Quotes from book
Between Planets

Between Planets

Robert A. Heinlein

Between Planets is a juvenile science fiction novel by American writer Robert A. Heinlein, originally serialized in Blue Book magazine in 1951 as "Planets in Combat". It was published in hardcover that year by Scribner's as part of the Heinlein juveniles.

“Everything is theoretically impossible, until it’s done. One could write a history of science in reverse by assembling the solemn pronouncements of highest authority about what could not be done and could never happen.”

Robert A. Heinlein book Between Planets

Source: Between Planets (1951), Chapter 2, “Mene, Mene, Tekel, Upharsin” (p. 23)

“My old man says when it's time to be counted, the important thing is to be man enough to stand up.”

Robert A. Heinlein book Between Planets

Source: Between Planets

“He considered horoscopes as silly as spectacles on a cow.”

Robert A. Heinlein book Between Planets

Source: Between Planets (1951), Chapter 4, “The Glory Road” (p. 43)

“Mercifully, we stay our hand. Earth’s cities will not be bombed. The free citizens of Venus Republic have no wish to slaughter their cousins still on Terra. Our only purpose is to establish our own independence, to manage our own affairs, to throw off the crushing yoke of absentee ownership and taxation without representation which has bleed us poor.
In doing so, in so taking our stand as free men, we call on all oppressed and impoverished nations everywhere to follow our lead, accept our help. Look up into the sky! Swimming there above you is the very station from which I now address you. The fat and stupid rulers of the Federation have made of Circum-Terra an overseer’s whip. The threat of this military base in the sky has protected their empire from the just wrath of their victims for more then five score years.
We now crush it.
In a matter of minutes this scandal in the clean skies, this pistol pointed at the heads of men everywhere on your planet, will cease to exist. Step out of doors, watch the sky. Watch a new sun blaze briefly, and know that its light is the light of Liberty inviting all of Earth to free itself.
Subject peoples of Earth, we free men of the free Republic of Venus salute you with that sign!”

Robert A. Heinlein book Between Planets

Source: Between Planets (1951), Chapter 6, “The Sign in the Sky” (p. 74) - Speech given before the destruction of the nuclear-armed satellite Circum-Terra.

“He had let himself be bulldozed by the odds against him. He promised himself never again to pay any attention to the odds, but only to the issues.”

Robert A. Heinlein book Between Planets

Source: Between Planets (1951), Chapter 4, “The Glory Road” (p. 45)

“Man needs freedom, but few men are so strong as to be happy with complete freedom. A man needs to be part of a group, with accepted and respected relationships. Some men join foreign legions for adventure; still more swear on a bit of paper in order to acquire a framework of duties and obligations, customs and taboos, a time to work and a time to loaf, a comrade to dispute with and a sergeant to hate—in short, to belong.”

Robert A. Heinlein book Between Planets

Source: Between Planets (1951), Chapter 7, “The Detour” (p. 83)

“The attack should not have happened, of course. The rice farmer sergeant had been perfectly right; the Federation could not afford to risk its own great cites to punish the villagers of Venus. He was right—from his viewpoint.
A rice farmer has one logic; the men who live by and for power have another and entirely different logic. Their lives are built on tenuous assumptions, fragile as reputation; they could not afford to ignore a challenge to their power—the Federation could not afford not to punish the insolent colonists.”

Robert A. Heinlein book Between Planets

Source: Between Planets (1951), Chapter 10, “While I Was Musing the Fire Burned” (p. 113)

“Chief, perhaps it would be clearest to say that the fasarta modulates the garbab in such a phase relationship that the thrimaleen is forced to bast—or, to put it another way, somebody loosed mice in the washroom. Seriously, there is no popular way to explain it. If you were willing to spend five hard years with me, working up through the math, I could probably bring you to the same level of ignorance and confusion that I enjoy.”

Robert A. Heinlein book Between Planets

Source: Between Planets (1951), Chapter 17, “To Reset the Clock” (p. 176)

“She grabbed him by both ears and kissed him quickly, then ran away.
Don stared after her, rubbing his mouth. Girls, he reflected, were much odder than dragons. Probably another race entirely.”

Robert A. Heinlein book Between Planets

Source: Between Planets (1951), Chapter 18, “Little David” (p. 182)

“Don took it and said, “Uh, thanks! That’s awfully kind of you. I’ll pay it back, first chance.”
“Instead, pay it forward to some other brother who needs it.””

Robert A. Heinlein book Between Planets

Source: Between Planets (1951), Chapter 8, “Foxes Have Holes, and Birds of the Air Have Nests—” (p. 91)

“He was still having trouble readjusting. Wars were something you studied, not something that actually happened.”

Robert A. Heinlein book Between Planets

Source: Between Planets (1951), Chapter 1, “New Mexico” (p. 9)

“Don, have you been dealing with a booklegger?”

Robert A. Heinlein book Between Planets

Source: Between Planets (1951), Chapter 1, “New Mexico” (p. 10) - Mr. Reeves, asking the main character why he was in possession of a forbidden book discussing interplanetary politics.

“A second sun blazed white and swelled visibly as he watched. What on Earth would have been—so many times had been—a climbing mushroom cloud was here in open space a perfect geometrical sphere, growing unbelievably. It swelled still larger, dropping from limelight white to to silvery violet, became blotched with purple, red and flame. And still it grew, until it blanked out the earth beyond it.
At the time it had been transformed into a radioactive cosmic cloud Circum-Terra had been passing over, or opposite, the North Atlantic; the swollen incandescent cloud was visible to most of the habitable portions of the globe, a burning symbol in the sky.”

Robert A. Heinlein book Between Planets

Source: Between Planets (1951), Chapter 6, “The Sign in the Sky” (p. 75)

“The point is, your request for a lawyer comes about two hundred years too late to be meaningful. The verbalisms lag behind the facts. Nevertheless, you shall have a lawyer—or a lollipop, whichever you prefer, after I am through questioning you. If I were you, I’d take the lollipop. More nourishing.”

Robert A. Heinlein book Between Planets

Source: Between Planets (1951), Chapter 3, “Hunted” (p. 38) - Secret Service officer to the main character during an interrogation.

“He gave up and went back to loafing, found that he could sleep all right in the afternoons but that the practice kept him awake at night.”

Robert A. Heinlein book Between Planets

Source: Between Planets (1951), Chapter 17, “To Reset the Clock” (p. 173)

Similar authors

Robert A. Heinlein photo

Robert A. Heinlein557

American science fiction author 1907–1988

Isaac Asimov photo

Isaac Asimov303

American writer and professor of biochemistry at Boston Uni… None

Carl Sagan photo

Carl Sagan365

American astrophysicist, cosmologist, author and science ed… None

Arthur C. Clarke photo

Arthur C. Clarke207

British science fiction writer, science writer, inventor, u… None

Stephen King photo

Stephen King733

American author None

L. Ron Hubbard photo

L. Ron Hubbard85

American science fiction author, philosopher, cult leader, … None

Ray Bradbury photo

Ray Bradbury401

American writer None

Jack London photo

Jack London77

American author, journalist, and social activist None

Frank Herbert photo

Frank Herbert158

American writer None

H.P. Lovecraft photo

H.P. Lovecraft203

American author None

Similar authors

Robert A. Heinlein photo

Robert A. Heinlein557

American science fiction author 1907–1988

Isaac Asimov photo

Isaac Asimov303

American writer and professor of biochemistry at Boston Uni… None

Carl Sagan photo

Carl Sagan365

American astrophysicist, cosmologist, author and science ed… None

Arthur C. Clarke photo

Arthur C. Clarke207

British science fiction writer, science writer, inventor, u… None

Stephen King photo

Stephen King733

American author None