Foundation

[Neil040]

I am with the pro Foundation lobby... not read for many many years but it still sits there in my memory as one of the great series of all.. now I would accept that the style may have been open to critiscm alright.. but it was the vast glorious scope and sweep of the whole thing that captivated me! The ideas were brilliant and as been said extremely forward thinking in some ways.. technology wise and also of course in that clever psychohistory science..

I remember that annoying Mule person too, who messed up the predictive future history pattern.. and also that he used some kind of fiendish musical instrumant that could influence and control people subltely... very good stuff all round for me as a young hippy as I was then!

 

[Rich]

I thought the Foundation series was superb.

Read all of them about 15 years ago.

Ties in well with the 'Robot' novels.

 

[blue_cephalopod]

I read prelude to foundation before foundation (prequel written after the foundation trilogy) so maybe i found it easier knowing more about hari seldon psychohistory and its purpose. I thought they were both great im looking forward to the others when i get them.

 

[Shoegaze99]

I've only read "Foundation", and what struck me was, firstly, that it was basically a couple of short stories stuck together - but the two latter ones seemed to repeat themselves.

That’s often the case with sci-fi of the era. Asminov’s “I, Robot” was simply a series of interconnected short stories, as were Bradbury’s classics, “The Martian Chronicles” and “Dandelion Wine” (not science fiction). And many more. Short fiction was the order of the day, meaning many “novels” of the time were collections of stories based around the same theme and/or characters, often with a literary conceit to link them all together, or expanded versions of short stories.

(Even the days true novels were so short as to be called a novella today)

In some ways the passing of that sort of thing is unfortunate, because today’s science fiction and fantasy novels are too often bloated and overlong when they don’t need to be. Editors are far too shy about slicing down a work, even when it needs slicing.

As far as “Foundation” goes, it is both Asminov’s most critically acclaimed work and my least favorite Asminov. What that means, I cannot say. But I liked his Robots books much more, thoroughly enjoy his essays, and was pretty floored by “The Gods Themselves.”

 

[dragonqueen]

I've read the whole series, the first 3 books are good, the second foundation is the best, but the last two arn't so good as they were written years later for money, and he didn't do such a good job on them

 

[Nebogipfel]

Thanks for the recommendation, merritt - I have to admit I wasn't so keen on "Foundation" in novel format - but as it's essentially a collection of short stories I guess that goes some way towards that.

Just as a curious pop-quiz:

a) how extensive is the Foundation series
b) were they all written as short stories, or were some composed as novels?

A)Foundation, Foundation and Empire, Second Foundation comprise the original (and IMHO, best) trilogy; Foundation's Edge and Foundation & Earth complete that line of thought with 3 permanent characters (Trevor, Bliss, and some old guy); Prelude to Foundation and Forward the Foundation officially "connect" Foundation with the Robot novels while detailing the life of Hari Seldon. I consider Robots & Empire to be Foundation at heart, and the same can be said for my favorite Asimov "The End of Eternity".

I have yet to read the Galactic Empire series (they are older and harder to locate as a set) but I do know that they exist in the past universe that makes up the Foundation era.

B)Only the first three (Foundation, Empire, Second) were written as short stories, although the intent was always to have them interconnect as the same story. Asimov only grudgingly extended the series decades later and since the publishing dates of his Foundation novels alternate with his R. Daneel novels it wasn't too much of a leap to connect those threads and once done further expand (with less chagrin but equal trepidition) his immense universe.


Trantor reigns

 

[Brian G Turner]

Thanks for the info, Nebogipfel - and welcome to the chronicles network, too.

 

[merritt]

Re: Foundation/

Reconsidering my "wading" through the series remark. I pulled a couple old pbacks with cool covers off the shelf. 1953 Avon 2nd Foundation : galactic empire & the caves of steel 1955 signet. I really enjoyed these when I read the reprints in the 70's as a teenager, I practically destroyed the vintage ones reading them as an adult.

Yeah looking at these reminds me of my enthusiasm when I first read them. i didn't get to read the pulp/series versions cause where I live they fell apart, & the ones you find today are falling apart. High Acid paper I think.
sorry, about the failure on the pop quiz

Plus my bibliography book is downstairs at the other computer, I am on my upstairs closet office dinosaur. = lazy?

I just asked my wife to get me hooked up with a USB hub so I put pictures on this antique Dell. (she stuck her tongue out at me!) I have old american 1950's sci-fi paperbacks with cool covers. I used to have number of them on harddrive but lost them when I did a rebuild. (didn't search thru backups)
Azimov wrote alot as you all know. I read a murder mystery that I enjoyed by him, murder at a book fair or a sci-fi convention, I can't remember the title.

Bye.
Merritt

 

[Sibeling]

At first I read Foundation's Edge and Foundation And Earth; I thought these were not so exciting and the characters were referring to some prior events all the time, so I couldn't really understand what do they mean.

But now, when I have found out about other books about the Foundation and the fact that they are better, I might try to read the whole thing.

 

[Nilentropy]

i tried for years to collect all of Asimov's "Future History" series:
I, Robot
Robot Visions
Robot Dreams
Caves of Steel
The Naked Sun
The Robots of Dawn
Robots and Empire
The Stars, Like Dust
The Currents of Space
Pebble in the Sky
Prelude to Foundation
Forward The Foundation
Foundation
Foundation and Empire
Second Foundation
Foundation's Edge
Foundation and Earth

All these books are one huge series. I won't just read the foundation part because it ends with robots. How can you read a series from the middle? DUH, you don't like it because you don't see the whole picture. I doubt many people here were alive when they were published, so why read out of order now if you're young?

 

[gleek]

i tried for years to collect all of Asimov's "Future History" series:
I, Robot
Robot Visions
Robot Dreams
Caves of Steel
The Naked Sun
The Robots of Dawn
Robots and Empire
The Stars, Like Dust
The Currents of Space
Pebble in the Sky
Prelude to Foundation
Forward The Foundation
Foundation
Foundation and Empire
Second Foundation
Foundation's Edge
Foundation and Earth

well, i started off by reading the foundation series and then back-tracking to the robot series. i think that the foundation novels in and of themselves make a lot of sense until you get to foundation and earth, THEN if you're intriguied by the robots it will twist your arm into reading the robot novels going forward. of the empire novels, i really loved the currents of space. if you can pick it up, do!

i understand everyone else's comments about foundation being a bit tough due to it's originally being a set of short stories, but i have to say that it really IS some of the best scifi out there. asimov's writing style is succint and to-the-point and very seldom does he ramble on or go on tangents.

 

[Amber]

I can safely point to the Foundation series being the first full science fiction series that I ever read. That was at the tender age of 8- slightly before my Lord of the Rings obsession, and slightly after my Homer and Virgil craze.


It's a lovely set of books. Not a usual word to describe it, but it's true. Genuinely interesting, and intriguing to say the least...

 

[Glen C]

First let me say. I am a HUGE Asimov fan, however like many who have posted here - I simply couldn't get into the rythmn of this work. To be fair to the good Doctor, the majority of his work came out in the Golden Age, and really began to look flat once the New Wave Movement got under way.

I have not seen this mentioned yet. But the Foundation series was never written as complete novels...well the first three books anyway. Orginally they appeared in Astounding during the decades of the 40's as series connected novelettes.

It wasn't that unusual for short stories to stitched together into novels A E Van Vogt's destination Universe should really be The Best Of Vogt lol

Glen

 

[flash]

i have only just got into the foundation series and have jsut finshed reading the second one.... its brillant... was even thinking about it when having shower, or on way home or even as theory just what boss was trying to explain at work! of thats not what novels are about then whats the point?

 

[Glen C]

I find that so cool that after so much time, a book can reach out and touch someone Hope you enjoy the conclusion

 

[Isolde]

I loved the Foundation series so much I had stopped reading scifi afterwards. I figured scifi couldn't get any better than that. It didn't help that I had read Blue Adept by Piers Anthony next.

 

[Brys]

I've read the three main novels - Foundation, Foundation and Empire, Second Foundation, and I thought they were excellent, definitely at the top of science fiction. I enjoyed them a lot because of how he used the template of the declining Roman Empire as a basis for science fiction (yes, I really like something that I didn't know existed until recently - historical SF).

It wasn't perfect, as the pacing was uneven and it felt like lots of short stories put together (moreso of Foundation than the latter two books), but it was still very intriguing. I didn't have any problem with the writing style - Asimov used a decent range of vocabulary and description, but it wasn't pretentious or over-descriptive, but neither was it sparse either, and it worked just right, except that sometimes his pacing wasn't perfect.

 

[GOLLUM]

So Brys are you saying that the Foundation Series is one of the best Sci Fi series other than arguably Dune you've read??

I read very little of Sci Fi and wouldn't mind knowing your opinion of the best say 3 Sci Fi novels/series you've read as we seem to have similar likes in the fantasy field.

I'll go check the Sci Fi recommendation thread too...

EDIT You mention Ender's Game - Orson Scott Card. Heard of it never read it and Dune and Book Of The New Sun already read and enjoyed.

 

[Brys]

Top 3 science-fiction series:
1) Ilium - Dan Simmons
2) Foundation - Isaac Asimov
3) Takeshi Kovacs series (Altered Carbon, Market Forces etc) - Richard Morgan

I would have put Dune at number 2 otherwise, just above Foundation, but you say you've read that. That's a pretty diverse selection of science fiction there. Ilium is probably less "hard" science fiction than Foundation, because of it's use of the Iliad as a focus point for the novel, but it also has a nice post-apocalyptic bit on earth as well - almost dystopian and prophetic. I'd say though that Foundation is very enjoyable, and one of the best science fiction series there is. It's less focused on plots and characters than most series, mainly focused on atmosphere and worldbuidling (well, SF equivalent, whatever that's called) - but in that respect, quite a bit like Erikson - it's definitely got a more realistic and complex universe developed than Dune IMO - and it's very influential. It's a good starting point in science fiction (which I'm using it as). The main problem I had was that I was using my Dad's old books that were only about 200 pages each, but had very small print.

 

[star.torturer]

read foundation last night and thouroul enjoyed it. going to buy the others now and read them in quick sucsession