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From: leeper@mtgzz.UUCP (m.r.leeper)
Newsgroups: net.sf-lovers
Subject: Re: GREAT SF STORIES (1939)
Message-ID: <724@mtgzz.UUCP>
Date: Tue, 14-May-85 00:19:30 EDT
Article-I.D.: mtgzz.724
Posted: Tue May 14 00:19:30 1985
Date-Received: Wed, 8-May-85 06:21:18 EDT
References: <713@mtgzz.UUCP> <186@hyper.UUCP>
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>>      "Lifeline" by Robert Heinlein
>
>It should be mentioned that this was Heinlein's first short
>story.  

I didn't think that was all that relevant, but it certainly is true.

>Like many of Heinlein's stories, at the time it was
>written, it was NOT a "re-telling of an old idea" but rather
>the first time the idea was brought into Science-Fiction.

The two are not mutually exclusive.  It was both.  There have been
tales since the ancient Greeks of people who have been told that they
would be killed in such and such a battle.  In fact, the idea of
knowing the time of one's death need not even be fantasy.  In this
case, instead of a Delphic oracle telling a man of his own death, a
scientist uses a scientific means.  That is an engaging concept in
itself, but its dramatic impact, the effect it has on people, has shown
up before in fiction.  (Not that it is relevant to this argument, but
it also shows up in -- admittedly later -- fantasy films GOLDEN
EARRINGS and KRULL and non-fantasy films IKIRU and LAST HOLIDAY those
these latter two are stretching the point a little.)  In any case, I
stand by what I said, it is a decent story but essentially an old
idea.

>Jerry can supply the date it was written.

It first appeared in magazine form in 1939 -- that is how it made it
into this anthology.

				Mark Leeper
				...ihnp4!mtgzz!leeper