this his unconscious desire—to be changed into a woman, and shed the tough guy mode? Was it like in Monty Python's LUMBERJACK SONG—
Oh, I'm a lumberjack, and I'm okay.
I sleep all night and I work all day.
I cut down trees. I wear high heels, suspenders and a bra.
I wish I'd been a girlie, just like my dear papa!
A far more realistic (in my opinion) treatment of what might happen to a male brain transplanted to a female body was done in the DC comic, All-Star Squadron #24, written by Roy Thomas in 1983. A villain called the Ultra-Humanite had had his brain transferred into the body of Dolores Winters, a popular actress of the 1940s. The now female Ultra-Humanite had a henchmen she called Deathbolt, who was obviously attracted to her in her female form. She had commanded a scientist to transfer her brain into the body of a robot.
DEATHBOLT: I still say, Boss, if I had a chassis like yours—one that used to belong to a movie star—last thing I'd want to do is junk it.
ULTRA-HUMANITE: I'll explain it to you one final time, Deathbolt. I suggest you listen—if you know what's good for you.
(She seizes his chin in her fingers and she does not look very pleased. He looks scared).
ULTRA-HUMANITE: It was an accident that my brain had to be transferred into Dolores Winter's body—a most regrettable accident.
DEATHBOLT; (ulp)
ULTRA-HUMANITE: My thoughts, my desires, my ambitions, are still those of the middle-aged male scientist I feel myself to be—and I live in torment until my brain is housed in that robot shell over there. Now I trust I've made myself clear—once and for all?
DEATHBOLT: L-like a bell, lady—I mean, Ultra!
Far as I'm concerned, that bit of dialogue is a far more likely and realistic expression of what a male brain transferred into a female body would feel. Though I can speak for no one else, if I found my brain had been transplanted into the body of a woman, I don't care what bodily sensations that body would be feeling, I would not listen to them. I'm male. I'm not gay and even if my body was now female, my brain would always be male, with a male's tastes and desires.