# Authors whose works profess beliefs antithetical to their own? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [December 18, 2010, 1:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/authors-whose-works-profess-beliefs-antithetical-to-their-own/564624 "2010-12-18T13:13:55Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 13\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Peter\_Morris](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/peter_morris/32/359_2.png) [@Peter\_Morris](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Peter_Morris)\ **Post date:** [December 19, 2010, 7:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/authors-whose-works-profess-beliefs-antithetical-to-their-own/564624/41 "2010-12-19T19:32:44Z")
Piers Anthony is an avowed atheist, yet he wrote the \*Incarnations \*series of books, set in a world where God and The Devil are well known to exist, where bad acts will send you to Hell, and prayer will get you into Heaven. It sometimes seems like he’s preaching a sermon, like the Narnia books. But he isn’t, and doesn’t believe in the message. ---
**Author:** ![Horatio\_Hellpop](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/e5b9ba/32.png) [@Horatio\_Hellpop](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Horatio_Hellpop)\ **Post date:** [December 20, 2010, 1:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/authors-whose-works-profess-beliefs-antithetical-to-their-own/564624/42 "2010-12-20T01:27:57Z")
> [@Dave\_Hartwick](#): > > HP Lovecraft’s stories are full of secrets _man was not meant to know_, indescribable _cosmic horrors_, and _superfluous italics_ but he was actually an atheist and scientific materialist. The racism that shows up from time to time is genuine, though. Well, maybe not. His writing had a lot of anti-Semitic posing, but he married a Jewish woman. Think of him as R. Crumb from 70 years earlier. Plato’s **Republic** is, in some interpretations, a manual of how unworkable republics would be. I have a book here of **Playboy** cartoons by Eldon Dedini. The guy depicted orgies and hedonism better than anybody, but nothing in his private life indicates he believed in any of that; he was a chuchgoing Catholic, a faithful husband and rather conservative. Neil LaBute’s Mormonism is a stark contrast to the rather icky protagonists of his stories. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [December 20, 2010, 7:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/authors-whose-works-profess-beliefs-antithetical-to-their-own/564624/43 "2010-12-20T07:17:22Z")
> [@Capitaine\_Zombie](#): > > Books only? > P.S:interestingly, both Clancy and Heinlein are conservatives. Maybe it’s more of a trope in some Conservative circles to use fiction as quasi propaganda. It certainly is among conservative SF writers; see half of everything Niven and/or Pournelle has written in the past 20 years. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [December 20, 2010, 7:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/authors-whose-works-profess-beliefs-antithetical-to-their-own/564624/44 "2010-12-20T07:22:26Z")
> [@Krokodil](#): > > Plato’s **Republic** is, in some interpretations, a manual of how unworkable republics would be. Not Plato’s fault. [The actual Greek title is _Politea_](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plato%27s_Republic) – “polity” – which just means a city-state of any form. The City in Speech is **perfectly** aligned with Plato’s actual beliefs. In fact . . . From _A History of Western Philosophy,_ by Bertrand Russell, Chapter XIV, “Plato’s Utopia”: > [@](#): > > . . . Although all the rulers are to be philosophers, there are to be no innovations; a philosopher is to be, for all time, a man who understands and agrees with Plato. > > When we ask: what will Plato’s Republic achieve? The answer is rather humdrum. It will achieve success in wars against roughly equal populations, and it will secure a livelihood for a certain small number of people. It will almost certainly produce no art or science, because of its rigidity; in this respect, as in others, it will be like Sparta. In spite of all the fine talk, skill in war and enough to eat is all that will be achieved. Plato had lived through famine and defeat in Athens; perhaps, subconsciously, he thought the avoidance of these evils the best that statesmanship could accomplish. > > \ > > Plato’s Republic, unlike modern Utopias, was perhaps intended to be actually founded. This was not so fantastic or impossible as it might naturally seem to us. Many of its provisions, including some that we should have thought quite impracticable, were actually realized at Sparta. The rule of philosophers had been attempted by Pythagoras, and in Plato’s time Archytas the Pythagorean was politically influential in Taras (modern Taranto) when Plato visited Sicily and southern Italy. It was common practice for cities to employ a sage to draw up their laws; Solon had done this for Athens, and Protagoras for Thurii. Colonies, in those days, were completely free from control by their parent cities, and it would have been quite feasible for a band of Platonists to establish the Republic on the shores of Spain or Gaul. Unfortunately chance led Plato to Syracuse, a great commercial city engaged in desperate wars with Carthage; in such an atmosphere, no philosopher could have achieved much. In the next generation, the rise of Macedon had made all small States antiquated, and brought about the futility of all political experiments in miniature. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [December 20, 2010, 7:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/authors-whose-works-profess-beliefs-antithetical-to-their-own/564624/45 "2010-12-20T07:26:50Z")
> [@RikWriter](#): > > I don’t know that this is exactly true, because I don’t know the EXACT nature of his political beliefs, but I have read that Eric Flint is a hardcore socialist, yet his 1632 novels don’t seem to espouse socialist ideals, at least not in an overt way. [He was in the Socialist Workers Party once.](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eric_Flint#Career) And in the 1632 novels, the class warriors of the Committees of Correspondence are pretty sympathetic characters and their hostility to the nobles entirely justified. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [December 20, 2010, 7:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/authors-whose-works-profess-beliefs-antithetical-to-their-own/564624/46 "2010-12-20T07:29:39Z")
> [@silenus](#): > > Exactly what political views of Heinlein are being espoused where? For any character you can find, I can find an opposite one. Not from a **sympathetic** character, you can’t. No socialist or quasi-socialist in Heinlein’s books is a sympathetic character. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [December 20, 2010, 7:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/authors-whose-works-profess-beliefs-antithetical-to-their-own/564624/47 "2010-12-20T07:31:36Z")
> [@Sage\_Rat](#): > > [Cradle Will Rock - Wikipedia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cradle_Will_Rock) Now **that** one is worth renting! ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [December 20, 2010, 7:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/authors-whose-works-profess-beliefs-antithetical-to-their-own/564624/48 "2010-12-20T07:37:38Z")
> [@pravnik](#): > > Machiavelli was who I first thought of as well. There’s been a school of thought for a while (pre-Cracked, even) that _The Prince_ was meant as social satire rather than as a straightforward political treatise. It was meant as a **resume** first and foremost. Machiavelli, having been purged from politics/government in his home state of Florence, was hoping some prince (preferably Cesare Borgia) would read it and hire him as an advisor. That said, the consensus among scholars is that [_The Discourses_](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Discourses_on_Livy) better represents Machiavelli’s actual, republican political views. But, he lived in a country of (mainly) principalities, and he would have stood by _The Prince_ so far as it goes: I.e., this is simply how princes **do** behave if they want to get and keep power, and those prevented by scruples lose out. That is not satire; that is science. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [December 20, 2010, 2:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/authors-whose-works-profess-beliefs-antithetical-to-their-own/564624/49 "2010-12-20T14:53:55Z")
> [@RikWriter](#): > > Any believer in representative government and free market capitalism would be all for destroying the monarchies as well. Yes, the union guys being heroes does play into his beliefs somewhat, but he doesn’t seem to be turning 17th C Europe into a welfare state in the books. So what? A welfare state of any kind would be technically impossible in that milieu. But class war would still be relevant, and if Marx had lived in 1632, he would have been a member of the Committees of Correspondence. ---
**Author:** ![Dr.Rieux](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/aeb1de/32.png) [@Dr.Rieux](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr.Rieux)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2010, 10:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/authors-whose-works-profess-beliefs-antithetical-to-their-own/564624/50 "2010-12-21T22:33:14Z")
> [@Hades](#): > > He is? Do you have a cite for that? I’m a Whedonite and don’t remember Joss making any overt political statements, unless you count his Equality Now speech about feminism. A couple of years ago, he made an address at the American Humanists convention. I’m trying to track it down. ---
**Author:** ![E-Sabbath](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/e19adc/32.png) [@E-Sabbath](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/E-Sabbath)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2010, 1:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/authors-whose-works-profess-beliefs-antithetical-to-their-own/564624/51 "2010-12-22T01:50:55Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > Not from a **sympathetic** character, you can’t. No socialist or quasi-socialist in Heinlein’s books is a sympathetic character. That is funny, because he was a supporter of Upton Sinclair’s. The whole End Poverty movement? So he personally supported socialism at one point to some degree. Hm. I suppose there’s some approval of socialism in The Roads Must Roll, perhaps? ---
**Author:** ![Mr.Excellent](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f19dbf/32.png) [@Mr.Excellent](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr.Excellent)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2010, 6:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/authors-whose-works-profess-beliefs-antithetical-to-their-own/564624/52 "2010-12-22T18:17:40Z")
> [@RikWriter](#): > > I don’t know that this is exactly true, because I don’t know the EXACT nature of his political beliefs, but I have read that Eric Flint is a hardcore socialist, yet his 1632 novels don’t seem to espouse socialist ideals, at least not in an overt way. Indeed, he’s written about this point - he had an interesting column on Baen’s website a while back, which I cannot dig up at the moment. The gist was that it’s silly to boycott Harlan Ellison’s works because he’s a dick on copyright issues, because an artist’s work can and should be appreciated separately from his political views. For example, Flint and Weber collaborated on the 1632 series - but the two men are on opposite ends of the political spectrum. If Flint insisted upon only reading works by people he agreed with, or only writing stories he agreed with politically, he’d be unable to work with Weber. ---
**Author:** ![Mr.Excellent](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f19dbf/32.png) [@Mr.Excellent](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr.Excellent)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2010, 6:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/authors-whose-works-profess-beliefs-antithetical-to-their-own/564624/53 "2010-12-22T18:21:17Z")
> [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](#): > > The views of Harry Paget Flashman definitely did not reflect the views of his author, George MacDonald Fraser. Mostly true. However, the thing that makes the Flashman novels such good reads is that Flashman is a remarkably clear-eyed observer of the world around him. A bigot, rapist, coward and all-around terrible human being, yes - but also a very smart and resourceful one. Recall, also, that these books were pretty well-researched. Obviously, Flashman’s political preferences, endorsement of cowardice, views on women and race and so on are not Fraser’s own. But when Flashman says, as an aside to the audience, “So-and-so historical figure was incompetent” or “The causes of the First Afghan War were such-and-such” - he’s probably saying something pretty close to what Fraser believed. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/authors-whose-works-profess-beliefs-antithetical-to-their-own/564624.md?page=2)