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About the author:
Robert Anson Heinlein was born on July 7, 1907 in Butler, Bates County, Missouri, the third son of Rex Ivar Heinlein and Bam Lyle Heinlein. At a young age his family moved to Kansas City, Missouri. He grew up there, but spent summers with relatives in Butler. He graduated from Central High School in Kansas City in 1924 and attended one year of college at Kansas City Community College. His brother Rex had gone on to the Naval Academy at Annapolis and Heinlein elected the same future for himself. Heinlein entered the Naval Academy in 1925. Heinlein was commissioned in 1929 and served on a variety of ships, including the USS Lexington and the destroyer USS Roper. The constant rolling of the destroyer caused Heinlein to be seasick much of the time, and in 1934, weakened, he contracted pulmonary tuberculosis. He was cured and then retired as medically unfit for service-- \"permanently disabled\"-- and given a small pension. In 1932, shortly after his commissioning, he married Leslyn Macdonald. Heinlein never commented publicly on Leslyn or the later divorce. Between 1934 and 1939 Heinlein is believed to have worked at several occupations in both Los Angeles and Colorado Springs. He studied advanced engineering and mathematics at UCLA as well as architecture. He is also believed to have worked in real estate and possibly as an artist, photographer and sculptor, although the details of these trades are not fully known. Heinlein ran for the 59th District California State Assembly seat in the November 1938 election. Although he ran unopposed as a Democrat, he was narrowly defeated in the primary by the Republican incumbent, Charles W. Lyons.
Heinlein divorced Leslyn in late 1947. In late 1948, he married Virginia Doris Gerstenfeld, who remained his wife, assistant and close companion until his death in 1988. She presently lives on the South Atlantic coast.
Heinlein died on the 8th May 1988. His remains were scattered from the stern of a Navy warship off the coast of California. There is no memorial.
Main Characters:
Valentine Michael Smith: he is born on Mars to Earthling parents who die almost immediately after his birth, and is raised by the Martian race. So all his experiences are entirely unique. He is unlike any other Martian because of his human physiology, and unlike any other human because of his Martian ways of thinking. When he comes to Earth, he's entirely innocent and open-minded to every possible influence. Mental powers that humans assume as impossible, such as telekinesis and mind reading, are normal to him, and his philosophies are entirely Martian as well-for example, if a \"water-brother\" (a close companion) wished him to die, Mike would be delighted to do so. Earth customs such as jealousy, desire, and lying are completely foreign to Mike.
Jubal Harshaw: he's an old lawyer, doctor and writer who lives together with his secretaries and assistants a very comfortable way of life, away from all the problems of normal people. Although he is tired of fighting against corrupt institutions and prefers to spend his old age satisfying his own desires, when he meets Mike, he seizes the opportunity to once again take on the authorities. In developing a fatherly attachment to Mike, Jubal reopens himself to emotions that he has shut off. With his wise way of getting things done, he has a big influence on Mike, who trusts in Jubal as the last instance and sees in him somehow the human wisdom the Old Ones personify on Mars.
Gillian Boardman: a courageous and confident young nurse. Her friend and old flame, newspaper reporter Ben Caxton, convinces her to help him rescue Mike from his enforced captivity at the hospital. Her nurturing attachment to Mike grows into a profound understanding. She is the first woman Mike ever sees, the first woman he shares water with, and the first woman he kisses. She may or may not be the woman to whom Mike loses his virginity-the identity of that woman is left kept in the dark.
Ben Caxton: A newspaper reporter who writes a political column that has given him the oservation of the Earth\'s government. Ben is driven partially by a newspaperman\'s lust for a good story, and partially by a passion for social justice. Despite his liberal politics, he has difficulty accepting the untraditional sexual practices of the church that Mike founds. Ben longs for an old-fashioned marriage to Jill.
Plot:
Humankind sends its first human expedition to Mars. The spaceship\'s crew arrives on the planet and are never heard from again. Twenty-five years later, another mission is sent, and the child of two of the first ship\'s crewmembers, who has been born on Mars and raised by the peculiar Martian race, is discovered and brought back to Earth. Because of various legal precedents, Valentine Michael Smith, the Man from Mars, is the inheritor to a vast fortune, and because of another precedent known as the Larkin Decision, Mike has a claim to legal ownership of the planet Mars. Therefore he has the potential to be very influential in matters of Earth politics, and he is kept under close guard at a hospital by the leader of Earth\'s government, Secretary General Joseph Douglas. In the hospital, Mike slowly teaches his body to adapt to the Earth\'s atmosphere and he begins learning Earth culture and language, which differ enormously from Martian ways of thought. An ambitious reporter, Ben Caxton, believes that Douglas is using Mike as a pawn in his own political power games and may be planning to kill him. Ben asks his friend and old flame, Jill Boardman, a nurse at the hospital, to help him spy on Mike\'s treatment at the hospital. So Ben gets kidnapped by the authorities. Jill sneaks Mike out of the hospital. When police officers try to kidnap them as well, Mike makes the officers disappear from existence-one of many psychic powers Mike has learned on Mars. Jill takes Mike to the only man she believes can help them, Jubal Harshaw, a famous doctor, lawyer, writer, and general cultural phenomenon. Jubal lives in a large house with three beautiful secretaries. Jubal agrees to help protect Jill and Mike from the authorities. Mike learns about Earth culture at Jubal\'s estate, reading everything in Jubal\'s library and becoming fascinated with Earth religions. The police eventually discover Mike\'s whereabouts and come to arrest Jubal, but at the last moment, Jubal is able to get through to Douglas personally and convince him to call off the police. Jubal also gets Douglas to rescue Ben from police captivity. Jubal is able to defuse Mike\'s political importance, arguing that Mike cannot be the legal owner of Mars since the Martian race inhabited it long before Mike was born. Jubal makes Douglas an ally by convincing him to become overseer of Mike\'s vast personal fortune. Following up on Mike\'s fascination with religion, he, Jubal and Jill go to visit the headquarters of a religious group called the Fosterites. The Fosterites have aggressively built a massive following, in part by enlisting entertainers, such as football players and strippers, to deliver their message, and incorporating things like gambling into their organization. With Jill as his companion, Mike travels to various cities incognito, experiencing Earth culture. They develop a magician\'s act that exhibits Mike\'s powers and join a carnival, but despite Mike\'s amazing abilities, he lacks a sense of showmanship, and they are fired. A Fosterite tattooed lady in the carnival, Patty, goes to visit them at their hotel room, hoping to convert them before they leave. Mike reveals to her that he is the Man from Mars, and reveals his powers. Patty decides that Mike is a new prophet sent to Earth, as powerful as Foster himself. Jill starts to learn the Martian language and some of Mike\'s psychic powers as they continue to travel together. Mike starts to learn many human concepts that have disturbed his understanding, such as desire and humor. Finally he believes he understands Earth culture and is ready to help people get past the petty fears and jealousies. He founds a church, called the Church of All Worlds, which uses techniques much as the Fosterites do to attract new members. The church grows in prominence, and a core group of followers-the \"ninth circle\"-live together communally, where they all work at learning Martian and developing psychic powers. They rarely wear clothing and engage in group sex and partner swapping in a manner disconcerting to outsiders. Ben goes to visit them and is deeply unnerved by their cultish behavior and open sexuality, but soon enough he has overcome his fears and joined them as well. Jubal-who has come to think of Mike as a son-worries about the increasing persecution Mike is facing, and wonders if Mike is not encouraging this persecution. When Mike\'s temple is burned down, Jubal rushes to see him. Though Jubal loves Mike, he has resisted visiting Mike\'s church. Jubal\'s philosophies are all deeply individualist, and Jubal, like Ben, is unnerved by the cultism of Mike\'s operation. Mike wonders if his attempts to help humanity are fruitless, if his message is being lost because of an inherent need in humans to create unhappiness for themselves. An angry mob gathers outside the hotel where they are staying, and, in true showman fashion, Mike presents himself to the mob, naked and defenceless. They murder him and he ascends to Heaven where he becomes an archangel alongside such other self-made prophets like Foster. Jubal and Mike\'s followers forge ahead with Mike\'s work on Earth.
Themes and Motifs:
Parallels between Mike and Jesus Christ - one obvious interpretation of Mike\'s story is a post-modern retelling of the Jesus story. Before the novel even begins, we see that the title of Part One is \"His Maculate Conception,\" a satirical reference to the mythology of Christ\'s Immaculate Conception. Although Mike\'s biological parents are entirely human, Mike\'s birth and childhood on Mars make his origin as unique on Earth as Christ\'s. Like Christ, Mike begins to preach a message of peace and love to mankind attracts followers. Mike\'s \"ninth circle\" is roughly equivalent to Christ\'s disciples, and he is persecuted by the Earthling institutions that seek to preserve their status quo at any cost. Mike is aware of his parallels to Jesus, so when he allows himself to be murdered at the end of the novel, he engineers his death to reference Christ\'s, even positioning himself to be struck by the light in such a way that it appears he has an angelic halo.
The Spiritual Importance of Sexuality - In his time on Earth, Mike slowly learns about his own race, and what characteristics define humankind. The narrator tells us early about the most important difference between human beings and Martians: Martians lack bipolar (male/female) sexuality. By the end of the novel Mike has come to believe that sexuality, and the sexual act, are the greatest gifts that belongs to humanity. Mike\'s first notion of intimacy, learned on Mars, is the act of \"water-sharing\" or drinking from the same glass as another. From there, Mike learns the human act of kissing, its own sort of water-sharing. Soon Mike discovers sex, the ultimate \"growing-closer.\" He believes that the mental bond shared between lovers during sex is the deepest \"grokking\" known.
Powerful Institutions and their tendency towards abusing their power - As soon as Mike is discovered on Mars, he is subjected to the wills of massive Earth institutions. He is brought back to Earth and put in a hospital where he is being observed and cared for. In fact, he is a prisoner of Secretary General Douglas and his administration, who know that Mike\'s political importance, as a celebrity, a man of enormous wealth and arguably the owner of planet Mars, is too great for them to allow him freedom. At one point Douglas considers murdering Mike to preserve his own political power. Any institution has a tendency toward self-preservation, but Heinlein demonstrates here that this tendency is often abused to override basic morality. This is practised by the Fosterite church as it is by the government, and the Fosterites of course are supposed to be, at their root, upholders of morality and goodness. And yet, though Jubal teaches Mike to mistrust institutions, Mike discovers that he needs to build an institution of his own, the Church of All Worlds, modeled largely on the Fosterites, in order to reach the public.
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