The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress
The Moon is a Harsh Mistress is a science fiction novel by Robert A. Heinlein about a Lunar colony's revolt against rule from Earth. It was published in 1966 and the year after it received the Hugo Award for best novel.The novel is narrated by Manuel Garcia O'Kelly Davis (Manny), a one-armed computerman whose accidental discovery of the self-awareness of an intelligent computer ignites a revolution against the hated Lunar Authority. The computer, dubbed Mike (after Mycroft Holmes, brother of Sherlock Holmes), assumes the nom de guerre of Adam Selene, chairman of the revolution. The wise Professor Bernardo de la Paz (Bernie), the beautiful rabble-rousing Wyoming Knott (Betty), and Manny (Bork) form the top-level cell in a plot with their fellow Loonies to liberate the Moon from Earth's control. Hazel Stone, a young girl "with no cushions", leads the Baker Street Irregulars (and later becomes Grandmother Hazel in The Rolling Stones).
The central premise in the book is a revolt against harmful authority (the American revolution of 1776 is often cited) and the advocacy of libertarian principles. Heinlein argues (or, more precisely, illustrates) that it is perfectly possible for a society to organise itself using a minimal government with all necessary services paid for by users on the basis of necessity.
However, the stated reasons for the revolt have rather to do with economic necessity: Luna is exporting so many goods to Earth (and receiving so little by return shipment) that according to Mike's forecasts, its resources will be exhausted in something on the order of seven years. (Since Earth sits at the bottom of a deep gravity well, the only feasible solution is one of engineering; a key plot point is the development of a method of shipping goods to Luna that is not prohibitively expensive.)
Nor, arguably, does Heinlein seem to be hopeful that the rather anarchic libertarianism of Lunar society will survive for very long. By -- and even well before -- the end of the novel, Manny is decrying the authoritarianism of many of his fellow Loonies and the regimentation they would impose on his free society. ("Rules, laws -- always for other fellow.") This theme is echoed elsewhere in Heinlein's works (notably those featuring Lazarus Long) -- that real, albeit temporary, liberty is to be found among the anarchic (but polite to a fault!) pioneer societies out along the advancing frontier, but the regimentation and legalism that inevitably follow also bring restraints that chafe true individualists. (For that matter, we learn in The Cat Who Walks Through Walls that this is just what happens to Luna.)
In general and in Moon, Heinlein seems somewhat pessimistic about human beings' tendency to "saddle themselves with governments." Readers who know of Heinlein's fondness and admiration for Mark Twain may hear an echo here of Huckleberry Finn's discomfort with the Widow Douglas's attempts to "sivilize" him.
The book is the origin of the acronym TANSTAAFL ("There Ain't No Such Thing As A Free Lunch"), and helped popularize the constructed language Loglan, which is mentioned in the story as being used for precise human-computer interaction.
The book is noteworthy, although by no means unique among Heinlein's work, for its assumptions about race and racism. Heinlein's forte was to describe his fictional future societies through the use of telling details rather than heavy-handed expostulation. One of those details in Moon is a thorough and thoroughly unselfconscious racial integration, most remarkable to Heinlein's readers for being unremarkable to the Lunarian colonists. But Heinlein does not predict that racial harmony will be universally true in the future; the reader doesn't realize how thoroughly integrated the moon is until Manny, on a diplomatic mission to the United States, is arrested for miscegenation after he innocently shows a picture of his extended family to his Southern hosts. Some insight into Heinlein's character is gained by recalling that the novel was published in 1966, during a time of significant turmoil over race relations and the future of race relations in the United States.
The novel is also notable stylistically for its use of a fairly thick (but still readable) Lunar dialect consisting predominantly of English words but strongly influenced by Russian grammar. It is likely that in this respect Heinlein was influenced by Anthony Burgess's A Clockwork Orange.
The setting of the novel was re-used much later by Heinlein for his late-period novel, The Cat Who Walks Through Walls.