Sunday, May 3, 2009

Robert Heinlein according to Ran Levi

Every once in a while, עושים היסטוריה! עם רן לוי (Making History with Ran Levi) pays attention to a writer and his work, mostly in the realm of Science Fiction in stead of digging into a subject of the history of science which is Ran Levi's usual subject. These are invariably great episodes.

Among these generally recommended is specifically the recently delivered episode about Robert Heinlein. With great respect, admiration and the usual, typical Israeli tongue in cheek, Ran Levi goes over Heinlein's biography, work and the wild variety of interpretations available. Heinlein is portrayed as a very original figure whose ideas cannot be molded into one commonplace stream or another, yet which stands out as smart, challenging, provocative and eventually accurate.

Apart from all the content of literature and political philosophy, the way Ran Levi deals with Heinlein involves enough science, history and technology to make it neatly fit in with the general subject of the series. Once again, he has shown to be, by far, the most professional Israeli podcaster.

More Making History with Ran Levi:
Diamond Rain and other phenomena,
Blood,
Myths and pseudo-knowledge,
What goes up, must come down,
Douglas Adams.

2 comments:

Saeed said...

I read a lot of Heinlein when I was in my late teens and early college years (before college work got too heavy).

Great author. I don't think there are any authors currently like him, and the science fiction genre could use one or two.

He combined great, personal, narrative writing with "hard science fiction". These days the few authors who put out hard science fiction are not engaging.

Anne the Man said...

I must admit, I have read only one of his books and that was probably more than 25 years ago. I was very impressed, enough to vividly remember after more than 25 years.