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"I'm very taken by mythology. I read it at a very early age and kept on reading it. Before I discovered science fiction I was reading mythology."
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This story has been largely forgotten (even though it still makes great reading). The notion of a waldo, however, has not. The word itself has come into common usage; the American Heritage Dictionary describes it as follows: "A mechanical agent, such as a gripper arm, controlled by a human limb." Real-life waldoes were developed for the nuclear industry during WWII; they were named after the invention described by Heinlein.
This technology is known today by the more generic term "telefactoring"; it is used in a variety of industries.
Heinlein shows his creativity by giving his character a problem (myasthenia gravis - degenerative muscle weakness) and then literally giving him the tool to solve it. You'll also enjoy his laboratory (in orbit, of course, to give Waldo maximum mobility).
A pantograph is a device with a simple physical connection between a pointer and a drawing pen on a piece of paper. Altering the linkage between the pointer and the pen alters the scale of the drawing. The pantograph dates from 1630. Thomas Jefferson liked them; he built one into Monticello. In Oath of Fealty, by Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle, telefactor operators who all live in the same arcology assist in a variety of tasks around the globe (and on the moon). At one point, they go on strike; a case of acting locally and globally. Compare to microhands from Microhands (Микроруки) (1931) by Boris Zhitkov and the iron fingers from The Death's Head Meteor (1931) by Neil R. Jones. Comment/Join this discussion ( 5 ) | RSS/XML | Blog This | Additional
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'... the expressionless face before me was therefore that of the golem-wrestler, Rolem, a creature that could be set for five times the strength of a human being.'
Giant Robotic Hands At Gundam Next Future Science
'Waldo put his arms into the primary pair before him; all three pairs, including the secondary pair mounted before the machine, came to life.'
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'... the glittering little rocket bolted to the black iron behind him.'
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'The slender stalks of a sunshade-photocell collector...'
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'The operation that had transformed half his body... had located the control switchboard in his teeth.'
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