![]() |
Cover art by Mark Stutzman |
FOR US, THE LIVING: A Comedy of Customs Robert Anson Heinlein Spider Robinson (Introduction) Robert James (Afterword) New York: Scribner, 2004 |
Rating: 5.0 High |
|||
ISBN-13 978-0-7432-5998-9 | ||||
ISBN 0-7432-5998-X | 263p. | HC | $25.00 |
Page 36: | "Perry was particularly delighted to recognize Diana among the Grecian wenches, and pointed out his discovery with a glee." |
S/B "with glee". |
Page 61: | "You see the banks had created a panic and a wave of fear by calling loans and refusing to loan more money." |
This is arguable, but I would say "calling in loans" and "lend". Also, lack of a comma after "see" gives the sentence a run-on feel, about which see Note 1, below. |
Page 74: | "Then let telegraph clerk in the country be considered a special election official." |
S/B "let each telegraph clerk". |
Page 78: | "...and he had the free intellect necessary to do what needed to be done without clouding the issue with a lot of moralistic tape." |
Unless this is an expression new to me, S/B "tripe". |
Page 97: | "In any case the screw itself is a gyro and you were processing it on a rigid frame." |
S/B "precessing". |
Page 140: | "...described with sweeps of his hands what would happen to a shell unlucky enough to be constrained by an inversed-cube type acceleration." |
S/B "inverse-cube" or "inverse-cubed". |
Page 146: | "I think you know what I mean by the term, and I think its in human nature that I should feel as I do...." |
Pesky apostrophes! S/B "it's in human nature". |
Page 148: | "Men are able consciously to examine their motives, emotions, and so forth, and by a conscious process to inhibit or divert a reaction, reflex, and so forth. He can control his emotions or modify them by conscious application, and thereby change 'human nature'." |
Error of number: S/B "They can control their emotions". (Or, better, at the start: "Man is able consciously...".) |
Page 151: | "With the advent of the New Economic Regime women no longer required the services of a man to support her or her offspring." |
Error of number: S/B "them or their offspring". (Or, conversely, near the start, "...no woman required...".) I'd also put a comma after "Regime". |
Page 151: | "Not only did it glorify the love between man and woman but it made possible a deeper, less antagonistic, relation between man and his brother, woman and her sister, for the primary causes of rivalry were gone." |
Extra comma: S/B "a deeper, less antagonistic". I'd also put a comma after "between man and woman" — but this is arguable. |
Page 163: | "For many years this was regarded as the ideal economic condition although any child can see the error of it, but it was called by all sorts of fancy names..." |
Strikes me as another "run-on phrase". See below, Note 1. |
Page 166: | "Thus steel plate or tanned leather may be termed raw material for automobiles factories and luggage factories." |
S/B "automobile factories". |
Page 167: | The list of elements of production worked out by Perry under Master Cathcart's tutelage |
This list omits the workers. (However, they are soon restored to the mix.) |
Page 175: | "Perry set it up on his slide rule." |
I judge this a continuity error. See below, Note 2. |
Page 178: | "Taxes on everybody—such as the sales tax—rob Peter to pay Paul, and increases purchasing power not a whit." |
Error of number: S/B "increase purchasing power". |
Page 181: | "As a matter of practice the government keeps very small stocks of commodities because with a stable standard for money the public prefers cash or credit at the Bank of the United States to the trouble of handling bulk in commodities." |
Words interchanged: S/B "commodities in bulk". |
Page 190: | "I said that government is a factor. It is, if for no other reason than through its police powers it makes the environment safe to work in." |
Missing word: S/B "than that through its police powers". |
Page 191: | "Yes, that is evident but what of it?" |
Strikes me as another "run-on phrase". See below, Note 1. |
Page 205: | "We know what we think it ought to do, but we knew that when the equations of synthesis were for it. But this stuff is all new. Suppose it does something different?" |
Missing word: S/B "when the equations of synthesis were solved for it" — or something similar. (See also Note 3.) |
Page 211: | "For example, if we had ordinary push buttons and I pressed the combination for maximum breaking, I'd be pushed hard upon the board by my own momentum, and I might not be able to release the controls." |
Those pesky homonyms! S/B "maximum braking". (See also Notes 4 & 5.) |
Page 212: | "The president had directed the building of a fleet of fast, unarmed, long-radii patrol vessels, ..." |
Odd choice of words: Why not "long-range"? (Perhaps an error in handwriting transcription, like tape/tripe.) |
Pages 214-5: | "—for the greatest bulwark of the underworld were always the moral creeds of the churches." |
Error of number: S/B either "bulwarks ... were" or "bulwark...was". |