The Year of the Jackpot by Robert Heinlein Page A

Matter of Form” (1938) was a long novelette, and he brought practical as well as theoretical lessons to his writers, who he unleashed to develop these ideas. (John Campbell of course, had also done this in the 40s and continued in the 50s to be a directive editor.) It is not inconceivable that many or even most of the contents of the 1950’s
Galaxy
were based on ideas originated by Gold: golden technology becomes brass and jails its human victims when it runs amok—is certainly one of his most characteristic.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
    Robert A. Heinlein (1907–1988) is by acclamation the most important and originating science fiction writer in the history of a genre marked by the first issue of
Amazing Science Fiction
in April 1926. Heinlein, a 1929 graduate of the Naval Academy, served during peacetime in command posts, contracted tuberculosis, was involuntarily retired in the mid-thirties and first became involved unsuccessfully in California politics as a disciple of Upton Sinclair. Failing to achieve electoral office, he wrote an unpublished polemical novel (published posthumously as a curiosity) and then turned to science fiction. Within less than three years after his first publication in
Astounding
(“Lifeline,” July 1939) he stood alone as the most successful and respected science fiction writer in the history of the genre. Early novels such as
Methusaleh’s Children
and
Sixth Column
appeared in
Astounding
along with memorable stories like “By His Bootstraps,” “Universe,” “Blowups Happen” and “The Roads Must Roll.” He paused during wartime for military liaison work, returned to writing in 1946 and after becoming the first writer to sell science fiction to the general circulation magazines he embarked upon the series of Scribners juveniles which defined the form and brought hundreds of thousands of young readers to the field. A four-time Hugo winner for best novel and three-time World Convention Guest of Honor, Heinlein received in 1974 the first SFWA Grand Master Trophy, an award created explicitly to honor him. His 1961 novel
Stranger In A Strange Land
became one of the signal novels adapted by the counterculture; its 1965 successor
The Moon Is A Harsh Mistress
was almost as successful. His long later novels were controversial for their self-indulgence, but his audience continued to grow. It is debatable whether Heinlein or his friend Isaac Asimov was the science fiction writer who had the greatest influence on the culture and on generations of scientists. They argued good-naturedly about it.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR OF THE eFOREWORD
    Paul Di Filippo is the author of many science fiction novels, the best known of which is the seminal
The Steampunk Trilogy
, and over a hundred short stories, several of which have been final balloted for the Nebula Award. He has been a regular columnist (the satirical “Plumage From Pegasus”) for many years in
The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction
. He has been a regular book reviewer for
Asimov’s Science Fiction Magazine
for well over a dozen years and is the science fiction reviewer for Amazon.

ABOUT THE JACKET
    COVER IMAGE: “Merry Christmas to Our Readers” by Ed Emshwiller
        Ed Emshwiller (1925–1990) was
Galaxy
’s dominant artist through the 1950s. His quirky images, perspective, and off-center humor provide perhaps the best realization of the magazine’s iconoclastic, satirical vision. Emshwiller was—matched with Kelly Freas—science fiction’s signature artist through the decade and a half initiated by this color illustration. He and Carol Emshwiller, the celebrated science fiction writer, lived in Long Island during the period of his prominence in science fiction. (Nonstop Press published
Emshwiller: Infinity X Two: The Art & Life of Ed and Carol Emshwiller
, a joint biography and collection of their work in visual and literary medium, in 2007.) In the early 70s, Emshwiller became passionately interested in avant-garde filmmaking, and