Robert A. Heinlein (1907–88,) fully Robert Anson Heinlein, was an American science fiction writer, aeronautical engineer, and naval officer. He was among the earliest to feature scientific accuracy in his fiction, and he is considered one of the most literary and sophisticated science-fiction writers.
Born in Butler, Missouri, Heinlein graduated from U.S. Naval Academy in 1929 and serving in the navy for five years. He studied physics and mathematics at the University of California-Los Angeles and then began writing science fiction in 1939. He served in the navy during World War II and resumed writing after the war.
Heinlein called his work “speculative fiction” because he tried to write about events that could happen, considering everything known about the universe’s natural laws. Heinlein wrote more than 50 novels and collections of short stories over four decades. He is best known for his novel Stranger in a Strange Land (1961,) a cult classic about a boy born during the first human-crewed mission to Mars. He is raised by Martians, then returns to Earth, starts a church, and preaches free love.
Heinlein’s other popular books include The Green Hills of Earth (1951,) Double Star (1956,) The Door into Summer (1957,) Citizen of the Galaxy (1957,) and Methuselah’s Children (1958.)
More: Wikipedia • READ: Works by Robert A. Heinlein
To be matter of fact about the world is to blunder into fantasy—and dull fantasy at that—as the real world is strange and wonderful.
—Robert A. Heinlein
Love is the condition in which the happiness of another person is essential to your own.
—Robert A. Heinlein
Topics: Love, Happiness
Never try to outstubborn a cat.
—Robert A. Heinlein
Topics: Cats
Belief gets in the way of learning.
—Robert A. Heinlein
Topics: Belief
When any government, or church for that matter, undertakes to say to it’s subjects, this you may not read, this you must not see, this you are forbidden to know the end result is tyranny and oppression, no matter how holy the motive.
—Robert A. Heinlein
Topics: Government
Those who cling to the untrue doctrine that violence never settles anything would be advised to conjure up the ghosts of Napoleon Bonaparte and of the Duke of Wellington and let them debate it. The ghost of Hitler could referee, and the jury might well be the Dodo, the Great Auk, and the Passenger Pigeon. Violence, naked force, has settled more issues in history than has any other factor, and the contrary opinion is wishful thinking at its worst. Nations and peoples who forget this basic truth have always paid for it with their lives and freedoms.
—Robert A. Heinlein
Topics: Violence
May you live as long as you wish and love as long as you live.
—Robert A. Heinlein
Topics: Living
A competent and self-confident person is incapable of jealousy in anything. Jealousy is invariably a symptom of neurotic insecurity.
—Robert A. Heinlein
Topics: Self Confidence, Jealousy, Confidence
To get anywhere, or even live a long time, a man has to guess, and guess right, over and over again, without enough data for a logical answer.
—Robert A. Heinlein
Topics: Chance
Most people who sneer at technology would starve to death if the engineering infrastructure were removed.
—Robert A. Heinlein
Topics: Technology
Ninety percent of all human wisdom is the ability to mind your own business.
—Robert A. Heinlein
Topics: Wisdom
No statement should be believed because it is made by an authority.
—Robert A. Heinlein
Topics: Authority, Control
Women and cats will do as they please, and men and dogs should relax and get used to the idea.
—Robert A. Heinlein
Topics: Fun, Cats, Men & Women
History does not record anywhere or at any time a religion that has any rational basis. Religion is a crutch for people not strong enough to stand up to the unknown without help. But, like dandruff, most people do have a religion and spend time and money on it and seem to derive considerable pleasure from fiddling with it.
—Robert A. Heinlein
Topics: Religion
An armed society is a polite society. Manners are good when one may have to back up his acts with his life.
—Robert A. Heinlein
Topics: Manners
Everything is theoretically impossible, until it is done. One could write a history of science in reverse by assembling the solemn pronouncements of highest authority about what could not be done and could never happen.
—Robert A. Heinlein
Topics: Authority, Possibilities, Vision
The greatest productive force is human selfishness.
—Robert A. Heinlein
Topics: Selfishness, One liners
Never make your appeal to a man’s better nature; he may not have one. Always make your appeal to his self-interest.
—Robert A. Heinlein
Topics: Better, Nature, Rest
Gratitude: An imaginary emotion that rewards an imaginary behavior, altruism. Both imaginaries are false faces for selfishness, which is a real and honest emotion.
—Robert A. Heinlein
Topics: Gratitude
Age is not an accomplishment, and youth is not a sin.
—Robert A. Heinlein
Topics: Youth
A long and wicked life followed by five minutes of perfect grace gets you into Heaven. An equally long life of decent living and good works followed by one outburst of taking the name of the Lord in vain
—Robert A. Heinlein
Topics: Sin
Most people can’t think, most of the remainder won’t think, the small fraction who do think mostly can’t do it very well. The extremely tiny fraction who think regularly, accurately, creatively, and without self-delusion—in the long run, these are the only people who count.
—Robert A. Heinlein
Topics: Thought
The supreme irony of life is that hardly anyone gets out of it alive.
—Robert A. Heinlein
Always listen to the experts. They’ll tell you what can’t be done and why. Then do it.
—Robert A. Heinlein
Topics: Advice, Experts, General, Professionalism
Being intelligent is not a felony, but most societies evaluate it as at least a misdemeanor.
—Robert A. Heinlein
Topics: Thinking
One man’s “magic” is another man’s engineering. “Supernatural” is a null word.
—Robert A. Heinlein
Topics: Engineering
The stars incline, but do not impel.
—Robert A. Heinlein
The whole principle [of censorship] is wrong. It’s like demanding that grown men live on skim milk because the baby can’t have steak.
—Robert A. Heinlein
Topics: Censorship
When any government, or any church for that matter, undertakes to say to its subjects, This you may not read, this you must not see, this you are forbidden to know, the end result is tyranny and oppression, no matter how holy the motives. Mighty little force is needed to control a man whose mind has been hoodwinked; contrariwise, no amount of force can control a free man, a man whose mind is free. No, not the rack, not fission bombs, – not anything – you can’t conquer a free man; the most you can do is kill him.
—Robert A. Heinlein
Topics: Oppression
The human race divides itself politically into those who want to be controlled, and those who have no such desire
—Robert A. Heinlein
Topics: Welfare
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