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Asimov's Foundation

S

ShapeShifter

SOC-13
After having heard about this Trilogy for over 30 years I gave in and started reading it just last week. However, after about 120 pages in, I'm having misgivings about continuing. Asimov writes about huge, sweeping concepts, massive historical trends and events but it is all very abstract. There are scores of proper nouns, but no characters, no personalities, no tangible human beings to link to the names. I've heard that Asimov wrote Foundation in his early 20s (based heavily on Gibbon) and unfortunately it shows clearly. Has anyone else read this alleged classic? What were your impressions of the story? Some of those aforementioned sweeping concepts I find very mildly inspiring for a Traveller campaign, but it's thus far been too nebulous in its treatment of many fleeting generations and the experiences of an elite few personages to motivate me to finish this as anything other than a ponderous literary obligation sans the requisite enthusiasm. Am I alone in my perhaps overly-critical assessment?
 
I read it years ago (at least 30 years ago :) ) and recall it fondly though youth and time passing have probably coloured my perceptions while age has eroded my memory :)

I have a vague recollection of what you're talking about now having read your summation, about the nebulous feel of it. I think it does develop that into character, IF I'm recalling rightly. You might just need to get a little further in, I'm not sure 120 pages is enough but then I wouldn't want you to read something you're not into on my say so :)

Not to distract from your topic but talking about "a ponderous literary obligation" puts me more in mind of my tackling the Mission Earth decology by L. Ron Hubbard (yes that one). Now THAT is a truly ponderous literary obligation at some 1.2 million words :) A good read though (but be warned, as I recall it had some raunchy bits). After that trilogies are light reading ;)
 
:rofl: Yes, Battlefield Earth was also ponderous! I couldn't get more than a few hundred pages in without grimacing and wincing at the horrid writing. I will persevere and read the Foundation Trilogy to its conclusion, and I will hope that Asimov's writing improves. It just reads like it was in dire need of a diligent editor to comb through it and leave the author detailed notes on how to improve it -- notes which were obviously ignored before the story went to press.
 
Pah. To both of you. I'm not talking the trivially short and better written Battlefield Earth big fat book. I'm talking about the epic, some say epically bad, Mission Earth novel series. Plow through that and no mere novel or trilogy will frighten you ;)

For what it's worth, beyond more distraction from the original question, I really didn't find Mission Earth, nor Battlefield Earth, all that bad. Of course it might have been that I read them during droughts of sci-fi offerings. They aren't among what I'd call my favourite reads and I wouldn't really recommend them for entertainment.
 
ShapeShifter said:
After having heard about this Trilogy for over 30 years I gave in and started reading it just last week. However, after about 120 pages in, I'm having misgivings about continuing. Asimov writes about huge, sweeping concepts, massive historical trends and events but it is all very abstract. There are scores of proper nouns, but no characters, no personalities, no tangible human beings to link to the names. I've heard that Asimov wrote Foundation in his early 20s (based heavily on Gibbon) and unfortunately it shows clearly. Has anyone else read this alleged classic? What were your impressions of the story? Some of those aforementioned sweeping concepts I find very mildly inspiring for a Traveller campaign, but it's thus far been too nebulous in its treatment of many fleeting generations and the experiences of an elite few personages to motivate me to finish this as anything other than a ponderous literary obligation sans the requisite enthusiasm. Am I alone in my perhaps overly-critical assessment?
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"Alleged" classic?? Goodness, how old are you? I encountered the series in my teens - in the 70's - and I've managed to reread it about every year or so since. I think part of what's happening is that the expectations for pace and such have changed over the years - people nowadays seem disappointed if a novel doesn't race like a 1-hour TV show, with a bit of soap opera thrown into the plot in the name of "depth of character". At the age when I was devouring Asimov and Clarke, my boy leans toward Percy Jackson.

Have you tried the really old classics? Jules Verne? Herman Melville? I took a read at them, kinda fun, but it was so stilted and awkward - the language conventions have changed over the generations. Melville was particularly ... difficult.
 
Yes, I have read all 6 books. :)

Yes there are six books in the series. The last 3 are not written by the Big A.

The style is dry compared to what most individuals are use now (and even some back then).

But if you want to fill in the middle read his other books about the same universe in between the first 3.

If you are not into empire building by reality, the series will most likely seem distant and large. Most stories are written about a hero or group of individuals that change the world (universe) but in the Foundation series it is about a concept that is taken on over eons and kept alive.

(or is it? read the entire series and you might be surprise or not.)

Dave Chase
 
I've read and enjoyed the entire set of Foundation books several times over the years. But, as much as enjpy the books, I must admit that I really dislike the central conceit of the series: that "if we eggheads can just get the math right, we can tell everyone how to live properly."

I think that's why like the fact that in Traveller, the only recorded instance of a "pyscho-history" experiment ended up with the Psionic Suppressions and more or less blew up in the Imperium's face.
 
Carlobrand said:
"Alleged" classic?? Goodness, how old are you? I encountered the series in my teens - in the 70's - and I've managed to reread it about every year or so since. I think part of what's happening is that the expectations for pace and such have changed over the years - people nowadays seem disappointed if a novel doesn't race like a 1-hour TV show, with a bit of soap opera thrown into the plot in the name of "depth of character". At the age when I was devouring Asimov and Clarke, my boy leans toward Percy Jackson.

Have you tried the really old classics? Jules Verne? Herman Melville? I took a read at them, kinda fun, but it was so stilted and awkward - the language conventions have changed over the generations. Melville was particularly ... difficult.
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I really like the Black Widowers series. That said, the best character in Foundation is the capital tramway, and the best character writing is at the videos in the vaults. Even The Mule was a piece of cardboard.

Great concept, poor writing of people.
 
Garyius2003 said:
I really like the Black Widowers series. That said, the best character in Foundation is the capital tramway, and the best character writing is at the videos in the vaults. Even The Mule was a piece of cardboard.

Great concept, poor writing of people.
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I love all of Asimov's old stuff and some of his newer stuff, though some of it's ... well ... but I have to be honest: his characters often seemed rather robotic.:D
 
Carlobrand said:
I love all of Asimov's old stuff and some of his newer stuff, though some of it's ... well ... but I have to be honest: his characters often seemed rather robotic.:D
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Yes, isn't it wonderful?

His later entries into the series where
The characters are given some depth are inferior, IMHO. (Trevize is still awesomely wooden, though.)
 
On the other hand, I have never been able to stand the current compulsion to turn every novel into an orgy of mental/emotional voyeurism, where 2/3 of the word count is tied up dissecting each characters previous emotional trauma, current angst and neurosis, and assorted mental maunderings... all in the name of "character development".

Give me a story that tells a story, and where each word of the text actually forwards the plot, action, and eventual resolution.

Any delving into the thoughts and motivations of the characters should ALSO further the story... not just "help you understand the motivations and personality of this character". If you are any kind of competent writer, a few words or lines of text should be enough that I can connect the character to someone I know or have read about... I can fill in from that perfectly fine, I don't need an author wasting most of the book doing that for me.


My mother read the Foundation Trilogy to my brother and I when I was ~9... and I read it for myself at ~12... and again at ~15, and again in my early 20s. I guess its time to do it again (I just turned 50).
 
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I read about one and three quarters of the Foundation books 30-odd years ago. As you say, more of an incomplete literary obligation than a fun read. At the time I was more into John Carter than Hari Seldon. Still am. Maybe that tags me as low-brow. Who cares? I like a ripping action yarn. :)

OTOH, I was fascinated by Caves of Steel and The Naked Sun, so don't write Asimov off just from the Foundation Trilogy. I assure you it's the plot, not the writer.
 
Read hundreds of Asimov's books, fiction and non, not to mention articles and anthologies... his style is different than most. His writing is 'uncluttered', which, IMO, makes him a better non-fiction than fiction writer - though he excelled at grand scheme and 'serious' fiction. Foundation is a decent read if you read them all, but Foundation's popularity is sorta akin to T5. The recent outpouring of support makes it a record kickstarter, but that is a lot about its fan base more than its content.

Asimov's stories are generally very plot centric, and linear, with a style of writing that requires one to do the heavy lifting with their own imagination as opposed to his. With his empire and foundation books he sets up a setting which is massive and only vaguely defined - the reader is left to filling in the vast blanks on their own. (Very much like the early OTU, not in specifics, but in this nature of a vast interstellar setting mostly 'defined' by the reader.)

Normal leisure reading, most expect the author to do a lot of the imagining for us, like with a movie. I think if I were now reading the first Foundation book for the first time, I'd probably feel about it more like the OP.

Foundation is best read after reading a number of Asimov's other books, notably his galactic empire and robot series - and then reading the entire Foundation series. The historical popularity of the Foundation series really sprang up in the '80s based on his following over the decades - not because it was any kind of awesome read. The first few, especially, are, IIRC, very dry and lacking in any character driven plot that modern readers are used to. The later ones focus more on individuals, so the reader can connect with the stories.

All told, the Foundation books tied together a large number of his prior works (a dozen or so directly, but several dozen all told) into one historical whole - and this is probably the primary reason for their popularity.
 
Carlobrand said:
Have you tried the really old classics? Jules Verne? Herman Melville? I took a read at them, kinda fun, but it was so stilted and awkward - the language conventions have changed over the generations. Melville was particularly ... difficult.
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War of the Worlds and Time Machine are worth reading; Dracula, maybe; Frankenstein, avoid!
 
It's worth noting that The Foundation Trilogy was mostly a set of short stories published one-by-one between 1944 and 1950 in Astounding Magazine. And because of the changes in settings, time periods and characters between most of those stories, not one of those books is really going to read like a novel. Especially when the original trilogy covers almost 400 years. The book versions were published in '51-'53, and I remember them being extremely popular in the mid-70s when Avon re-published them in paperback and the single hardback was one of the staples of the Science Fiction Book Club (introduced in '63).

Someone earlier said "six" Foundation novels, but there were actually seven. Here's the list in chronological order of the Foundation universe, but there are big payoffs to reading them in the order written and published:

Prelude to Foundation (1988)
Forward the Foundation (1993)
- Foundation (1951)
- Foundation and Empire (1952)
- Second Foundation (1953)
Foundation's Edge (1982)
Foundation and Earth (1986)


There's also The Second Foundation Trilogy by "The Killer B's", that for the most part fall between Forward the Foundation and Foundation:

Foundation's Fear (1997, Gregory Benford) *
Foundation and Chaos (1998, Greg Bear)
Foundation's Triumph (1999, David Brin)

And there are definitely fun times to be had if you happen to have read Asimov's Galactic Empire books and the Robot series (especially the later ones).

I tried to read the Foundation Trilogy originally in '77, but gave up way too early (I was 11). But I tried it again in 1981 and I was hooked. Coincidentally, I bought Deluxe Traveller at the same time (having avoided it for years for some reason) and the two are inextricably linked in my mind for all time because of it. At the same time, I can see why anyone coming to it thinking it might be like the game Traveller would be disappointed. There are better books out there for that (Poul Anderson, EC Tubb's Dumarest Saga, Piper, etc.).

I think the stories in Foundation are good, but the series really kicks into high gear in the second part of Foundation and Empire. Damn, that was an exciting read. And at that point, you do start to get characters you can care about, though I must admit that even toward the end, Asimov wasn't a great with female characters (like so many of his age).

I've read the whole series and the Robot books probably five times in my 46 years. I can't say that for anything else, and I'd probably feel guilty about it if they weren't such quick reads. Yes, thin on characters, but the concepts are big and I still love the "haHA!!" payoffs at the end of each story.

There is one other novel that I think is worth checking out: Psychohistorical Crisis, a 2001 book by Donald Kingsbury. It is not an "authorized" part of Asimov's Foundation universe, but rather a deconstruction of it (or, rather, just the original Trilogy). It's set 2700 years after Foundation, and fills in a lot of blanks, brings the technology up to date and does a thorough examination of how psychohistory works... or does it? :) It's a long book, but a different approach than The Second Foundation Trilogy in looking behind the curtain.



* Foundation's Fear is an awful book and IMO not worth any time put into reading it. The other two are better and almost feel like Asimov wrote them, though not necessarily that he would have written them.
 
I'll concur with Andrew's opinions on War of the Worlds, The Time Machine, Dracula and Frankenstein. I liked Journey to the centre of the Earth (though I will admit that the sea-cavern snapped my disbelief suspenders even as a youngster). I only got a few dozen pages through Moby Dick (that's not sci fi...)
Probably my favourite sci fi novel was The Stainless Steel Rat, but I think Harrison fell foul of the classic GM error in later books - he let his character grow too big too fast.
I've read surprisingly little sci fi (or fantasy) for a fan - it's just so difficult to find the Goldilocks Effect. They're either too hard, trapped in a tiny STL universe, or out with the pixies, galaxy-hopping. Maybe that's why I like Traveller - it's Just Right. :)
 
The first part of the Foundation trilogy is the worst. It's set-up and pre-exposition*. Once you're through that, it's more like a set of linked short stories that are more character-driven. But the classic element here isn't the characters, its all too lightly handled or that. The classic element is that it was a departure from much of the common SF of the day with some actual sweep and scope to the story and overarching theme.

As opposed to: Inexplicable science results in monster, monster creates havoc, plucky young woman gets into risky situation, monster threatens young woman, hero saves young woman through grit and brawn and pseudo-scientific deus ex machina (though without any actual distinguishable elements of character that might distract from reader identification), duly warned, humanity girds for next monstrous threat and couple live happily, etc.

Once you get through the start the series is a quick read. Take the time to read the whole end. The "big reveal" probably won't surprise you, but it's brief and there are other reasons to finish out the last bit of exposition.

And on the other books, I felt Foundation's Fear was execrable. I threw it away rather than giving it to the thrift store where it might have found another victim.

*Many feel the same way about the start of E.E. Doc Smith's Triplanetary. I blew through it the first time, but find it a bit tedious when re-reading the Lensman series now.
 
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Andrew Boulton said:
I also gave up on Foundation, but it was 30yrs ago so I should try again.
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I veered of some 100 pages into two different Foundation series entry points... and gave up. I tried again 15years ago... same issues as before.

Azimov... wonderful concepts, but cardboard cut-out stick-puppets marching through the plots.

I much prefer Niven, Pournelle, Stirling, Cole & Bunch, Doohan, McCaffrey, and Bujold. I'm finding Ringo too strong of language and borderline on tech-incompetence... but good stories, none the less.

For ol' Isaac, I'll stick to film or short stories.
 
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