Talk:Future History (Heinlein)

message: (These notes are primarily for Moses, but also for anyone else who has an interest in this article.)
I reviewed James Gifford's list here:
4.1 - What is the Future History?
And also the list he published in Robert A. Heinlein: A Reader's Companion.  I think it makes the most sense to show a single all-inclusive Future History chart, with footnotes to indicate stories that were either (d) dropped, (u) unwritten, or (c) compatible with the Future History, but not canonical.
This is more or less what Future History currently shows under Chronology:
* Life-Line
* "—And He Built a Crooked House—" (d1)
* "Let There Be Light" (d2)
* Word Edgewise (u1)
* The Roads Must Roll
* Blowups Happen
* The Man Who Sold the Moon
* Delilah and the Space-Rigger
* Space Jockey
* Requiem
* The Long Watch
* Gentlemen, Be Seated
* The Black Pits of Luna
* Nothing Ever Happens On the Moon (c1)
* "It"s Great to Be Back!"
* "--We Also Walk Dogs"
* Searchlight
* Ordeal in Space
* The Green Hills of Earth
* Fire Down Below! (u2)
* Logic of Empire
* The Menace from Earth
* Columbus Was a Dope (c2)
* The Sound Of His Wings (u3)
* Eclipse (u4)
* The Stone Pillow (u5)
* "If This Goes On--"
* Coventry
* Misfit
* Methuselah's Children
* Universe
* Common Sense
* Time Enough for Love
* To Sail Beyond The Sunset (c3)
* (And at this point, we diverge to World As Myth)
(TPTT = "The Past Through Tomorrow"):
* (d1) Does not appear in TPTT; possibly considered sub-standard.
* (d2) Does not appear in TPTT; Gifford has two possible explanations – (1) Heinlein might have considered it sub-standard (it was a 1940 'Lyle Monroe' story); (2) the editor of TPTT simply didn't like the story.  These theories are based on Heinlein's accession notes to the UCSC archives, 1967.  Arguments for including it are (1) Douglas and Martin do appear as individuals in the Future History chart (pages 660-661 of TPTT) and (2) Douglas-Martin sun-power screens are important plot elements in "The Roads Must Roll", "Blowups Happen", and "The Man Who Sold The Moon", and they are mentioned in "To Sail Beyond The Sunset."
* (u1) Unwritten, no details known.
* (u2) Unwritten, about a revolution in Antarctica.
* (u3) Unwritten, the story of Nehemiah Scudder's rise to power
* (u4) Unwritten, the transition of the U.S. from republic to theocracy
* (u5) Unwritten, the early resistance movement, which takes us up to "-If This Goes On".
Gifford calls these "Works that fit into the Future History but were never officially included":
* (c1) Not officially part of Future History; Gifford includes it himself with the comment that Heinlein said it was "not incompatible with the Future History."
* (c2) Gifford includes this as Future History (alternate); it's not officially included.
* (c3) Clearly part of the Future History; it's in part a retelling of "Time Enough for Love" and "The Man Who Sold the Moon" from Maureen's perspective.
I'm a bit confused about the "Early Incarnations" section and the breakdown between Original Future History and Second Future History.  This reads like original research.  The list we should document on this page is the one shown under Chronology; I've never heard of Heinlein breaking it up into two categories like this.
The "Other Future Histories" section is also questionable.  There were sometimes cross-references between stories (the most obvious examples being Gulf->Friday and The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress->The Rolling Stones->The Cat Who Walks Through Walls), but this whole section should be trimmed down to a simple observation that Heinlein sometimes carried plot points between stories.  (I would argue that the whole section needs to go; it has nothing to do with the Future History series.)
Arguably, we could include a section here about World As Myth, as those books are an offshoot from the Future History.
-- Jim Douglas 06:41, 19 September 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Yeah, I pretty much agree with everything you said here. This page is basically a re-edit of User:Kthgibson's , so if you think if you think it's original research, you're probably right. I say go for it. One thing I like about the current incarnation is that the main chronology of the Future History is upfront, so that readers who are new to it don't get confused by what they should start reading or in what order. If we start them straight off with a bunch of unwritten stories and annotations about whether a story actually belongs or not, they might get daunted. Maybe we could put a main Future History at the top and then all the unwritten stories and stories that may or may not belong down below in a separate section. Or there could be standard Future History at the top and then a complete Future History down below. There a lot of ways to go with it. I think the main thing is to be clear. mosesroth 08:27, 19 September 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Drop '''Early Incarnations''' and '''Other Future Histories''' ? 

message: Text below was cut from the main article as original research or unrelated to the main article topic.
===Early Incarnations===
Heinlein’s Future History was compiled from two earlier future histories by Heinlein, by retconning them together and removing some of the stories and novels and adding in other stories. One, written before World War II, was called Future History, but was different in many respects and it is listed below as "Original Future History". The other, written after World War II, was never given a name, but is called "Second Future History" below.
====Original Future History====
The stories in the "Original Future History" include a story (marked with an *) that would be retroactively removed when the final Future History was created, another that was sometimes included and sometimes not (marked with an ^), and a third story written at this time, but not included in the "Original Future History" (marked with a **).
*Life-Line (1939)
* ^"Let There Be Light" (~1949)
* *"—And He Built a Crooked House—" (~1950)
*The Roads Must Roll (~1976)
*Blowups Happen (~1977)
*Requiem (~2010)
*Logic of Empire (~2025)
*"If This Goes On—" (~2075)
*Coventry (~2110)
*Misfit (~2110)
*Methuselah's Children (2136 - 2210)
*Universe (~2600?)
*Common Sense (~2600?)
* **We Also Walk Dogs
====Second Future History====
After World War II, Heinlein thought space flight was just around the corner, and wished to show the readership how humanity would conquer the Solar system.  He started a second future history (called here "Second Future History"), though he never officially gave it a name.  The stories marked with an * would be retroactively compiled with the "Original Future History" to create the Future History in its final form.
*Rocket Ship Galileo
* *Space Jockey
* *Gentlemen, Be Seated!
* *The Black Pits of Luna
* *"It's Great to Be Back!"
* *The Long Watch
*Red Planet
* *The Green Hills of Earth
* *Ordeal in Space
*The Rolling Stones
*Farmer in the Sky
*Space Cadet
===Other Future Histories===
Heinlein also published other future histories, unrelated to the main Future History.
====Unnamed Series====
With the short stories from the "Second Future History" moved to the final Future History, that left the novels, all juveniles, in an unnamed series. The novel Time for the Stars and the short story "Sky Lift" both seem to be related to these novels, because Ortega Torchships are the mode of interplanetary travel in both these stories as well as in the novel Farmer in the Sky, but there is no direct linkage otherwise. In addition, Stranger in a Strange Land appears to be a prequel to Red Planet and The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress appears to be a prequel to The Rolling Stones, but they are otherwise unrelated to the other books in the unnamed series.
*Rocket Ship Galileo
*Red Planet 
*The Rolling Stones aka Space Family Stone aka Tramp Space Ship
*Farmer in the Sky aka Satellite Scout
*Space Cadet
*Sky Lift
*Time for the Stars
====Miscellaneous====
Heinlein also wrote other stories and novels, some of them interelated, making series. This includes the novella "Gulf" and the novel Friday which are in the same series and the novels Between Planets and Starman Jones which are in another.
There are some common elements in Friday and The Cat Who Walks Through Walls, and since both stories have connections with other stories, they seem to belong to the same timeline (in the World as Myth concept), the Timeline 3.
Text above this line was cut from the main article as original research or unrelated to the main article topic. -- Jim Douglas (talk) (contribs) 04:14, 20 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Text cut from article 2006-10-20 

message: Heinlein also published other future histories, unrelated to the main Future History.
====Unnamed Series====
With the short stories from the "Second Future History" moved to the final Future History, that left the novels, all juveniles, in an unnamed series. The novel Time for the Stars and the short story "Sky Lift" both seem to be related to these novels, because Ortega Torchships are the mode of interplanetary travel in both these stories as well as in the novel Farmer in the Sky, but there is no direct linkage otherwise. In addition, Stranger in a Strange Land appears to be a prequel to Red Planet and The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress appears to be a prequel to The Rolling Stones, but they are otherwise unrelated to the other books in the unnamed series.
*Rocket Ship Galileo
*Red Planet 
*The Rolling Stones aka Space Family Stone aka Tramp Space Ship
*Farmer in the Sky aka Satellite Scout
*Space Cadet
*Sky Lift
*Time for the Stars
====Miscellaneous====
Heinlein also wrote other stories and novels, some of them interelated, making series. This includes the novella "Gulf" and the novel Friday which are in the same series and the novels Between Planets and Starman Jones which are in another.
There are some common elements in Friday and The Cat Who Walks Through Walls, and since both stories have connections with other stories, they seem to belong to the same timeline (in the World as Myth concept), the Timeline 3.
Text above this line was cut from the main article as original research or unrelated to the main article topic. -- Jim Douglas (talk) (contribs) 04:14, 20 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Other Future Histories

message: Heinlein also wrote other stories and novels, some of them interelated, making series. This includes the novella "Gulf" and the novel Friday which are in the same series and the novels Between Planets and Starman Jones which are in another.
There are some common elements in Friday and The Cat Who Walks Through Walls, and since both stories have connections with other stories, they seem to belong to the same timeline (in the World as Myth concept), the Timeline 3.
Text above this line was cut from the main article as original research or unrelated to the main article topic. -- Jim Douglas (talk) (contribs) 04:14, 20 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Miscellaneous

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thread_title: Image copyright problem with Image:Pasttomorrow.jpg

message: It seems to me that the article should say something about what happens in the Future History.  It's been years since I've read THE PAST THROUGH TOMORROW, but I remember the main points as:
(1) The development of space travel, not by the US government but by a private businessman, Harriman.
(2) The overthrow of the US government by a phony religious leader, Nehemiah Scudder.
(3) The eventual defeat of Scudder, followed by an attempt to found a Utopian society.
CharlesTheBold (talk) 05:05, 11 March 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  So what happened? 

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thread_title:  External links modified 

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thread_title:  External links modified 

message: Even though there are multiple incarnations of the chart, why is one of them not included in-line with this piece, to show it?
https://web.archive.org/web/20151105170345/http://www.baenebooks.com/chapters/1439133417/1439133417___1.htm
It seems jarringly lacking for it to not be here, as it is (AFAIK) the first of its type.
OBloodyHell (talk) 14:17, 23 January 2023 (UTC)
replies: text: It would be a violation of copyright. Schazjmd (talk) 16:15, 23 January 2023 (UTC)
thread_title:  Why is the actual chart not included?