Heinlein Archives Put Online 242
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."
Comment removed (Score:5, Interesting)
No Free Lunch (Score:2, Interesting)
Grumble, mumble mumble.
Shoulda known.
Copyright concerns (Score:3, Interesting)
I'm a fanboy but... (Score:5, Interesting)
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 [heinleinarchives.net] will set you back $21!!
Re:A practice that could save us from rereleases. (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:This links to a *STORE*, people... (Score:2, Interesting)
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? (Score:4, Interesting)
He also put in his bequeathing to UCSC that there was one work not to be published...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
Re:A practice that could save us from rereleases. (Score:4, Interesting)
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.
It's a shame he renewed everything. (Score:3, Interesting)
Actually, it appears there may be one or two available shorts [pgdp.net], 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 (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:For real? (Score:4, Interesting)
-nB
*Yes I'm a geek, but old ragstock is known for decay, thus a Lucite box, purged with argon.
Re:For real? - Copyright (Score:3, Interesting)
A friend of mine, now deceased, Amy Mahin was the copyright lawyer for Lassie [wikipedia.org]. 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 [fotki.com] 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].