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Foundation Mass Market Paperback – October 1, 1991

by Isaac Asimov (Author)

4.4 32,700 ratings

Book 1 of 7: Foundation

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The first novel in Isaac Asimov’s classic science-fiction masterpiece, the Foundation series

THE EPIC SAGA THAT INSPIRED THE APPLE TV+ SERIES FOUNDATION • Nominated as one of America’s best-loved novels by PBS’s The Great American Read

For twelve thousand years the Galactic Empire has ruled supreme. Now it is dying. But only Hari Seldon, creator of the revolutionary science of psychohistory, can see into the future—to a dark age of ignorance, barbarism, and warfare that will last thirty thousand years. To preserve knowledge and save humankind, Seldon gathers the best minds in the Empire—both scientists and scholars—and brings them to a bleak planet at the edge of the galaxy to serve as a beacon of hope for future generations. He calls his sanctuary the Foundation.

The Foundation novels of Isaac Asimov are among the most influential in the history of science fiction, celebrated for their unique blend of breathtaking action, daring ideas, and extensive worldbuilding. In Foundation, Asimov has written a timely and timeless novel of the best—and worst—that lies in humanity, and the power of even a few courageous souls to shine a light in a universe of darkness.

Book 1 of 7

Foundation
Print length

296 pages
Language

English
Publisher

Bantam Spectra Books
Publication date

October 1, 1991
Dimensions

4.11 x 0.83 x 6.88 inches
ISBN-10

0553293354
ISBN-13

978-0553293357
Lexile measure

830L
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Popular Highlights in this book

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“Never let your sense of morals prevent you from doing what is right!”
Highlighted by 5,054 Kindle readers
“It pays to be obvious, especially if you have a reputation for subtlety.”
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‘To succeed, planning alone is insufficient. One must improvise as well.’
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From the Publisher

Green background with topographical lines, six book covers. ”Experience the genre-defining series”


	Foundation and Empire (Book 2)	Second Foundation (Book 3)	Foundation’s Edge (Book 4)	Foundation and Earth (Book 5)	Prelude to Foundation (Foundation Prequel 1)	Forward the Foundation (Foundation Prequel 2)

Customer Reviews	12,834	10,772	7,893	6,550	6,224	4,447
Price	$11.54	$11.39	$13.50	$14.76	$17.45	$10.99
	The second novel in Isaac Asimov’s classic science-fiction masterpiece, the Foundation series.	The third novel in Isaac Asimov’s classic science-fiction masterpiece, the Foundation series.	The fourth novel in Isaac Asimov’s classic science-fiction masterpiece, the Foundation series.	The fifth novel in Isaac Asimov’s classic science-fiction masterpiece, the Foundation series.	The first of two prequel novels in Isaac Asimov’s classic science-fiction masterpiece.	The second of two prequel novels in Isaac Asimov’s classic science-fiction masterpiece.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

Foundation marks the first of a series of tales set so far in the future that Earth is all but forgotten by humans who live throughout the galaxy. Yet all is not well with the Galactic Empire. Its vast size is crippling to it. In particular, the administrative planet, honeycombed and tunneled with offices and staff, is vulnerable to attack or breakdown. The only person willing to confront this imminent catastrophe is Hari Seldon, a psychohistorian and mathematician. Seldon can scientifically predict the future, and it doesn't look pretty: a new Dark Age is scheduled to send humanity into barbarism in 500 years. He concocts a scheme to save the knowledge of the race in an Encyclopedia Galactica. But this project will take generations to complete, and who will take up the torch after him? The first Foundation trilogy (Foundation, Foundation and Empire, Second Foundation) won a Hugo Award in 1965 for "Best All-Time Series." It's science fiction on the grand scale; one of the classics of the field. --Brooks Peck

Review

Praise for Isaac Asimov and his Foundation series

“A true polymath, a superb rationalist, an exciting and accessible writer in both fiction and nonfiction, Isaac Asimov was simply a master of all he surveyed.”—Greg Bear

“Asimov served wondrous meals-of-the-mind to a civilization that was starved for clear thinking about the future. To this day, his visions spice our ongoing dinner-table conversation about human destiny.”—David Brin

“Isaac was still in his teens when I met him, a fan of mine before I was a fan of his. Writing for John W. Campbell back in the famous ‘golden age of science fiction,’ he became one of the founders of our field. With the Robot stories and the Foundation stories, he helped to shape science fiction as we know it.”—Jack Williamson

“I grew up on the ABC’s of science fiction—Asimov, Bradbury, Clarke. There’s a reason Asimov’s name comes first, and not just because of the alphabet!”—Janis Ian

“With his fertile imagination, his wit, and his prolific output, Isaac Asimov truly laid the foundation for all future generations of science fiction writers.”—Kevin J. Anderson

“If anything can be said to have been the launch pad for space-age science fiction, it has to be the Foundation trilogy. It’s a classic. And it’s unforgettable.”—Jack McDevitt

“The Foundation series is one of the masterpieces of science fiction. If you’ve never read these novels, then you’re in for a treat, and even if you’ve already read them, then you owe it to yourself to reread them, because they’re still great.”—Allen Steele

“Quite simply, Asimov got me started.”—Liz Williams

“Asimov’s Foundation trilogy was the pivotal touchstone of my life in creative fiction. His vision and scope spanned the galaxy across eons, and at the same time he told deeply personal stories of living characters. The writer I am sprang from the boy that these books touched back then. They continue to move me still. Thank you, Isaac, for opening my mind and my life to the possible.”—Tracy Hickman

“I’m sure there will be more Foundation stories, and more robot stories, and more science-fictional mysteries, because those are Isaac’s legacies to us. But reading them won’t be quite the same. There was only one Isaac Asimov; there will never be another.”—Mike Resnick

About the Author

Isaac Asimov began his Foundation series at the age of twenty-one, not realizing that it would one day be considered a cornerstone of science fiction. During his legendary career, Asimov penned more than 470 books on subjects ranging from science to Shakespeare to history, though he was most loved for his award-winning science fiction sagas, which include the Robot, Empire, and Foundation series. Named a Grand Master of Science Fiction by the Science Fiction Writers of America, Asimov entertained and educated readers of all ages for close to five decades. He died, at the age of seventy-two, in April 1992.

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

1

His name was Gaal Dornick and he was just a country boy who had never seen Trantor before. That is, not in real life. He had seen it many times on the hyper-video, and occasionally in tremendous three-dimensional newscasts covering an Imperial Coronation or the opening of a Galactic Council. Even though he had lived all his life on the world of Synnax, which circled a star at the edges of the Blue Drift, he was not cut off from civilization, you see. At that time, no place in the Galaxy was.

There were nearly twenty-five million inhabited planets in the Galaxy then, and not one but owed allegiance to the Empire whose seat was on Trantor. It was the last half-century in which that could be said.

To Gaal, this trip was the undoubted climax of his young, scholarly life. He had been in space before so that the trip, as a voyage and nothing more, meant little to him. To be sure, he had traveled previously only as far as Synnax's only satellite in order to get the data on the mechanics of meteor driftage which he needed for his dissertation, but space-travel was all one whether one travelled half a million miles, or as many light years.

He had steeled himself just a little for the Jump through hyper-space, a phenomenon one did not experience in simple interplanetary trips. The Jump remained, and would probably remain forever, the only practical method of travelling between the stars. Travel through ordinary space could proceed at no rate more rapid than that of ordinary light (a bit of scientific knowledge that belonged among the items known since the forgotten dawn of human history), and that would have meant years of travel between even the nearest of inhabited systems. Through hyper-space, that unimaginable region that was neither space nor time, matter nor energy, something nor nothing, one could traverse the length of the Galaxy in the interval between two neighboring instants of time.

Gaal had waited for the first of those jumps with a little dread curled gently in his stomach, and it ended in nothing more than a trifling jar, a little internal kick which ceased an instant before he could be sure he had felt it. That was all.

And after that, there was only the ship, large and glistening; the cool production of 12,000 years of Imperial progress; and himself, with his doctorate in mathematics freshly obtained and an invitation from the great Hari Seldon to come to Trantor and join the vast and somewhat mysterious Seldon Project.

What Gaal was waiting for after the disappointment of the Jump was that first sight of Trantor. He haunted the View-room. The steel shutter-lids were rolled back at announced times and he was always there, watching the hard brilliance of the stars, enjoying the incredible hazy swarm of a star cluster, like a giant conglomeration of fireflies caught in mid-motion and stilled forever. At one time there was the cold, blue-white smoke of a gaseous nebula within five light years of the ship, spreading over the window like distant milk, filling the room with an icy tinge, and disappearing out of sight two hours later, after another Jump.

The first sight of Trantor's sun was that of a hard, white speck all but lost in a myriad such, and recognizable only because it was pointed out by the ship's guide. The stars were thick here near the Galactic center. But with each Jump, it shone more brightly, drowning out the rest, paling them and thinning them out.

An officer came through and said, "View-room will be closed for the remainder of the trip. Prepare for landing."

Gaal had followed after, clutching at the sleeve of the white uniform with the Spaceship-and-Sun of the Empire on it.

He said, "Would it be possible to let me stay? I would like to see Trantor."

The officer smiled and Gaal flushed a bit. It occurred to him that he spoke with a provincial accent.

The officer said, "We'll be landing on Trantor by morning."

"I mean I want to see it from Space."

"Oh. Sorry, my boy. If this were a space-yacht we might manage it. But we're spinning down, sun-side. You wouldn't want to be blinded, burnt, and radiation-scarred all at the same time, would you?"

Gaal started to walk away.

The officer called after him, "Trantor would only be a gray blur anyway, Kid. Why don't you take a space-tour once you hit Trantor. They're cheap."

Gaal looked back, "Thank you very much."

It was childish to feel disappointed, but childishness comes almost as naturally to a man as to a child, and there was a lump in Gaal's throat. He had never seen Trantor spread out in all its incredibility, as large as life, and he hadn't expected to have to wait longer.

2

The ship landed in a medley of noises. There was the far-off hiss of the atmosphere cutting and sliding past the metal of the ship. There was the steady drone of the conditioners fighting the heat of friction, and the slower rumble of the engines enforcing deceleration. There was the human sound of men and women gathering in the debarkation rooms and the grind of the hoists lifting baggage, mail, and freight to the long axis of the ship, from which they would be later moved along to the unloading platform.

Gaal felt the slight jar that indicated the ship no longer had an independent motion of its own. Ship's gravity had been giving way to planetary gravity for hours. Thousands of passengers had been sitting patiently in the debarkation rooms which swung easily on yielding force-fields to accommodate its orientation to the changing direction of the gravitational forces. Now they were crawling down curving ramps to the large, yawning locks.

Gaal's baggage was minor. He stood at a desk, as it was quickly and expertly taken apart and put together again. His visa was inspected and stamped. He himself paid no attention.

This was Trantor! The air seemed a little thicker here, the gravity a bit greater, than on his home planet of Synnax, but he would get used to that. He wondered if he would get used to immensity.

Debarkation Building was tremendous. The roof was almost lost in the heights. Gaal could almost imagine that clouds could form beneath its immensity. He could see no opposite wall; just men and desks and coverging floor till it faded out in haze.

The man at the desk was speaking again. He sounded annoyed. He said, "Move on, Dornick." He had to open the visa, look again, before he remembered the name.

Gaal said, "Where—where—"

The man at the desk jerked a thumb, "Taxis to the right and third left."

Gaal moved, seeing the glowing twists of air suspended high in nothingness and reading, "TAXIS TO ALL POINTS."

A figure detached itself from anonymity and stopped at the desk, as Gaal left. The man at the desk looked up and nodded briefly. The figure nodded in return and followed the young immigrant.

He was in time to hear Gaal's destination.

Gaal found himself hard against a railing.

The small sign said, "Supervisor." The man to whom the sign referred did not look up. He said, "Where to?"

Gaal wasn't sure, but even a few seconds hesitation meant men queuing in line behind him.

The Supervisor looked up, "Where to?"

Gaal's funds were low, but there was only this one night and then he would have a job. He tried to sound nonchalant: "A good hotel, please."

The Supervisor was unimpressed. "They're all good. Name one."

Gaal said, desperately, "The nearest one, please."

The Supervisor touched a button. A thin line of light formed along the floor, twisting among others which brightened and dimmed in different colors and shades. A ticket was shoved into Gaal's hands. It glowed faintly.

The Supervisor said, "One point twelve."

Gaal fumbled for the coins. He said, "Where do I go?"

"Follow the light. The ticket will keep glowing as long as you're pointed in the right direction."

Gaal looked up and began walking. There were hundreds creeping across the vast floor, following their individual trails, sifting and straining themselves through intersection points to arrive at their respective destinations.

His own trail ended. A man in glaring blue and yellow uniform, shining and new in unstainable plastotextile, reached for his two bags.

"Direct line to the Luxor," he said.

The man who followed Gaal heard that. He also heard Gaal say, "Fine," and watched him enter the blunt-nosed vehicle.

Product details

Publisher ‏ : ‎ Bantam Spectra Books; Revised edition (October 1, 1991)
Language ‏ : ‎ English
Mass Market Paperback ‏ : ‎ 296 pages
ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 0553293354
ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0553293357
Lexile measure ‏ : ‎ 830L
Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 2.31 pounds
Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 4.11 x 0.83 x 6.88 inches

Best Sellers Rank: #46,348 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #416 in Hard Science Fiction (Books)
- #1,136 in Space Operas
- #1,590 in Classic Literature & Fiction

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4.4 32,700 ratings

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Isaac Asimov

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Isaac Asimov (/ˈaɪzᵻk ˈæzᵻmɒv/; born Isaak Yudovich Ozimov; circa January 2, 1920 – April 6, 1992) was an American author and professor of biochemistry at Boston University, best known for his works of science fiction and for his popular science books. Asimov was prolific and wrote or edited more than 500 books and an estimated 90,000 letters and postcards. His books have been published in 9 of the 10 major categories of the Dewey Decimal Classification.

Asimov wrote hard science fiction and, along with Robert A. Heinlein and Arthur C. Clarke, he was considered one of the "Big Three" science fiction writers during his lifetime. Asimov's most famous work is the Foundation Series; his other major series are the Galactic Empire series and the Robot series. The Galactic Empire novels are explicitly set in earlier history of the same fictional universe as the Foundation series. Later, beginning with Foundation's Edge, he linked this distant future to the Robot and Spacer stories, creating a unified "future history" for his stories much like those pioneered by Robert A. Heinlein and previously produced by Cordwainer Smith and Poul Anderson. He wrote hundreds of short stories, including the social science fiction "Nightfall", which in 1964 was voted by the Science Fiction Writers of America the best short science fiction story of all time. Asimov wrote the Lucky Starr series of juvenile science-fiction novels using the pen name Paul French.

Asimov also wrote mysteries and fantasy, as well as much nonfiction. Most of his popular science books explain scientific concepts in a historical way, going as far back as possible to a time when the science in question was at its simplest stage. He often provides nationalities, birth dates, and death dates for the scientists he mentions, as well as etymologies and pronunciation guides for technical terms. Examples include Guide to Science, the three-volume set Understanding Physics, and Asimov's Chronology of Science and Discovery, as well as works on astronomy, mathematics, history, William Shakespeare's writing, and chemistry.

Asimov was a long-time member and vice president of Mensa International, albeit reluctantly; he described some members of that organization as "brain-proud and aggressive about their IQs". He took more joy in being president of the American Humanist Association. The asteroid 5020 Asimov, a crater on the planet Mars, a Brooklyn elementary school, and a literary award are named in his honor.

Bio from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. Photo by Phillip Leonian from New York World-Telegram & Sun [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.

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Customers find the story quality wonderful and well-plotted. They describe the book as entertaining and enjoyable. Readers appreciate the concepts highlighted in the book and the parallels to history and modern society. They mention the pacing is fast and always timely. Opinions are mixed on the writing quality, character development, and sturdiness.

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395 customers mention "Story quality"326 positive69 negative

Customers find the story quality great. They say the plot unravels with non-stop intrigue. Readers also mention the individual episodes are nice. They also say the style is basic pulp fiction, and little resignation is required of the imagination.

"...I find this style works well for these and other Asimov books, with small-scale stories adding together to convey a sweep of events...." Read more

"...And yet that universe is immensely attractive, reduced to comic book simplicity, perfect for any adolescent (whether 14 or 74) to immerse himself -..." Read more

"Good story, good characters. Could be two times longer and still very enjoyable. There can be a little bit more character development" Read more

"...However, past that section, the story builds and builds wonderfully...." Read more

375 customers mention "Readability"330 positive45 negative

Customers find the book entertaining, interesting, and enjoyable. They also say the story is engaging and imaginative.

"...The writing is direct, crisp, and clear, and is fine for YA or adult readers...." Read more

"Good story, good characters. Could be two times longer and still very enjoyable. There can be a little bit more character development" Read more

"...Now, after all the pedagogical review, as a book to read, this is marvelous. Had forgotten how lovely words could be...." Read more

"The good parts are so good and deserved entire novels instead of sections. Hardin and Mallow steal the show. The rest of the show is ho-hum." Read more

215 customers mention "Thought provoking"210 positive5 negative

Customers find the book thought-provoking. They appreciate the concepts highlighted in it, the interesting premise, and unexpected outcomes. Readers also find the parallels to history and modern society insightful and valuable. They also mention the concept of psychohistory is fascinating and undeniably transformative for the genre.

"...and have not read some of Isaac Asimov's work, this is an excellent place to start, although it is not the "beginning"...." Read more

"...The students said they are amazed that the book is so rich in ideas as they are accustomed to books where there is one idea - like get the sword -..." Read more

"...introduce a large number of characters that are important, interesting, and unique...." Read more

"...way, can reduce the world to bits of data and produce pure, unsullied-by-reality results...." Read more

41 customers mention "Pacing"30 positive11 negative

Customers find the book fast-paced, gripping, and fascinating. They also say it's always timely and entertaining.

"...There are no Empire clones or robots. It is an easy and fast read, covering the philosophy of Hari Seldon regarding the predicted demise of a huge..." Read more

"...He wanted clear, fast, easy-to-read prose.Asimov’s choice of psychology as the master social science seems an odd choice today...." Read more

"...This book will make you think. It can move slowly at times and I was not crazy about the jabberwocky language spoken by one of the characters...." Read more

"And just as amazing as my first paperback read a long time ago. Gripping and memorable. Relevant still today. I can't wait to get to book two . . ...." Read more

185 customers mention "Writing quality"111 positive74 negative

Customers have mixed opinions about the writing quality of the book. Some mention it's well-written, easy to read, and believable. However, others say the dialog is lazily written and shallow. They also mention the lack of physical descriptions and thoughts.

"...The writing is direct, crisp, and clear, and is fine for YA or adult readers...." Read more

"...problem links in with the first part, and is the general formulaic nature of some of the parts, and the treatment of some characters due to it...." Read more

"...The book is well-split in five sections: The Psychohistorians, The Encyclopedists, The Mayors, The Traders and The Merchant Princes...." Read more

"...is a fantastic writer in terms of creating intrigue, wit, and believable dialog, and the result is he has developed a very enjoyable series...." Read more

98 customers mention "Character development"36 positive62 negative

Customers have mixed opinions about the character development in the book. Some mention the characters are memorable and chock-full of singular personality. However, others say the characters lack any real individuality. They also mention the book doesn't focus on continuous character development.

"...review of the original Foundation(#1) book, I said "the characters are flat, the plot is laborious, and the themes are shallow.",..." Read more

"Good story, good characters. Could be two times longer and still very enjoyable. There can be a little bit more character development" Read more

"...Last but not least, it’s a remarkably sexist book. Asimov’s skills as a futurist did not extend to imagining moves toward greater gender equality." Read more

"...Even with an omniscient narration technique at hand, rare are the thoughts of characters, their descriptions, or an inkling of the settings on which..." Read more

56 customers mention "Sturdiness"35 positive21 negative

Customers have mixed opinions about the sturdiness of the book. Some mention it holds up well, is of good quality, and reads for the money. Others say it's falling apart, time-consuming, and tedious.

"...While it is certainly a solid piece of work, I don't quite understand how it is deserving of such praise...." Read more

"...reading through the filter of a lifetime of experience, cracks appear in the plaster, and beneath them one finds that the lath is too widely spaced..." Read more

"...Part of a seven volume series this book lays a solid basis for the rest of the series.Excellent writing from a master storyteller...." Read more

"...It stands up well to the passage of time. The twists and surprises take the story in unexpected and interesting directions...." Read more

39 customers mention "Dated content"14 positive25 negative

Customers have mixed opinions about the dated content of the book. Some mention it's timeless, while others say it seems dated.

"...Foundation also has not aged well in terms of technology, as Asimov really misses on a lot of advancements that it seems other Sci-Fi authors were..." Read more

"...For being over 50 years old the analogy to current life remains fresh and real." Read more

"It shows its age at points, but it’s a pretty nice picture of the human condition and how we can overcome it with critical thinking" Read more

"...the dialog stilted, the descriptions uninspired, and the visions of the future seem dated even by 1950s standards...." Read more

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William Mead

Foundation Trilogy: Essential, superb science fiction

Reviewed in the United States on January 11, 2015

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Foundation by Isaac Asimov is the first book in the Foundation trilogy, set about 50,000 years in the future. The second and third volumes in the trilogy are Foundation and Empire and Second Foundation . With many, many reviews describing the books, there is little need for a description of the plot here. Instead, I'll give a few incidental notes on the SciFi ideas embedded in Foundation trilogy and my recommendations for potential readers.

"Foundation" is from the 1940's, when some of the ubiquitous ideas of modern science fiction were born. In the 1940's, it was already clear that the universe was a very large and complex place (though it is even larger and more complex now than was known then!). So, writers, including Asimov, invented the devices of transport and communication faster than the speed of light. This brought the stars within "reach" and opened wide horizons for imagining how the future might develop if such technologies existed. "Foundation" and its original trilogy brought forth one of Asimov's unique contributions to the imagined future of science: "psychohistory." The concept of psychohistory is that large-scale social and political events can be mathematically forecast in the form of event probabilities. Asimov's various writings use these assumptions to write stories dealing with social, political, and individual challenges of an imagined future. Asimov adroitly mixes the large- and small-scale human events into richly entertaining stories. "Foundation" and other novels of the trilogy are composed of related vignettes, reflecting their original publication in serialized form. I find this style works well for these and other Asimov books, with small-scale stories adding together to convey a sweep of events. The whole adds up to more than the sum of the parts.

For readers who have little experience with SciFi novels, I think "Foundation" would be an excellent place to start. The writing is direct, crisp, and clear, and is fine for YA or adult readers. The original Foundation trilogy is almost completely free of profanity and sexual themes. Violence is limited to the occasional murder and wars at a distance.

If you are already a SciFi fan, and have not read some of Isaac Asimov's work, this is an excellent place to start, although it is not the "beginning". A semi-rational path for readers new to Asimov would be "Foundation", followed, if you like it by the two other members of the original trilogy, "Foundation and Empire," and "Second Foundation". From here, if you want a little more, try either the Robot series or the expanded 7-book Foundation series. If you are game for a lot more, and want to see Asimov's "future history" in a roughly (future) chronological order, I'd suggest looking at Asimov's main set of future history works that comprise the Empire series, the Robot series, and the expanded Foundation series.

I'd rate "Foundation" as Must Read for all except those who are severely SciFi-phobic!!

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jasonhad

A True Classic

Reviewed in the United States on August 19, 2012

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Breathes there a teenager of the md-20th century with a love of science fiction who was not weaned on the Foundation series? All that sweeping drama, testosterone-laden but basically non-violent (all the violence is simply swept into summarizing references to ships destroyed and cities ransacked) marching through decades without concentrating on anything really boring, like character development, emotional entanglements or the trappings of society. Not a single reference to such trash as classical music, or stage shows, or pop music, or romance, just sweeping views of a distant future (or could it have been the distant past?) with the means of traveling between stars in the galaxy in the flash of a gnat's eyelash.

And yet . . . revisiting the beloved Foundation, reading through the filter of a lifetime of experience, cracks appear in the plaster, and beneath them one finds that the lath is too widely spaced, the bricks behind that lath are often without mortar, and one can see the trees where bricks are missing. We live already in an age where technology has bypassed this particular Universe. Computers have become infinitely more pervasive than Asimov might have dreamed in his wildest fantasy, for at the time of the writing they were mere collators of stacks of punched cards, the transistor had yet to be introduced or shrunk to the size of a grain of sand, much less a sub-microscopic speck imprinted by the millions on a tiny wafer of silicon.

Asimov had enormous faith in the future of Humanity, but he had no idea of how rapidly that future would approach - or how slowly humans would react and adapt to the challenges posed. No Empire can be established when information is instantaneously available to three-quarters of the population. Will an army composed of humans indefinitely repress an entire population composed of their friends, family, relatives? We see the answer in Libya, in Egypt, in Syria, in Africa - where the mobile phone has allowed guerrilla tactics to be employed by any group, whether terrorist or freedom-fighter or mall-invasion gangs or "mothers against the death camps of dog pounds."

Human society has been transformed by 24/7 information availability - but the universe of the Foundation proposes a populace of ciphers acting in ignorance of facts that would already be generally available in the 21st century. "Just Google it" or "look it up in Wikipedia" is nowhere to be found. There is a project of the First Foundation to write a "Galactic Encyclopedia" - yet it already exists in 2012.

And yet that universe is immensely attractive, reduced to comic book simplicity, perfect for any adolescent (whether 14 or 74) to immerse himself - or very infrequently herself, as this universe is truly misogynist: the strongest female is just a papier maché accoutrement.

The psychobabble of "psychohistory" which is the very premise of the Foundations is wholly implausible, of course. The introduction by Asimov of "The Mule" is his admission of the absurdity of such a concept, which he probably didn't consider when the first book was written. Man has mutated more rapidly in the past 10,000 years than Asimov's populace has in 50,000 - a highly unlikely probability in the event that man actually progresses to interstellar colonization.

All that said - I downloaded the trilogy on Kindle whilst in America, read it through lovingly, and was again transported to that clean, technologically impossible universe, forgetting all the travails of real life at present, putting the horrors of terrorism, the Hunger Games, the beheadings of "infidels" and the lies of politicians to one side for too brief a span. It isn't great literature, not even great Science Fiction - yet it is riveting to any adolescent male who enjoys reading as opposed to or in parallel with the escapism of cinematic action films like the "Matix" or "Terminator" trilogies.

For some reason, Europeans aren't allowed to download the books. No doubt the vagaries of copyright laws, tax authorities and those £%^&* politicians - as well as the accursed lawyers (who are blissfully absent from the trilogy, undoubtedly bred out of existence due to their total lack of humanity).

Asimov was the supreme techie of his time - and it shows in his use of language - sparse, precise, technically impeccable, but occasionally impenetrable without a modicum of concentration.

I heartily recommend it to you !

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Oleg Melnikov

I wish it was longer

Reviewed in the United States on July 20, 2024

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Good story, good characters. Could be two times longer and still very enjoyable. There can be a little bit more character development

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olaru victor

Capturing

Reviewed in Canada on November 18, 2023

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I did not read such a capturing book in a while now. Super book for science fiction lovers. You'll definitely love it.

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Francisco Felix

Clássicos não o são por acaso

Reviewed in Brazil on July 26, 2023

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Ao reler mais uma vez Fundação, eu fiquei com uma impressão estranha de que acabara de reler Baudolino, de Umberto Eco. Talvez a fantasia fantástica num panorama de um mundo mergulhado nas trevas da ignorância após a derrocada de um antigo império. Talvez a abundância de religiosidade patética e misturada ao poder secular. Talvez o paralelo entre protagonistas anti-heróicos que desejam apenas escapar da grande confusão em que se meteram, e usam de uma criatividade inesperada para o mundo onde vivem. Talvez a sabedoria oculta no conhecimento. Talvez nada realmente, só um delírio meu.

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Denys Nedbaylo

Perfect

Reviewed in Germany on September 12, 2024

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Perfect

D. Murphy

great book, much better than the tv series

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on August 10, 2024

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great book, much better than the tv series.

It’s a bit light on action and it jumps forward several decades at a time, but it is still one of the great, imaginative works of the last 60 years.

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Jorge Sousa

Um livro obrigatório para quem gosta de Ficção Científica

Reviewed in Spain on January 24, 2024

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Isaac Azimov é um escritor de referência na área, o seu primeiro livro não desilude em nada a essa percepção.

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Collection of short stories. Read with a group. End with a dinner party.

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