Asimov's most famous work is theFoundation series,[3] the first three books of which won the one-timeHugo Award for "Best All-Time Series" in 1966.[4] His other major series are theGalactic Empire series and theRobot series, which include major works such asThe Caves of Steel and "The Naked Sun", both written in the mid-1950s. TheGalactic Empire novels are set in the much earlier history of the same fictional universe as theFoundation series. Later, withFoundation and Earth (1986), he linked this distant future to theRobot series, creating a unified "future history" for his works.[5] He also wrotemore than 380 short stories, including thesocial science fiction novelette "Nightfall", which in 1964 was voted the best short science fiction story of all time by theScience Fiction Writers of America. Asimov wrote theLucky Starr series ofjuvenile science-fiction novels using the pen name Paul French.[6]
Most of his popular science books explain concepts in a historical way, going as far back as possible to a time when the science in question was at its simplest stage. Examples includeGuide to Science, the three-volumeUnderstanding Physics, andAsimov's Chronology of Science and Discovery. He wrote on numerous other scientific and non-scientific topics, such aschemistry,astronomy,mathematics,history,biblical exegesis, andliterary criticism.
There are three very simple English words: 'Has', 'him' and 'of'. Put them together like this—'has-him-of'—and say it in the ordinary fashion. Now leave out the two h's and say it again and you have Asimov.
Asimov's family name derives from the first part ofозимый хлеб (ozímyj khleb), meaning 'winter grain' (specificallyrye), in which his great-great-great-grandfather dealt, with the Russian surname ending-ov added.[14]Azimov is spelledАзимов in theCyrillic alphabet.[1] When the family arrived in the United States in 1923 and their name had to be spelled in theLatin alphabet, Asimov's father spelled it with an S, believing this letter to be pronounced like Z (as in German), and so it became Asimov.[1] This later inspired one of Asimov's short stories, "Spell My Name with an S".[15]
Asimov refused early suggestions of using a more common name as a pseudonym, believing that its recognizability helped his career. After becoming famous, he often met readers who believed that "Isaac Asimov" was a distinctive pseudonym created by an author with a common name.[16]
Asimov was born inPetrovichi,Russian SFSR,[17] on an unknown date between October 4, 1919, and January 2, 1920, inclusive. Asimov celebrated his birthday on January 2.[a]
Asimov's parents wereRussian Jews, Anna Rachel (née Berman) and Judah Asimov, the son of a miller.[18] He was named Isaac after his mother's father, Isaac Berman.[19] Asimov wrote of his father, "My father, for all his education as anOrthodox Jew, was not Orthodox in his heart", noting that "he didn't recite themyriad prayers prescribed for every action, and he never made any attempt to teach them to me."[20]
In 1921, Asimov and 16 other children in Petrovichi developeddouble pneumonia. Only Asimov survived.[21] He had two younger siblings: a sister, Marcia (born Manya;[22] June 17, 1922 – April 2, 2011),[23] and a brother,Stanley (July 25, 1929 – August 16, 1995), who would become vice-president ofNewsday.[24][25]
Asimov's family travelled to the United States via Liverpool on theRMSBaltic, arriving on February 3, 1923[26] when he was three years old. He later wrote two essays about his family's arrival in America: "Ellis Island and I" (inThe Tyrannosaurus Prescription, 1988) and "Ellis Island: Enter One Immigrant ... Sprouting Measles" (TV Guide, 1984).[27] His parents spokeYiddish and English to him; he never learnedRussian, his parents using it as a secret language "when they wanted to discuss something privately that my big ears were not to hear".[28][29] Growing up inBrooklyn, New York, Asimov taught himself to read at the age of five (and later taught his sister to read as well, enabling her to enter school in thesecond grade).[30] His mother got him intofirst grade a year early by claiming he was born on September 7, 1919.[31][32] In third grade he learned about the "error" and insisted on an official correction of the date to January 2.[33] He became anaturalized U.S. citizen in 1928 at the age of eight.[34]
After becoming established in the U.S., his parents owned a succession ofcandy stores in which everyone in the family was expected to work. The candy stores sold newspapers and magazines, which Asimov credited as a major influence in his lifelong love of the written word, as it presented him as a child with an unending supply of new reading material (including pulpscience fiction magazines)[35] that he could not have otherwise afforded. Asimov began reading science fiction at age nine, at the time that the genre was becoming more science-centered.[36] Asimov was also a frequent patron of theBrooklyn Public Library during his formative years.[37]
Asimov attended New York City public schools from age five, includingBoys High School inBrooklyn.[38] Graduating at 15, he attended theCity College of New York for several days before accepting a scholarship atSeth Low Junior College. This was a branch ofColumbia University inDowntown Brooklyn designed to absorb some of the academically qualified Jewish andItalian-American students who applied to the more prestigiousColumbia College but exceeded the unwritten ethnicadmission quotas which were common at the time. Originally azoology major, Asimov switched tochemistry after his first semester because he disapproved of "dissecting an alley cat". After Seth Low Junior College closed in 1936, Asimov finished hisBachelor of Science degree at Columbia's Morningside Heights campus (later theColumbia University School of General Studies)[39] in 1939. (In 1983, Dr. Robert Pollack [dean of Columbia College, 1982–1989] granted Asimov an honorary doctorate from Columbia College after requiring that Asimov place his foot in a bucket of water to pass the college's swimming requirement.[40])
After two rounds of rejections by medical schools, Asimov applied to the graduate program in chemistry at Columbia in 1939; initially he was rejected and then only accepted on a probationary basis.[41] He completed hisMaster of Arts degree in chemistry in 1941 and earned aDoctor of Philosophy degree in chemistry in 1948.[e][46][47] During his chemistry studies, he also learned French and German.[48]
From 1942 to 1945 duringWorld War II, between his masters and doctoral studies, Asimov worked as a civilian chemist at thePhiladelphia Navy Yard's Naval Air Experimental Station and lived in theWalnut Hill section ofWest Philadelphia.[49][50] In September 1945, he was conscripted into the post-warU.S. Army; if he had not had his birth date corrected while at school, he would have been officially 26 years old and ineligible.[51] In 1946, a bureaucratic error caused his military allotment to be stopped, and he was removed from a task force days before it sailed to participate inOperation Crossroads nuclear weapons tests atBikini Atoll.[52] He was promoted tocorporal on July 11 before receiving anhonorable discharge on July 26, 1946.[53][f]
After completing his doctorate and apostdoctoral year withRobert Elderfield,[55] Asimov was offered the position ofassociate professor ofbiochemistry at theBoston University School of Medicine. This was in large part due to his years-long correspondence withWilliam Boyd, a former associate professor of biochemistry at Boston University, who initially contacted Asimov to compliment him on his storyNightfall.[56] Upon receiving a promotion to professor ofimmunochemistry, Boyd reached out to Asimov, requesting him to be his replacement. The initial offer of professorship was withdrawn and Asimov was offered the position of instructor of biochemistry instead, which he accepted.[57] He began work in 1949 with a $5,000 salary[58] (equivalent to $66,000 in 2024), maintaining this position for several years.[59] By 1952, however, he was making more money as a writer than from the university, and he eventually stopped doing research, confining his university role to lecturing students.[g] In 1955, he was promoted totenured associate professor. In December 1957, Asimov was dismissed from his teaching post, with effect from June 30, 1958, due to his lack of research. After a struggle over two years, he reached an agreement with the university that he would keep his title[61] and give the opening lecture each year for a biochemistry class.[62] On October 18, 1979, the university honored his writing by promoting him to full professor of biochemistry.[63] Asimov's personal papers from 1965 onward are archived at the university'sMugar Memorial Library, to which he donated them at the request of curator Howard Gotlieb.[64][65]
In 1959, after a recommendation fromArthur Obermayer, Asimov's friend and a scientist on theU.S. missile defense project, Asimov was approached byDARPA to join Obermayer's team. Asimov declined on the grounds that his ability to write freely would be impaired should he receiveclassified information, but submitted a paper to DARPA titled "On Creativity"[66] containing ideas on how government-based science projects could encourage team members to think more creatively.[67]
Asimov met his first wife, Gertrude Blugerman, on ablind date on February 14, 1942, and married her on July 26.[68] The couple lived in an apartment inWest Philadelphia while Asimov was employed at the Philadelphia Navy Yard (where two of his co-workers wereL. Sprague de Camp andRobert A. Heinlein). Gertrude returned to Brooklyn while he was in the Army, and they both lived there from July 1946 before moving toStuyvesant Town,Manhattan, in July 1948. They moved toBoston in May 1949, then to nearby suburbsSomerville in July 1949,Waltham in May 1951, and, finally,West Newton in 1956.[69] They had two children, David (born 1951) and Robyn Joan (born 1955).[70] In 1970, they separated and Asimov moved back to New York, this time to theUpper West Side of Manhattan where he lived for the rest of his life.[71] He began seeingJanet O. Jeppson, a psychiatrist and science-fiction writer, and married her on November 30, 1973,[72] two weeks after his divorce from Gertrude.[73]
Asimov was aclaustrophile: he enjoyed small, enclosed spaces.[74][h] In the third volume of his autobiography, he recalls a childhood desire to own a magazine stand in aNew York City Subway station, within which he could enclose himself and listen to the rumble of passing trains while reading.[75]
Asimov wasafraid of flying, doing so only twice: once in the course of his work at the Naval Air Experimental Station and once returning home fromOʻahu in 1946. Consequently, he seldom traveled great distances. This phobia influenced several of his fiction works, such as theWendell Urth mystery stories and theRobot novels featuringElijah Baley. In his later years, Asimov found enjoyment traveling oncruise ships, beginning in 1972 when he viewed theApollo 17 launch from acruise ship.[76] On several cruises, he was part of the entertainment program, giving science-themed talks aboard ships such as theQueen Elizabeth 2.[77] He sailed to England in June 1974 on theSS France for a trip mostly devoted to lectures in London and Birmingham,[78] though he also found time to visitStonehenge[79] and Shakespeare's birthplace.[80]
Asimov with his second wife, Janet. "[Sideburns] became a permanent feature of my face, and it is now difficult to believe early photographs that show me without [them]."[81] (Photo by Jay Kay Klein.)
He was an able public speaker and was regularly invited to give talks about science in his distinctNew York accent. He participated in manyscience fiction conventions, where he was friendly and approachable.[77] He patiently answered tens of thousands of questions and other mail with postcards and was pleased to give autographs. He was of medium height, 5 ft 9 in (1.75 m)[83] and stocky build. In his later years, he adopted a signature style of "mutton-chop"sideburns.[84][85] He took to wearingbolo ties after his wife Janet objected to his clip-on bow ties.[86] He never learned to swim or ride a bicycle, but did learn to drive a car after he moved to Boston. In his humor bookAsimov Laughs Again, he describes Boston driving as "anarchy on wheels".[87]
Asimov's wide interests included his participation in later years in organizations devoted to thecomic operas ofGilbert and Sullivan.[77] Many of his short stories mention or quote Gilbert and Sullivan.[88] He was a prominent member ofThe Baker Street Irregulars, the leadingSherlock Holmes society,[77] for whom he wrote an essay arguing that Professor Moriarty's work "The Dynamics of An Asteroid" involved the willful destruction of an ancient, civilized planet. He was also a member of the male-only literary banqueting club theTrap Door Spiders, which served as the basis of his fictional group of mystery solvers, theBlack Widowers.[89] He later used his essay on Moriarty's work as the basis for a Black Widowers story, "The Ultimate Crime", which appeared inMore Tales of the Black Widowers.[90][91]
Asimov was a founding member of the Committee for the Scientific Investigation of Claims of the Paranormal, CSICOP (now theCommittee for Skeptical Inquiry)[94] and is listed in its Pantheon of Skeptics.[95] In a discussion withJames Randi atCSICon 2016 regarding the founding of CSICOP,Kendrick Frazier said that Asimov was "a key figure in theSkeptical movement who is less well known and appreciated today, but was very much in the public eye back then." He said that Asimov's being associated with CSICOP "gave it immense status and authority" in his eyes.[96]: 13:00
Asimov describedCarl Sagan as one of only two people he ever met whose intellect surpassed his own. The other, he claimed, was thecomputer scientist andartificial intelligence expertMarvin Minsky.[97] Asimov was an on-and-off member and honorary vice president ofMensa International, albeit reluctantly;[98] he described some members of that organization as "brain-proud and aggressive about their IQs".[99][i]
After his father died in 1969, Asimov annually contributed to a Judah Asimov Scholarship Fund atBrandeis University.[102]
He died in Manhattan on April 6, 1992,[106] and was cremated.[107] The cause of death was reported as heart andkidney failure.[108][109][110] Ten years following Asimov's death, Janet and Robyn Asimov agreed that the HIV story should be made public; Janet revealed it in her edition of his autobiography,It's Been a Good Life.[104][110][105]
[T]he only thing about myself that I consider to be severe enough to warrant psychoanalytic treatment is my compulsion to write ... That means that my idea of a pleasant time is to go up to my attic, sit at my electric typewriter (as I am doing right now), and bang away, watching the words take shape like magic before my eyes.
Asimov's career can be divided into several periods. His early career, dominated by science fiction, began with short stories in 1939 and novels in 1950. This lasted until about 1958, all but ending after publication ofThe Naked Sun (1957). He began publishing nonfiction as co-author of a college-level textbook calledBiochemistry and Human Metabolism. Following the brief orbit of the first human-made satelliteSputnik I by the USSR in 1957, he wrote more nonfiction, particularlypopular science books, and less science fiction. Over the next quarter-century, he wrote only four science fiction novels, and 120 nonfiction books.
Starting in 1982, the second half of his science fiction career began with the publication ofFoundation's Edge. From then until his death, Asimov published several more sequels and prequels to his existing novels, tying them together in a way he had not originally anticipated, making a unified series. There are many inconsistencies in this unification, especially in his earlier stories.[112]Doubleday andHoughton Mifflin published about 60% of his work up to 1969, Asimov stating that "both represent a father image".[62]
Asimov believed his most enduring contributions would be his "Three Laws of Robotics" and theFoundation series.[113] TheOxford English Dictionary credits his science fiction for introducing into the English language the words "robotics", "positronic" (an entirely fictional technology), and "psychohistory" (which is also used for adifferent study on historical motivations). Asimov coined the term "robotics" without suspecting that it might be an original word; at the time, he believed it was simply the natural analogue of words such asmechanics andhydraulics, but forrobots. Unlike his word "psychohistory", the word "robotics" continues in mainstream technical use with Asimov's original definition.Star Trek: The Next Generation featuredandroids with "positronic brains" and the first-season episode "Datalore" called the positronic brain "Asimov's dream".[114]
Asimov was so prolific and diverse in his writing that his books span all major categories of theDewey Decimal Classification except for category 100,philosophy andpsychology.[115] However, he wrote several essays about psychology,[116] and forewords for the booksThe Humanist Way (1988) andIn Pursuit of Truth (1982),[117] which were classified in the 100s category, but none of his own books were classified in that category.[115]
According toUNESCO'sIndex Translationum database, Asimov is the world's 24th-most-translated author.[118]
No matter how various the subject matter I write on, I was a science-fiction writer first and it is as a science-fiction writer that I want to be identified.
Asimov became a science fiction fan in 1929,[120] when he began reading thepulp magazines sold in his family's candy store.[121] At first his father forbade reading pulps until Asimov persuaded him that because thescience fiction magazines had "Science" in the title, they must be educational.[122] At age 18 he joined theFuturiansscience fiction fan club, where he made friends who went on to become science fiction writers or editors.[123]
Asimov began writing at the age of 11, imitatingThe Rover Boys with eight chapters ofThe Greenville Chums at College. His father bought him a used typewriter at age 16.[62] His first published work was a humorous item on the birth of his brother for Boys High School's literary journal in 1934. In May 1937 he first thought of writing professionally, and began writing his first science fiction story, "Cosmic Corkscrew" (now lost), that year. On May 17, 1938, puzzled by a change in the schedule ofAstounding Science Fiction, Asimov visited its publisherStreet & Smith Publications. Inspired by the visit, he finished the story on June 19, 1938, and personally submitted it toAstounding editorJohn W. Campbell two days later. Campbell met with Asimov for more than an hour and promised to read the story himself. Two days later he received a detailed rejection letter.[120] This was the first of what became almost weekly meetings with the editor while Asimov lived in New York, until moving to Boston in 1949;[58] Campbell had a strong formative influence on Asimov and became a personal friend.[124]
By the end of the month, Asimov completed a second story, "Stowaway". Campbell rejected it on July 22 but—in "the nicest possible letter you could imagine"—encouraged him to continue writing, promising that Asimov might sell his work after another year and a dozen stories of practice.[120] On October 21, 1938, he sold the third story he finished, "Marooned Off Vesta", toAmazing Stories, edited byRaymond A. Palmer, and it appeared in the March 1939 issue. Asimov was paid $64 (equivalent to $1,430 in 2024), or one cent a word.[62][125] Two more stories appeared that year, "The Weapon Too Dreadful to Use" in the MayAmazing and "Trends" in the JulyAstounding, the issue fans later selected as the start of theGolden Age of Science Fiction.[16] For 1940,ISFDB catalogs seven stories in four different pulp magazines, including one inAstounding.[126] His earnings became enough to pay for his education, but not yet enough for him to become a full-time writer.[125]
He later said that unlike other Golden Age writers Heinlein andA. E. van Vogt—also first published in 1939, and whose talent and stardom were immediately obvious—Asimov "(this is not false modesty) came up only gradually".[16] Through July 29, 1940, Asimov wrote 22 stories in 25 months, of which 13 were published; he wrote in 1972 that from that date he never wrote a science fiction story that was not published (except for two "special cases"[j]).[129] By 1941 Asimov was famous enough thatDonald Wollheim told him that he purchased "The Secret Sense" for a new magazine only because of his name,[130] and the December 1940 issue ofAstonishing—featuring Asimov's name in bold—was the first magazine to basecover art on his work,[131] but Asimov later said that neither he nor anyone else—except perhaps Campbell—considered him better than an often published "third rater".[132]
Based on a conversation with Campbell, Asimov wrote "Nightfall", his 32nd story, in March and April 1941, andAstounding published it in September 1941. In 1968 theScience Fiction Writers of America voted "Nightfall" the best science fiction short story ever written.[108][132] InNightfall and Other Stories Asimov wrote, "The writing of 'Nightfall' was a watershed in my professional career ... I was suddenly taken seriously and the world of science fiction became aware that I existed. As the years passed, in fact, it became evident that I had written a 'classic'."[133] "Nightfall" is an archetypal example ofsocial science fiction, a term he created to describe a new trend in the 1940s, led by authors including him and Heinlein, away fromgadgets andspace opera and toward speculation about thehuman condition.[134]
After writing "Victory Unintentional" in January and February 1942, Asimov did not write another story for a year. He expected to make chemistry his career, and was paid $2,600 annually at the Philadelphia Navy Yard, enough to marry his girlfriend; he did not expect to make much more from writing than the $1,788.50 he had earned from the 28 stories he had already sold over four years. Asimov left science fiction fandom and no longer read new magazines, and might have left the writing profession had not Heinlein and de Camp been his coworkers at the Navy Yard and previously sold stories continued to appear.[135]
In 1942, Asimov published the first of hisFoundation stories—later collected in theFoundation trilogy:Foundation (1951),Foundation and Empire (1952), andSecond Foundation (1953). The books describe the fall of a vastinterstellar empire and the establishment of its eventual successor. They feature his fictional science ofpsychohistory, whose theories could predict the future course of history according to dynamical laws regarding the statistical analysis of mass human actions.[136]
Campbell raised his rate per word,Orson Welles purchased rights to "Evidence", and anthologies reprinted his stories. By the end of the war Asimov was earning as a writer an amount equal to half of his Navy Yard salary, even after a raise, but Asimov still did not believe that writing could support him, his wife, and future children.[137][138]
His"positronic" robot stories—many of which were collected inI, Robot (1950)—were begun at about the same time. They promulgated a set of rules ofethics for robots (seeThree Laws of Robotics) and intelligent machines that greatly influenced other writers and thinkers in their treatment of the subject. Asimov notes in his introduction to the short story collectionThe Complete Robot (1982) that he was largely inspired by the tendency of robots up to that time to fall consistently into aFrankenstein plot in which they destroyed their creators. TheRobot series has led to film adaptations. With Asimov's collaboration, in about 1977,Harlan Ellison wrote a screenplay ofI, Robot that Asimov hoped would lead to "the first really adult, complex, worthwhilescience fiction film ever made". The screenplay has never been filmed and was eventually published in book form in 1994. The 2004 movieI, Robot, starringWill Smith, was based on an unrelated script byJeff Vintar titledHardwired, with Asimov's ideas incorporated later after the rights to Asimov's title were acquired.[139] (The title was not original to Asimov but had previously been used fora story byEando Binder.) Also, one of Asimov's robot short stories, "The Bicentennial Man", was expanded into a novelThe Positronic Man by Asimov andRobert Silverberg, and this was adapted into the 1999 movieBicentennial Man, starringRobin Williams.[93]
In 1966 theFoundation trilogy won theHugo Award for the all-time best series of science fiction and fantasy novels,[140] and they along with theRobot series are his most famous science fiction. Besides movies, hisFoundation andRobot stories have inspired other derivative works of science fiction literature, many by well-known and established authors such asRoger MacBride Allen,Greg Bear,Gregory Benford,David Brin, andDonald Kingsbury. At least some of these appear to have been done with the blessing of, or at the request of, Asimov's widow,Janet Asimov.[141][142][143]
In 1948, he also wrote a spoof chemistry article, "The Endochronic Properties of Resublimated Thiotimoline". At the time, Asimov was preparing his own doctoraldissertation, which would include an oral examination. Fearing a prejudicial reaction from his graduate school evaluation board atColumbia University, Asimov asked his editor that it be released under a pseudonym. When it nevertheless appeared under his own name, Asimov grew concerned that his doctoral examiners might think he wasn't taking science seriously. At the end of the examination, one evaluator turned to him, smiling, and said, "What can you tell us, Mr. Asimov, about the thermodynamic properties of the compound known as thiotimoline". Laughing hysterically with relief, Asimov had to be led out of the room. After a five-minute wait, he was summoned back into the room and congratulated as "Dr. Asimov".[144]
Demand for science fiction greatly increased during the 1950s, making it possible for a genre author to write full-time.[145] In 1949, book publisherDoubleday's science fiction editor Walter I. Bradbury accepted Asimov's unpublished "Grow Old with Me" (40,000 words), but requested that it be extended to a full novel of 70,000 words. The book appeared under the Doubleday imprint in January 1950 with the title ofPebble in the Sky.[58] Doubleday published five more original science fiction novels by Asimov in the 1950s, along with the six juvenileLucky Starr novels, the latter under the pseudonym "Paul French".[146] Doubleday also published collections of Asimov's short stories, beginning withThe Martian Way and Other Stories in 1955. The early 1950s also sawGnome Press publish one collection of Asimov's positronic robot stories asI, Robot and hisFoundation stories and novelettes as the three books of theFoundation trilogy. More positronic robot stories were republished in book form asThe Rest of the Robots.
Book publishers and the magazinesGalaxy andFantasy & Science Fiction ended Asimov's dependence onAstounding. He later described the era as his "'mature' period". Asimov's "The Last Question" (1956), on the ability of humankind to cope with and potentially reverse the process ofentropy, was his personal favorite story.[147]
In December 1974, formerBeatlePaul McCartney approached Asimov and asked him to write the screenplay for a science-fiction movie musical. McCartney had a vague idea for the plot and a small scrap of dialogue, about a rock band whose members discover they are being impersonated by extraterrestrials. The band and their impostors would likely be played by McCartney's groupWings, then at the height of their career. Though not generally a fan of rock music, Asimov was intrigued by the idea and quickly produced a treatment outline of the story adhering to McCartney's overall idea but omitting McCartney's scrap of dialogue. McCartney rejected it, and the treatment now exists only in the Boston University archives.[150]
Asimov said in 1969 that he had "the happiest of all my associations with science fiction magazines" withFantasy & Science Fiction; "I have no complaints aboutAstounding,Galaxy, or any of the rest, heaven knows, butF&SF has become something special to me".[151] Beginning in 1977, Asimov lent his name toIsaac Asimov's Science Fiction Magazine (nowAsimov's Science Fiction) and wrote an editorial for each issue. There was also a short-livedAsimov's SF Adventure Magazine and a companionAsimov's Science Fiction Anthology reprint series, published as magazines (in the same manner as the stablematesEllery Queen's Mystery Magazine's andAlfred Hitchcock's Mystery Magazine's "anthologies").[152]
Asimov and two colleagues published a textbook in 1949, with two more editions by 1969.[62] During the late 1950s and 1960s, Asimov substantially decreased his fiction output (he published only four adult novels between 1957'sThe Naked Sun and 1982'sFoundation's Edge, two of which were mysteries). He greatly increased his nonfiction production, writing mostly on science topics; the launch of Sputnik in 1957 engenderedpublic concern over a "science gap".[154] Asimov explained inThe Rest of the Robots that he had been unable to write substantial fiction since the summer of 1958, and observers understood him as saying that his fiction career had ended, or was permanently interrupted.[155] Asimov recalled in 1969 that "the United States went into a kind of tizzy, and so did I. I was overcome by the ardent desire to write popular science for an America that might be in great danger through its neglect of science, and a number of publishers got an equally ardent desire to publish popular science for the same reason".[156]
Fantasy and Science Fiction invited Asimov to continue his regular nonfiction column, begun in the now-folded bimonthly companion magazineVenture Science Fiction Magazine. The first of 399 monthlyF&SF columns appeared in November 1958 and they continued until his terminal illness.[157][k] These columns, periodically collected into books by Doubleday,[62] gave Asimov a reputation as a "Great Explainer" of science; he described them as his only popular science writing in which he never had to assume complete ignorance of the subjects on the part of his readers. The column was ostensibly dedicated to popular science but Asimov had complete editorial freedom, and wrote about contemporary social issues[citation needed] in essays such as "Thinking About Thinking"[158] and "Knock Plastic!".[159] In 1975 he wrote of these essays: "I get more pleasure out of them than out of any other writing assignment."[160]
Asimov's first wide-ranging reference work,The Intelligent Man's Guide to Science (1960), was nominated for aNational Book Award, and in 1963 he won aHugo Award—his first—for his essays forF&SF.[161] The popularity of his science books and the income he derived from them allowed him to give up most academic responsibilities and become a full-timefreelance writer.[162] He encouraged other science fiction writers to write popular science, stating in 1967 that "the knowledgeable, skillful science writer is worth his weight in contracts", with "twice as much work as he can possibly handle".[163]
The great variety of information covered in Asimov's writings promptedKurt Vonnegut to ask, "How does it feel to know everything?" Asimov replied that he only knew how it felt to have the 'reputation' of omniscience: "Uneasy".[164]Floyd C. Gale said that "Asimov has a rare talent. He can make your mental mouth water over dry facts",[165] and "science fiction's loss has been science popularization's gain".[166] Asimov said that "Of all the writing I do, fiction, non-fiction, adult, or juvenile, theseF & SF articles are by far the most fun".[167] He regretted, however, that he had less time for fiction—causing dissatisfied readers to send him letters of complaint—stating in 1969 that "In the last ten years, I've done a couple of novels, some collections, a dozen or so stories, but that'snothing".[156]
In his essay "To Tell a Chemist" (1965), Asimov proposed a simpleshibboleth for distinguishing chemists from non-chemists: ask the person to read the word "unionized". Chemists, he noted, will readun-ionized (electrically neutral), while non-chemists will readunion-ized (belonging to a trade union).
Asimov coined the term "robotics" in his May 1941 story "Liar!",[168] though he later remarked that he believed then that he was merely using an existing word, as he stated inGold ("The Robot Chronicles"). While acknowledging the Oxford Dictionary reference, he incorrectly states that the word was first printed about one third of the way down the first column of page 100 in the March 1942 issue ofAstounding Science Fiction – the printing of his short story "Runaround".[169][170]
In the same story, Asimov also coined the term "positronic" (the counterpart to "electronic" forpositrons).[171]
Asimov coined the term "psychohistory" in hisFoundation stories to name a fictional branch of science which combineshistory,sociology, andmathematical statistics to make general predictions about the future behavior of very large groups of people, such as theGalactic Empire. Asimov said later that he should have called it psychosociology. It was first introduced in the five short stories (1942–1944) which would later be collected as the 1951fix-up novelFoundation.[172] Somewhat later, the term "psychohistory" was applied by others to research of the effects of psychology on history.[173][174]
In addition to his interest in science, Asimov was interested in history. Starting in the 1960s, he wrote 14 popular history books, includingThe Greeks: A Great Adventure (1965),[175]The Roman Republic (1966),[176]The Roman Empire (1967),[177]The Egyptians (1967)[178]The Near East: 10,000 Years of History (1968),[179] andAsimov's Chronology of the World (1991).[180]
He publishedAsimov's Guide to the Bible in two volumes—covering theOld Testament in 1967 and theNew Testament in 1969—and then combined them into one 1,300-page volume in 1981. Complete with maps and tables, the guide goes through the books of the Bible in order, explaining the history of each one and the political influences that affected it, as well as biographical information about the important characters. His interest in literature manifested itself in several annotations of literary works, includingAsimov's Guide to Shakespeare (1970),[l]Asimov's Annotated Don Juan (1972),Asimov's Annotated Paradise Lost (1974), andThe Annotated Gulliver's Travels (1980).[181]
Asimov was also a noted mystery author and a frequent contributor toEllery Queen's Mystery Magazine. He began by writing science fiction mysteries such as his Wendell Urth stories, but soon moved on to writing "pure" mysteries. He published two full-length mystery novels, and wrote 66 stories about theBlack Widowers, a group of men who met monthly for dinner, conversation, and a puzzle. He got the idea for the Widowers from his own association in a stag group called the Trap Door Spiders, and all of the main characters (with the exception of the waiter, Henry, who he admitted resembled Wodehouse's Jeeves) were modeled after his closest friends.[182] A parody of the Black Widowers, "An Evening with the White Divorcés," was written by author, critic, and librarian Jon L. Breen.[183] Asimov joked, "all I can do ... is to wait until I catch him in a dark alley, someday."[184]
Toward the end of his life, Asimov published a series of collections oflimericks, mostly written by himself, starting withLecherous Limericks, which appeared in 1975.Limericks: Too Gross, whose title displays Asimov's love ofpuns, contains 144 limericks by Asimov and an equal number byJohn Ciardi. He even created a slim volume ofSherlockian limericks. Asimov featuredYiddish humor inAzazel, The Two Centimeter Demon. The two main characters, both Jewish, talk over dinner, or lunch, or breakfast, about anecdotes of "George" and his friend Azazel. Asimov'sTreasury of Humor is both a working joke book and a treatise propounding his views onhumor theory. According to Asimov, the most essential element of humor is an abrupt change in point of view, one that suddenly shifts focus from the important to the trivial, or from the sublime to the ridiculous.[185][186]
Particularly in his later years, Asimov to some extent cultivated an image of himself as an amiable lecher. In 1971, as a response to the popularity of sexual guidebooks such asThe Sensuous Woman (by "J") andThe Sensuous Man (by "M"), Asimov publishedThe Sensuous Dirty Old Man under the byline "Dr. 'A'"[187] (although his full name was printed on the paperback edition, first published 1972). However, by 2016, Asimov's habit of groping women was seen assexual harassment and came under criticism, and was cited as an early example of inappropriate behavior that can occur at science fiction conventions.[188]
Asimov publishedthree volumes of autobiography.In Memory Yet Green (1979)[189] andIn Joy Still Felt (1980)[190] cover his life up to 1978. The third volume,I. Asimov: A Memoir (1994),[191] covered his whole life (rather than following on from where the second volume left off). The epilogue was written by his widowJanet Asimov after his death. The book won aHugo Award in 1995.[192] Janet Asimov editedIt's Been a Good Life (2002),[193] a condensed version of his three autobiographies. He also published three volumes of retrospectives of his writing,Opus 100 (1969),[194]Opus 200 (1979),[195] andOpus 300 (1984).[196]
In 1987, the Asimovs co-wroteHow to Enjoy Writing: A Book of Aid and Comfort. In it they offer advice on how to maintain a positive attitude and stay productive when dealing with discouragement, distractions, rejection, and thick-headed editors. The book includes many quotations, essays, anecdotes, and husband-wife dialogues about the ups and downs of being an author.[197][198]
Asimov andStar Trek creatorGene Roddenberry developed a unique relationship duringStar Trek's initial launch in the late 1960s. Asimov wrote a critical essay onStar Trek's scientific accuracy forTV Guide magazine. Roddenberry retorted respectfully with a personal letter explaining the limitations of accuracy when writing a weekly series. Asimov corrected himself with a follow-up essay toTV Guide claiming that despite its inaccuracies,Star Trek was a fresh and intellectually challengingscience fiction television show. The two remained friends to the point where Asimov even served as an advisor on a number ofStar Trek projects.[199]
In 1973, Asimov published a proposal forcalendar reform, called the World Season Calendar. It divides the year into four seasons (named A–D) of 13 weeks (91 days) each. This allows days to be named, e.g., "D-73" instead of December 1 (due to December 1 being the 73rd day of the 4th quarter). An extra 'year day' is added for a total of 365 days.[200]
Asimov won more than a dozen annual awards for particular works of science fiction and a half-dozen lifetime awards.[201]He also received 14honorary doctorate degrees from universities.[202]
1996 – A 1946 Retro-Hugo for Best Novel of 1945 was given at the 1996 WorldCon for "The Mule", the 7th Foundation story, published inAstounding Science Fiction[225]
2009 – A crater on the planet Mars,Asimov,[9] was named in his honor
2010 – In the US Congress bill about the designation of the National Robotics Week as an annual event, a tribute to Isaac Asimov is as follows:
"Whereas the second week in April each year is designated as 'National Robotics Week', recognizing the accomplishments of Isaac Asimov, who immigrated to America, taught science, wrote science books for children and adults, first used the term robotics, developed the Three Laws of Robotics, and died in April 1992: Now, therefore, be it resolved ..."[228]
2016 – A 1941Retro-Hugo for Best Short Story of 1940 was given at the 2016 WorldCon forRobbie, his first positronic robot story, published inSuper Science Stories, September 1940[230]
I have an informal style, which means I tend to use short words and simple sentence structure, to say nothing of occasional colloquialisms. This grates on people who like things that are poetic, weighty, complex, and, above all, obscure. On the other hand, the informal style pleases people who enjoy the sensation of reading an essay without being aware that they are reading and of feeling that ideas are flowing from the writer's brain into their own without mental friction.
Asimov was his own secretary, typist,indexer,proofreader, andliterary agent.[62] He wrote a typed first draft composed at the keyboard at 90 words per minute; he imagined an ending first, then a beginning, then "let everything in-between work itself out as I come to it". (Asimov used anoutline only once, later describing it as "like trying to play the piano from inside a straitjacket".) After correcting a draft by hand, he retyped the document as the final copy and only made one revision with minor editor-requested changes; aword processor did not save him much time, Asimov said, because 95% of the first draft was unchanged.[147][233][234]
After disliking making multiple revisions of "Black Friar of the Flame", Asimov refused to make major, second, or non-editorial revisions ("like chewing used gum"), stating that "too large a revision, or too many revisions, indicate that the piece of writing is a failure. In the time it would take to salvage such a failure, I could write a new piece altogether and have infinitely more fun in the process". He submitted "failures" to another editor.[147][233]
Asimov's fiction style is extremely unornamented. In 1980, science fiction scholarJames Gunn wrote ofI, Robot:
Except for two stories—"Liar!" and "Evidence"—they are not stories in which character plays a significant part. Virtually all plot develops in conversation with little if any action. Nor is there a great deal of local color or description of any kind. The dialogue is, at best, functional and the style is, at best, transparent. ... . The robot stories and, as a matter of fact, almost all Asimov fiction—play themselves on a relatively bare stage.[235]
Asimov addressed such criticism in 1989 at the beginning ofNemesis:
I made up my mind long ago to follow one cardinal rule in all my writing—to be 'clear'. I have given up all thought of writing poetically or symbolically or experimentally, or in any of the other modes that might (if I were good enough) get me a Pulitzer prize. I would write merely clearly and in this way establish a warm relationship between myself and my readers, and the professional critics—Well, they can do whatever they wish.[236]
Gunn cited examples of a more complex style, such as the climax of "Liar!". Sharply drawn characters occur at key junctures of his storylines:Susan Calvin in "Liar!" and "Evidence",Arkady Darell inSecond Foundation, Elijah Baley inThe Caves of Steel, andHari Seldon in theFoundation prequels.
Other than books by Gunn and Joseph Patrouch, there is relatively little literary criticism on Asimov (particularly when compared to the sheer volume of his output). Cowart and Wymer'sDictionary of Literary Biography (1981) gives a possible reason:
His words do not easily lend themselves to traditionalliterary criticism because he has the habit of centering his fiction on plot and clearly stating to his reader, in rather direct terms, what is happening in his stories and why it is happening. In fact, most of the dialogue in an Asimov story, and particularly in the Foundation trilogy, is devoted to such exposition. Stories that clearly state what they mean in unambiguous language are the most difficult for a scholar to deal with because there is little to be interpreted.[237]
Gunn's and Patrouch's studies of Asimov both state that a clear, direct prose style is still a style. Gunn's 1982 book comments in detail on each of Asimov's novels. He does not praise all of Asimov's fiction (nor does Patrouch), but calls some passages inThe Caves of Steel "reminiscent ofProust". When discussing how that novel depicts night falling over futuristic New York City, Gunn says that Asimov's prose "need not be ashamed anywhere in literary society".[238]
Although he prided himself on his unornamented prose style (for which he creditedClifford D. Simak as an early influence[16][239]), and said in 1973 that his style had not changed,[147] Asimov also enjoyed giving his longer stories complicatednarrative structures, often by arranging chapters in nonchronological ways. Some readers have been put off by this, complaining that thenonlinearity is not worth the trouble and adversely affects the clarity of the story. For example, the first third ofThe Gods Themselves begins with Chapter 6, then backtracks to fill in earlier material.[240] (John Campbell advised Asimov to begin his stories as late in the plot as possible. This advice helped Asimov create "Reason", one of the earlyRobot stories). Patrouch found that the interwoven and nested flashbacks ofThe Currents of Space did serious harm to that novel, to such an extent that only a "dyed-in-the-kyrt Asimov fan" could enjoy it.[241] In his later novelNemesis one group of characters lives in the "present" and another group starts in the "past", beginning 15 years earlier and gradually moving toward the time of the first group.
Asimov once explained that his reluctance to write about aliens came from an incident early in his career whenAstounding's editorJohn Campbell rejected one of his science fiction stories because the alien characters were portrayed as superior to the humans. The nature of the rejection led him to believe that Campbell may have based his bias towards humans in stories on a real-world racial bias. Unwilling to write only weak alien races, and concerned that a confrontation would jeopardize his and Campbell's friendship, he decided he would not write about aliens at all.[242] Nevertheless, in response to these criticisms, he wroteThe Gods Themselves, which contains aliens and alien sex. The book won theNebula Award for Best Novel in 1972,[212] and theHugo Award for Best Novel in 1973.[212] Asimov said that of all his writings, he was most proud of the middle section ofThe Gods Themselves, the part that deals with those themes.[243]
In theHugo Award–winning novelette "Gold", Asimov describes an author, based on himself, who has one of his books (The Gods Themselves) adapted into a "compu-drama", essentiallyphoto-realisticcomputer animation. The director criticizes the fictionalized Asimov ("Gregory Laborian") for having an extremely nonvisual style, making it difficult to adapt his work, and the author explains that he relies on ideas and dialogue rather than description to get his points across.[244]
In the early days of science fiction some authors and critics felt that the romantic elements were inappropriate in science fiction stories, which were supposedly to be focused on science and technology. Isaac Asimov was a supporter of this point of view, expressed in his 1938–1939 letters toAstounding, where he described such elements as "mush" and "slop". To his dismay, these letters were met with a strong opposition.[245]
Asimov attributed the lack of romance and sex in his fiction to the "early imprinting" from starting his writing career when he had never been on a date and "didn't know anything about girls".[125] He was sometimes criticized for the general absence of sex (and ofextraterrestrial life) in his science fiction. He claimed he wroteThe Gods Themselves (1972) to respond to these criticisms,[246] which often came fromNew Wave science fiction (and often British) writers. The second part (of three) of the novel is set on an alien world with three sexes, and the sexual behavior of these creatures is extensively depicted.
There is a perennial question among readers as to whether the views contained in a story reflect the views of the author. The answer is, "Not necessarily—" And yet one ought to add another short phrase "—but usually."
Asimov was anatheist, and ahumanist.[117] He did not oppose religious conviction in others, but he frequently railed againstsuperstitious andpseudoscientific beliefs that tried to pass themselves off as genuine science. During his childhood, his parents observed the traditions ofOrthodox Judaism less stringently than they had in Petrovichi; they did not force their beliefs upon young Isaac, and he grew up without strong religious influences, coming to believe that theTorah representedHebrew mythology in the same way that theIliad recordedGreek mythology.[248] When he was 13, he chose not to have abar mitzvah.[249] As his booksTreasury of Humor andAsimov Laughs Again record, Asimov was willing to tell jokes involving God,Satan, theGarden of Eden,Jerusalem, and other religious topics, expressing the viewpoint that a good joke can do more to provoke thought than hours of philosophical discussion.[185][186]
For a brief while, his father worked in the localsynagogue to enjoy the familiar surroundings and, as Isaac put it, "shine as a learned scholar"[250] versed in the sacred writings. This scholarship was a seed for his later authorship and publication ofAsimov's Guide to the Bible, an analysis of the historic foundations for the Old and New Testaments. For many years, Asimov called himself an atheist; he considered the term somewhat inadequate, as it described what he did not believe rather than what he did. Eventually, he described himself as a "humanist" and considered that term more practical. Asimov continued to identify himself as asecular Jew, as stated in his introduction toJack Dann's anthology of Jewish science fiction,Wandering Stars: "I attend no services and follow no ritual and have never undergone that curious puberty rite, the Bar Mitzvah. It doesn't matter. I am Jewish."[251]
When asked in an interview in 1982 if he was an atheist, Asimov replied,
I am an atheist, out and out. It took me a long time to say it. I've been an atheist for years and years, but somehow I felt it was intellectually unrespectable to say one was an atheist, because it assumed knowledge that one didn't have. Somehow it was better to say one was a humanist or an agnostic. I finally decided that I'm a creature of emotion as well as of reason. Emotionally I am an atheist. I don't have the evidence to prove that God doesn't exist, but I so strongly suspect he doesn't that I don't want to waste my time.[252]
Likewise, he said about religious education: "I would not be satisfied to have my kids choose to be religious without trying to argue them out of it, just as I would not be satisfied to have them decide to smoke regularly or engage in any other practice I consider detrimental to mind or body."[253]
In his last volume of autobiography, Asimov wrote,
If I were not an atheist, I would believe in a God who would choose to save people on the basis of the totality of their lives and not the pattern of their words. I think he would prefer an honest and righteous atheist to a TV preacher whose every word is God, God, God, and whose every deed is foul, foul, foul.[254]
The same memoir states his belief thatHell is "the drooling dream of asadist" crudely affixed to an all-merciful God; if even human governments were willing to curtail cruel and unusual punishments, wondered Asimov, why would punishment in the afterlife not be restricted to a limited term? Asimov rejected the idea that a human belief or action could merit infinite punishment. If an afterlife existed, he claimed, the longest and most severe punishment would be reserved for those who "slandered God by inventing Hell".[255]
Asimov said about using religious motifs in his writing:
I tend to ignore religion in my own stories altogether, except when I absolutely have to have it. ... and, whenever I bring in a religious motif, that religion is bound to seem vaguely Christian because that is the only religion I know anything about, even though it is not mine. An unsympathetic reader might think that I am "burlesquing" Christianity, but I am not. Then too, it is impossible to write science fiction and really ignore religion.[256]
Asimov became a staunch supporter of theDemocratic Party during theNew Deal, and thereafter remained a politicalliberal. He was a vocal opponent of theVietnam War in the 1960s and in a television interview during the early 1970s he publicly endorsedGeorge McGovern.[257] He was unhappy about what he considered an "irrationalist" viewpoint taken by many radical political activists from the late 1960s and onwards. In his second volume of autobiography,In Joy Still Felt, Asimov recalled meeting the counterculture figureAbbie Hoffman. Asimov's impression was that the1960s' counterculture heroes had ridden an emotional wave which, in the end, left them stranded in a "no-man's land of the spirit" from which he wondered if they would ever return.[258]
Asimov vehemently opposedRichard Nixon, considering him "a crook and a liar". He closely followedWatergate, and was pleased when the president was forced to resign. Asimov was dismayed over the pardon extended to Nixon by his successorGerald Ford: "I was not impressed by the argument that it has spared the nation an ordeal. To my way of thinking, the ordeal was necessary to make certain it would never happen again."[259]
After Asimov's name appeared in the mid-1960s on a list of people theCommunist Party USA "considered amenable" to its goals, theFBI investigated him. Because of his academic background, the bureau briefly considered Asimov as a possible candidate for known Soviet spy ROBPROF, but found nothing suspicious in his life or background.[260]
Asimov appeared to hold an equivocal attitude towardsIsrael. In his first autobiography, he indicates his support for the safety of Israel, though insisting that he was not aZionist.[261] In his third autobiography, Asimov stated his opposition to the creation of aJewish state, on the grounds that he was opposed to havingnation-states in general, and supported the notion of a single humanity. Asimov especially worried about the safety of Israel given that it had been created among Muslim neighbors "who will never forgive, never forget and never go away", and said that Jews had merely created for themselves another "Jewish ghetto".[n]
Asimov believed that "science fiction ... serve[s] the good of humanity".[163] He considered himself a feminist even beforewomen's liberation became a widespread movement; he argued that the issue ofwomen's rights was closely connected to that of population control.[262] Furthermore, he believed thathomosexuality must be considered a "moral right" on population grounds, as must all consenting adult sexual activity that does not lead to reproduction.[262] He issued many appeals forpopulation control, reflecting a perspective articulated by people fromThomas Malthus throughPaul R. Ehrlich.[263]
In a 1988 interview byBill Moyers, Asimov proposedcomputer-aided learning, where people would use computers to find information on subjects in which they were interested.[264] He thought this would make learning more interesting, since people would have the freedom to choose what to learn, and would help spread knowledge around the world. Also, theone-to-one model would let students learn at their own pace.[265] Asimov thought that people would live in space by 2019.[266]
Computerization will undoubtedly continue onward inevitably...This means that a vast change in the nature of education must take place, and entire populations must be made "computer-literate" and must be taught to deal with a "high-tech" world.
He continues on education:
Education, which must be revolutionized in the new world, will be revolutionized by the very agency that requires the revolution — the computer.
Schools will undoubtedly still exist, but a good schoolteacher can do no better than to inspire curiosity which an interested student can then satisfy at home at the console of his computer outlet.
There will be an opportunity finally for every youngster, and indeed, every person, to learn what he or she wants to learn, in his or her own time, at his or her own speed, in his or her own way.
Education will become fun because it will bubble up from within and not be forced in from without.
Asimov would often fondle, kiss and pinch women at conventions and elsewhere without regard for their consent. According toAlec Nevala-Lee, author of an Asimov biography[268] and writer on the history of science fiction, he often defended himself by saying that far from showing objections, these women cooperated.[269] In a 1971 satirical piece,The Sensuous Dirty Old Man, Asimov wrote: "The question then is not whether or not a girl should be touched. The question is merely where, when, and how she should be touched."[269]
According to Nevala-Lee, however, "many of these encounters were clearly nonconsensual."[269] He wrote that Asimov's behavior, as a leading science-fiction author and personality, contributed to an undesirable atmosphere for women in the male-dominated science fiction community. In support of this, he quoted some of Asimov's contemporary fellow-authors such asJudith Merril,Harlan Ellison andFrederik Pohl, as well as editors such as Timothy Seldes.[269] Additional specific incidents were reported by other people includingEdward L. Ferman, long-time editor ofThe Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, who wrote "...instead of shaking my date's hand, he shook herleft breast".[270]
Asimov's defense of civil applications ofnuclear power, even after theThree Mile Island nuclear power plant incident, damaged his relations with some of his fellow liberals. In a letter reprinted inYours, Isaac Asimov,[262] he states that although he would prefer living in "no danger whatsoever" to living near a nuclear reactor, he would still prefer a home near a nuclear power plant to a slum onLove Canal or near "aUnion Carbide plant producingmethyl isocyanate", the latter being a reference to theBhopal disaster.[262]
In the closing years of his life, Asimov blamed the deterioration of the quality of life that he perceived in New York City on the shrinking tax base caused by themiddle-class flight to the suburbs, though he continued to support high taxes on the middle class to pay for social programs. His last nonfiction book,Our Angry Earth (1991, co-written with his long-time friend, science fiction authorFrederik Pohl), deals with elements of the environmental crisis such asoverpopulation,oil dependence,war,global warming, and the destruction of theozone layer.[271][272] In response to being presented byBill Moyers with the question "What do you see happening to the idea of dignity to human species if this population growth continues at its present rate?", Asimov responded:
It's going to destroy it all ... if you have 20 people in the apartment and two bathrooms, no matter how much every person believes in freedom of the bathroom, there is no such thing. You have to set up, you have to set up times for each person, you have to bang at the door, aren't you through yet, and so on. And in the same way, democracy cannot survive overpopulation. Human dignity cannot survive it. Convenience and decency cannot survive it. As you put more and more people onto the world, the value of life not only declines, but it disappears.[273]
Asimov enjoyed the writings ofJ. R. R. Tolkien, and usedThe Lord of the Rings as a plot point in aBlack Widowers story, titledNothing like Murder.[274] In the essay "All or Nothing" (forThe Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction, Jan 1981), Asimov said that he admired Tolkien and that he had readThe Lord of the Rings five times. (The feelings were mutual, with Tolkien saying that he had enjoyed Asimov's science fiction.[275] This would make Asimov an exception to Tolkien's earlier claim[275] that he rarely found "any modern books" that were interesting to him.)
He acknowledged other writers as superior to himself in talent, saying ofHarlan Ellison, "He is (in my opinion) one of the best writers in the world, far more skilled at the art than I am."[276] Asimov disapproved of theNew Wave's growing influence, stating in 1967 "I want science fiction. I think science fiction isn't really science fiction if it lacks science. And I think the better and truer the science, the better and truer the science fiction".[163]
The feelings of friendship and respect between Asimov andArthur C. Clarke were demonstrated by the so-called "Clarke–Asimov Treaty ofPark Avenue", negotiated as they shared a cab in New York. This stated that Asimov was required to insist that Clarke was the best science fiction writer in the world (reserving second-best for himself), while Clarke was required to insist that Asimov was the best science writer in the world (reserving second-best for himself). Thus, the dedication in Clarke's bookReport on Planet Three (1972) reads: "In accordance with the terms of the Clarke–Asimov treaty, the second-best science writer dedicates this book to the second-best science-fiction writer."
In 1980, Asimov wrote a highly critical review ofGeorge Orwell's1984.[277] Though dismissive of his attacks, James Machell has stated that they "are easier to understand when you consider that Asimov viewed 1984 as dangerous literature. He opines that if communism were to spread across the globe, it would come in a completely different form to the one in 1984, and by looking to Orwell as an authority on totalitarianism, 'we will be defending ourselves against assaults from the wrong direction and we will lose'."[278]
Asimov became a fan of mystery stories at the same time as science fiction. He preferred to read the former because "I read every [science fiction] story keenly aware that it might be worse than mine, in which case I had no patience with it, or that it might be better, in which case I felt miserable".[147] Asimov wrote "I make no secret of the fact that in my mysteries I useAgatha Christie as my model. In my opinion, her mysteries are the best ever written, far better than the Sherlock Holmes stories, andHercule Poirot is the best detective fiction has seen. Why should I not use as my model what I consider the best?"[279] He enjoyed Sherlock Holmes, but consideredArthur Conan Doyle to be "a slapdash and sloppy writer."[280]
Asimov also enjoyed humorous stories, particularly those ofP. G. Wodehouse.[281]
In non-fiction writing, Asimov particularly admired the writing style ofMartin Gardner, and tried to emulate it in his own science books. On meeting Gardner for the first time in 1965, Asimov told him this, to which Gardner answered that he had based his own style on Asimov's.[282]
John Jenkins, who has reviewed the vast majority of Asimov's written output, once observed, "It has been pointed out that most science fiction writers since the 1950s have been affected by Asimov, either modeling their style on his or deliberately avoiding anything like his style."[284] Along with such figures asBertrand Russell andKarl Popper, Asimov left his mark as one of the most distinguishedinterdisciplinarians of the 20th century.[285] "Few individuals", writesJames L. Christian, "understood better than Isaac Asimov whatsynoptic thinking is all about. His almost 500 books—which he wrote as a specialist, a knowledgeable authority, or just an excited layman—range over almost all conceivable subjects: the sciences, history, literature, religion, and of course, science fiction."[286]
In 2024,DARPA named one of its programs after Asimov, inspired by his “Three Laws of Robotics.” The program, Autonomy Standards and Ideals with Military Operational Values (ASIMOV), aims to develop benchmarks objectively and quantitatively assessing the ethical challenges and readiness of utilizing autonomous systems for military operations.[287]
Over a space of 40 years, I published an average of 1,000 words a day. Over the space of the second 20 years, I published an average of 1,700 words a day.
Depending on the counting convention used,[289] and including all titles, charts, and edited collections, there may be currently over 500 books in Asimov's bibliography—as well as his individual short stories, individual essays, and criticism. For his 100th, 200th, and 300th books (based on his personal count), Asimov publishedOpus 100 (1969),Opus 200 (1979), andOpus 300 (1984), celebrating his writing.[194][195][196] An extensive bibliography of Isaac Asimov's works has been compiled by Ed Seiler.[290] His book writing rate was analysed, showing that he wrote faster as he wrote more.[291]
An online exhibit inWest Virginia University Libraries' virtually complete Asimov Collection displays features, visuals, and descriptions of some of his more than 600 books, games, audio recordings, videos, and wall charts. Many first, rare, and autographed editions are in the Libraries' Rare Book Room. Book jackets and autographs are presented online along with descriptions and images of children's books, science fiction art, multimedia, and other materials in the collection.[292][293]
TheRobot series was originally separate from theFoundation series. The Galactic Empire novels were published as independent stories, set earlier in the same future asFoundation. Later in life, Asimov synthesized theRobot series into a single coherent "history" that appeared in the extension of theFoundation series.[294]
All of these books were published byDoubleday & Co, except the original Foundation trilogy which was originally published by Gnome Books before being bought and republished by Doubleday.
Foundation and Empire. 1952. (also published with the title 'The Man Who Upset the Universe' as a 35¢ Ace paperback, D-125, in about 1952)ISBN0-553-29337-0.
David Frost interview program, August 1969. Frost asked Asimov if he had ever tried to find God and, after some initial evasion, Asimov answered, "God is much more intelligent than I am—let him try to find me."[300]
Several of his stories ("The Dead Past", "Sucker Bait", "Satisfaction Guaranteed", "Reason", "Liar!", and "The Naked Sun") were adapted as television plays for the first three series of the science-fiction (later horror) anthology seriesOut of the Unknown between 1965 and 1969. Only "The Dead Past" and "Sucker Bait" are known to still exist entirely as 16mmtelerecordings.Tele-snaps, brief audio recordings and video clips exist for "Satisfaction Guaranteed" and "The Prophet" (adapted from "Reason"), while only production stills, brief audio recordings and video clips exist for "Liar!". Production stills and an almost complete audio recording exist for "The Naked Sun".[308]
Robot City (1995), anadventure game released forWindows andMac OS, based on the book series of the same name that consists of science fiction novels written by multiple authors, inspired by theRobot series.
^abcAsimov, Isaac (1979).In Memory Yet Green. p. 31.The date of my birth, as I celebrate it, was January 2, 1920. It could not have been later than that. It might, however, have been earlier. Allowing for the uncertainties of the times, of the lack ofrecords, of theJewish andJulian calendars, it might have been as early as October 4, 1919. There is, however, no way of finding out. My parents were always uncertain and it really doesn't matter. I celebrate January 2, 1920, so let it be.
^In the humorous poem "The Prime of Life" published in the anthologyThe Bicentennial Man and Other Stories (p. 3), Asimov rhymes his name thusly: "Why,mazel tov, it's Asimov." In his comments on his poem, Asimov wrote that originally it was "Why, stars above, it's Asimov," and when someone suggested to use "mazel tov" instead, Asimov accepted this as a significant improvement.
^Asimov, Stanley (1996).Yours, Isaac Asimov.My estimate is that Isaac received about 100,000 letters in his professional career. And with the compulsiveness that has to be a character trait of a writer of almost 500 books, he answered 90 percent of them. He answered more than half with postcards and didn't make carbons of them. But with the 100,000 letters he received, there are carbons of about 45,000 that he wrote.
^He obtained his Ph.D. on May 20, 1948.[42] He wrote a dissertation on "Kinetics of the Reaction Inactivation ofTyrosinase During Its Catalysis of the Aerobic Oxidation ofCatechol".[43] An abridged version was published in theJournal of the American Chemical Society[44] (February 1950, p. 820; online at theJACS website.[45](subscription required)). (The introduction to the full dissertation was reprinted in his bookOpus 100, pp. 171–173.)
^Between 1950 and 1953 he published seven scientific research papers: the summary of his PhD dissertation (described in an earlier explanatory note), which he described as "my longest and my best," and six papers about his research at Boston University ("all those papers were unimportant").[60]
^Asimov, Isaac (1969).Nightfall, and Other Stories. Doubleday. p. 244.I wrote a novel in 1953 which pictured a world in which everyone lived in underground cities, comfortably enclosed away from the open air. People would say, 'How could you imagine such a nightmarish situation?' And I would answer in astonishment, 'What nightmarish situation?'
^On the subject of IQ tests, Asimov wrote: "there is no objective definition of intelligence, and what we call intelligence is only a creation of cultural fashion and subjective prejudice,"[100] and "I simply don't think it is reasonable to use IQ tests to produce results of questionable value, which may then serve to justify racists in their own minds and to help bring about the kinds of tragedies we have already witnessed earlier in this century."[101]
^The two exceptions were both 1,000-word short stories written in 1941, "Masks" and "Big Game."[127] The latter was published in 1974.[128]
^A 400th essay, a compilation of excerpts from his earlier essays edited by his widow Janet Jeppson Asimov, was published in the magazine in 1994.
^Asimov,In Joy Still Felt (1980), pp. 464–465: "Of all the books I have ever worked on, I thinkAsimov's Guide to Shakespeare gave me the most pleasure, day in, day out. For months and months I lived and thought Shakespeare, and I don't see how there can be any greater pleasure in the world—any pleasure, that is, that one can indulge in for as much as ten hours without pause, day after day indefinitely."
^Reprinted as "The Birth and Death of the Universe" inIs Anyone There? (Doubleday, 1967)
^Asimov, Isaac (1994).I, Asimov: A Memoir. New York: Doubleday. p. 380.When Israel was founded in 1948 and all my Jewish friends were jubilant, I was the skeleton at the feast. I said, "We are building ourselves a ghetto. We will be surrounded by tens of millions of Muslims who will never forgive, never forget and never go away."... But don't Jews deserve a homeland? Actually, I feel that no human group deserves a "homeland" in the usual sense of the word. ... I am not a Zionist, then, because I don't believe in nations, and Zionism merely sets up one more nation to trouble the world.
^Asimov, Isaac (1979)In Memory Yet Green, pp. 3–4. Avon. "Strictly speaking, then, I was not born in Russia, nor in the U.S.S.R. either, but in the Russian S.F.S.R. (Great Russia). ... Petrovichi was in the Smolensk-guberniya—that is, in the Smolensk district of Great Russia. "Guberniya" is a term no longer used in the U.S.S.R., I believe, and one would now speak of the Smolensk-oblast instead."
^Asimov, Isaac (1979)In Memory Yet Green, p. 21. Avon.
^Asimov, Isaac (1979)In Memory Yet Green, pp. 8, 22, 30. Avon.
^Asimov, I. (1979)In Memory Yet Green, (Avon 1980 edition), p. 364.
^Asimov, I. (1979)In Memory Yet Green, (Avon 1980 edition), pp. 355, 366, 476, 480–481, 532, 560–563, 623, and Asimov, I. (1979)In Joy Still Felt, (Avon 1980 edition), pp. 47–49.
^"Isaac Asimov FAQ".asimovonline.com.Archived from the original on October 16, 2012. RetrievedMarch 3, 2015.
^Asimov wrote in 1969 that "periodic trips to New York ... have, more and more, become a kind of highlight to my life".Asimov, Isaac (1969).Nightfall, and other stories. Doubleday. p. 267.
^Asimov, Isaac. (1975)Buy Jupiter and Other Stories, VGSF (1988 ed.), p. 205.
^"Asimov in the UK".Rob Hansen's Fan Stuff.Archived from the original on September 30, 2020. RetrievedJuly 16, 2020.
^Platt, Charles (1978). "A Visit with Isaac Asimov". In Durwood, Thomas (ed.).Ariel, The Book of Fantasy, Volume 4. Ariel Books. pp. 28–31.ISBN9780345278296.
^Seiler, Edward; Hatcher, Richard (1995)."Asimov essays about psychology". Isaac Asimov Home Page.Archived from the original on January 21, 2013. RetrievedMay 13, 2013.
^abIsaac Asimov, "The Way of Reason", inIn Pursuit of Truth: Essays on the Philosophy of Karl Popper on the Occasion of his 80th Birthday,, ed.Paul Levinson, Humanities Press, 1982, pp. ix–x.
^Latham, Rob (2009)."Fiction, 1950-1963". In Bould, Mark; Butler, Andrew M.; Roberts, Adam; Vint, Sherryl (eds.).The Routledge Companion to Science Fiction. Routledge. pp. 80–89.ISBN978-1-135-22836-1.Archived from the original on January 26, 2021. RetrievedNovember 21, 2020.
^According to theOxford English Dictionary, the term "robotics" was first used in the short story "Liar!" published in the May 1941 issue ofAstounding Science Fiction.
^Asimov, Isaac (1983). "4 The Word I Invented".Counting the Eons. Doubleday.Bibcode:1983coeo.book.....A.Robotics has become a sufficiently well developed technology to warrant articles and books on its history and I have watched this in amazement, and in some disbelief, because I invented ... the word
^Cowart, David; Wymer, Thomas L. (1981).Dictionary of Literary Biography: Volume 8: Twentieth-Century American Science Fiction Writers. Detroit: Gale Research. pp. 15–29.
^Asimov, Isaac.In Memory Yet Green: The Autobiography of Isaac Asimov, 1920–1954. Doubleday, 1979.
^"I make no secret of the fact that I am a non-observant Jew", Asimov, Isaac.Isaac Asimov's Science Fiction Magazine, Volume 15, Issues 10–13. p. 8. Davis Publishing, 1991.
^Lee, Alec (2018).Astounding: John W. Campbell, Isaac Asimov, Robert A. Heinlein, L. Ron Hubbard, and the Golden Age of science fiction. New York: Dey St., an imprint of William Morrow.ISBN978-0-06-257194-6.OCLC1030279844.
^Davin, Eric (2006).Partners in Wonder: Women and the Birth of Science Fiction, 1926–1965. Lanham, MD: Lexington Books.ISBN978-0-7391-1267-0.OCLC1253442749.
^Sara Schotland, "Deformed, Neanderthal, and Thoroughly Alien: Exploitation of the Other in Asimov’s 'Ugly Little Boy'," Otherness: Essays and Studies, Vol. 8, No. 1, March 2021.[2]
^Peter W. Singer, "Isaac Asimov's Laws of Robotics Are Wrong," Brookings Institution, July 28, 2016.[3]
Gunn, James E. (1982).Isaac Asimov: The Foundations of Science Fiction. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Käkelä, Jari (2016).The Cowboy Politics of an Enlightened Future: History, Expansionism, and Guardianship in Isaac Asimov's Science Fiction (PhD thesis). Helsinki: University of Helsinki.hdl:10138/166004.ISBN978-951-51-2404-3.
