'Trash'
[NAFDA] "There will be an occasional happy, so that it might be crushed under the boot of the writer." From Zorro to Angel (including Wonderfalls and The Inside), this is where Buffistas come to anoint themselves in the bloodbath.
Ok, but is there back and forth along the line? Is ita restricted to Tim and Mark, or can she mess around with you and Kate Winslet if the spirit moves her?
Or, if the het thing messes things up, say Kate then marries Sean. Free for all, or do you and ita just get to gnash your teeth jealously?
I'm married to everybody in the line. Everybody is married to everybody else. You just sign up boy, girl, boy, girl in order.
The way I should have put it: I marry Tim. Tim and I marry ita. Tim, ita, and I marry Mark. And so on. So when Kate marries Sean, ita and I are in clover. Assuming it's Sean Bean. If it's Sean William Scott, ita and I exercise our veto power.
Because this is middle-period Heinlein, it never even occurs to ita and me to mess around with Kate. What a waste.
It's essentially a way of dodging inheritance taxes.
As originally conceived, it's a way of setting up a stable family in an environment that is both very dangerous and woman-poor. (Yes, the boy-girl rotation doesn't work with that. It's presented as one family's habit. Don't yell at me, yell at Heinlein.) If you have two mothers and three fathers in the family, when a parent dies, there are still several people around to raise the kids.
Is there a limit to the number of people in a line marriage? I'm having fun making mine up, but I think it could get unwieldy.
And Tim, as first husband, at age 102, has the right to bed down with all teh new wives first, right-o?
Right-o. Also, I, as first wife, at a ripe and shapely 45 (hey, if this is my fantasy, I'm going with it) get first dibs on Tim, Mark, and Sean-if-it's-Bean.
Tim, Mark, and Sean would presumably not have signed on for the whole shebang if they couldn't stand the thought of bedding me.
Wow. RH needed some saltpeter.
And in TMisHM's Luna, women toally have the power when it comes to sex. There are so few of them, it's ladies-choice, all day, every day.
But grandpa still gets the droit de seigneur.
I understand the whole "propogation is the ultimate biological imperative" argument of RAH's, and for species survival, this is true. I'm just saying that there's more to marriage than biological imperative. And RAH just gets all end-all-and-be-all smug about "women breed, men protect, and if you don't belive this, you're an idiot."
Wow. you are making me hate Heinlein and I've never even read him.