Talk:Lazarus Long

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[edit] Comments in third paragraph - do they belong?

From the article (bold is mine):

The promotional copy on the back of Time Enough For Love, the second book featuring the character of Lazarus Long, states that Lazarus was "so in love with time that he became his own ancestor," but this never happens in any of the published books. (yes it does in the one of the last books published - but it involves incest with his mother) This would be a better explanation of his longevity (since he would go back in time and give himself the longevity genes that were necessary for staying alive long enough to be able to go back in time and give himself the longevity genes).

Hey, who stuck this in here? It seems to me that comments like those belong on the talk page, NOT in the article. -- Enigmatick 06:17, 3 October 2005 (UTC)

The back usage of the word ancestor could be used irrelevant of genetics. Ancestors in a non genetic sense are those who come before. He goes back in time and becomes one of the people who shaped his life. Cerium136 04:19, 28 July 2007 (UTC)

Wrong... he did NOT become his own ancestor. Yes, he had sex with his mother but he did not impregnate her. Later on he probably did when he brought her back to Tertius, but when he had sex with her in TEfL she was already pregnant with her husbands son. Plus, in order for him to become his own ancestor wouldn't he have to have sex with his Grandmother? Shonsu 04:49, 30 May 2006 (UTC)

No, he could be his own ancestor by merely impregnating his mother, not his grandmother. Think about it. What you perhaps are presuming is that he is also Maureen's ancestor, which is nowhere stated. --Uroshnor 14:57, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

Well, RAH never does kill him off (and won't, so LL is now effectively immortal). Perhaps at some future date (in a book RAH never got around to writing) LL time-loops again, and does become his own ancestor? RobertAustin 20:07, 28 October 2006 (UTC)

Heinlein used that plot in another story. -- Jim Douglas (talk) (contribs) 20:11, 28 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Spoilers

I have just edited this page and moved the Spoiler warning higher. Some facts in the 2nd paragraph give away plot twists in the book Methuselah's Children. I feel the first couple of paragraphs need to be cleaned up a little so as to give a better idea who LL is. Warpedshadow 13:31, 26 October 2005 (UTC)

If any of you braniacs would bother to actually read the book, then you'd realize that when Lazarus states he is 213 years old, he gets his math wrong. If you are going to put a specific number in the article (213 is a very specific age), then at least check to see if it's correct. I know he says that's how old he is, but he's wrong. This article needs to be changed to reflect his true age, which I think is closer to 227 at the time he says it.

Obviously what Heinlein is saying is that despite the fact that Lazarus had then reached the oldest age ever obtained by any human in history, he was so unconcerned with his age that when someone asks him how old he is, he answers with the wrong age because he perhaps hasn't thought about it in years, so his math is shaky. Anyone who has read the book will know that when Mary asks him, "How old are you?" He says something like (I don't have the book in front of me), "One hundred...no...two hundred and thirteen." (Then still gets it wrong). Anyway, the article should be changed to reflect his true age at the time, with perhaps a word on what his arithmetic mistake implies about Lazarus' philosophy on life. --Uroshnor 09:43, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

The current article states, "When the character of Lazarus Long is introduced in Methuselah's Children, he is 213 years old..." I must repeat: no, he is not. I don't have the book in front of me though (I'm on a different continent from my book collection at the moment), so could anyone who has access to the book please do the math and insert his true age into the article? I'm not going to do it since I'm not sure what it is (I'm relying on memory). Saying that he said he was 213, now that's true, but saying that's how old he is, that's false. --Uroshnor 09:56, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

On page 663 of my very old copy of The Past Through Tomorrow, Justin Foote says "the meeting of 2125" was "eleven years ago", which would make Lazarus 2136 - 1912 = 224 years old at the beginning of Methuselah's Children. -- Jim Douglas 06:12, 27 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] The Rambling about Back-Cover Blurbs in General

... kind of drifts a long way off the topic of L. L. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 80.228.160.95 (talk • contribs) 09:25, 22 August 2006 (UTC)

So it does. I have now pruned it quite a bit. However, that particular back copy is extremely misleading. The one on my copy of Time Enough for Love (Ace edition, 1988) not only has the "became his own ancestor" silliness, but sets out in bold type LAZARUS LONG 1916–4272 though clear internal evidence insists that Woodrow Wilson Smith was born on November 11, 1912. On my first reading I kept expecting a surprise plot twist in which young Woody dies and it turns out that Lazarus has misremembered (?!) and is actually a younger brother or something such. (As I'm writing this, I notice that the figure 4272 is even more bogus: The novel opens in 4272, and according to dialogue in chapter XVII Lazarus is still alive in 4291). Sigh. Henning Makholm 16:53, 25 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Notebooks

Nothing about all the sayings in the "Notebooks of LL"? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 66.191.237.118 (talk • contribs) 05:06, 22 October 2006

So put it in. Be bold. The Notebooks of Lazarus Long are mentioned in the article on Time Enough for Love, in any case. --Michael K. Smith 19:51, 2 November 2006 (UTC)