Forward the Foundation by Isaac Asimov

Again Asimov structures his story with scenes separated widely. Third novel in a row. This time Seldon grows older, each scene exists years apart. Instead of searching for Earth, or trying to understand humanity through different groups, here scenes show stages of the Empire’s collapse and Seldon’s aging. The journey idea of the last two novels serves this structure better, but hey, this wasn’t entirely unreadable.

Intuition is the art, peculiar to the human mind, of working out the correct answer from data that is, in itself, incomplete or even, perhaps, misleading.

Is there tension? I mean, by now everything published in the Foundation series points to Seldon winning. With Seldon facing physical danger and the interventions not yet recorded, I feel no tension. It feels more like, “I wonder how Hari Seldon gets out of this,” because I know he does. Though that tendency appears in a large amount of Asimov’s writing, it’s just more poignant in these two prequels. (This critique equally applies to the last novel too, Prelude to Foundation, though there the mythic tone imparted by the mystery-filled encyclopedia quotes really help my interest in it. It may just be that Seldon’s origins and early struggles interest me more.)

People live and die by nonsense. It's not what is so much as what people think is.

It’s a sticky trick, prequels. Asimov’s problem here is that he relies on the same old danger he always has--physical violence. I know Seldon survives to old age already, the title of the series gives away his success even to somebody reading these two prequels first. So, these two, and mostly this one, come across as fan service. Yet, in Prelude there still exists a chance of Seldon being some sort of conglomeration of people, a fiction, and this Seldon being replacable. But that doesn’t happen, and this story falls flat. Not because Asimov didn’t do what I would’ve done, that would be the worst critique ever; simply because I struggled to find tension in the last novel, hence the conspiracy theory, and failed to find it in this one.

You must have minimalism because every change, any change, has myriad side effects that can’t always be allowed for. If the change is too great and the side effects too many, then it becomes certain that the outcome will be far removed from anything you’ve planned and that it would be entirely unpredictable.

How could it be done better than this? Well, raise and answer different questions, apply different stresses, and resolve differently are ever only the three options. Instead of answering the questions of psychohistory, clearly what the fanbase wanted, he answers the question of what Seldon was like as an old man. Not as engaging. Instead of applying interpersonal conflicts and politics, Asimov apply’s physical violence that the reader already knows isn’t dangerous. He still has trouble writing characters. Instead of resolving this as a triumph, it takes a Shakespearean tragedy turn, which I don’t mind so much.

The word 'tradition' covered it all, as it covered so many things, some useful, some foolish.

All that said, this novel shows Seldon’s devotion, and losing everything he loves. The personal and public sacrifices to his job, to his calling. It’s chilling and heartwarming simultaneously. Asimov knows this story from the inside, this being his last written book, and it’s his final statement: beware dreams, you know not what they will cost, and prioritize rationally to ensure you serve what you believe. This theme engages the reader well, and it had better, because to book focuses on it.

You don’t need schooling to be a philosopher. Just an active mind and experience with life.

In short, not a great book. But also not unreadable. The theme grabbed me and I happily stared at the car wreck and triumph of Seldon’s life. However, when it was over, I rejoiced. I’m not sure I want to read more of Asimov’s long fiction. This is bad fan service.

People tended to avoid the humiliation of failure by joining the obviously winning side even against their own opinions.

Prelude to Foundation by Isaac Asimov

After the surprisingly good Foundation and Earth, Prelude to Foundation also relies on a journey to drive the narrative. Instead of running towards something though, here the characters run away from capture. The protagonist, hyper-rational Hari Seldon, founder of the Foundation, journeys through several locations to come to grips with competing interpretations of human nature and power, and help codify his own.

⁠Mathematicians deal with large numbers sometimes, but never in their income.

Imperial Sector: First, the Imperial sector, where the whole truth cannot be seen from the outside. Seldon gives his paper, and the results of the talk surprise him. Chetter Hummin looks like a normal businessman, functionary, but ends up being tied in deeply with elements antagonistic to Imperial power. A couple of brightly dressed youngsters end up being thugs. Seldon ends up being a kung-fu master. The point here is that the outward appearance, and even the way people interact, doesn’t necessarily reveal their nature⁠—and can misdirect, especially when cultural differences stand in the way. The people here orbit power the closest of anybody in the empire. Power is attracted to itself. And power is a sliding scale where the closer you are to other people with it, the more of it you have. Seldon’s talk sets him up as a potentially powerful figure, and even potential power attracts the powerful around him. That’s his first lesson, his first unexpected truth.

I’ve seen many people with status, but I’m still looking for a happy one. Status won’t sit still under you; you have to continually fight to keep from sinking.

Streeling University: Dumped into familiar circumstances, an idyllic university, Seldon should feel comfortable and safe here. And he takes that feeling too far. He ignores what he learned in the Imperial sector. The new dimension to his life that the adventures in the Imperial sector added do not come home to his mind until it is too late and he heads topside. The familiarity of the college atmosphere blinds him to the pitfalls, potential traps, and importance of his flight. This second lesson of the book shows the importance of mental agility. Recognizing truth is not enough if you don’t allow it to change your life and thinking. Even Dors cannot warn Seldon effectively. Though a place of learning that demands much from the students, the faculty grows complacent, throwing ideas out there for the sake of inconsequential arguments, lulling each other to bumbling tenure. Seldon’s agility led to his sensational paper, yet he doesn’t apply that throughout his life and it gets him into deep trouble. In other words, dispassionate, detached, academia or knowledge doesn’t excuse you from still being acted upon by that knowledge.

“A great many things are possible.” And to himself he added: But not practical.

Topside: The danger he worked himself into shows up as he heads outside the domed surface of the planet Trantor. He almost dies here, maybe twice, certainly once. An aircar of some sort seems to be searching for something, and all of the unexplained phenomena of his time at the university finally catch up to him in his mind. Here he finally believes the truth he learned in the Imperial sector, and he interprets the aircar as hunting him, so he runs away. Then a freak storm hits and, lost, he almost freezes to death. In addition to finally believing his own power, Seldon learns about people here. He simply doesn’t know the intentions of those around him⁠—a fact driven home by the quotes at the beginning of the chapter. And the discussion about the aircar and the storm drive home the point that humans always operate off of incomplete information. Yet here is also a point where nature is the main enemy, not human nature, and this inclusion helps muddy the human waters, showing that what people serve helps them prioritize their actions, cares, and life.

How harmful overspecialization is. It cuts knowledge at a million points and leaves it bleeding.

Mycogen: The religious fundamentalists of Mycogen show a closed off culture. They export the highest quality food, but do not import. They are past and future looking, and do not pay much attention to the present. Their history shows Aurora, a semi-mythical planet to them and where humans orginated, and they revere robots⁠—a technology now lost, or outlawed. Seldon’s idea is that he can extrapolate from a single group of ancient humans the truths about all humans that he needs for psychohistory. He’s hoping that by collecting a ton of truths, he will be able to more easily get at the underlying premises that those truths fall out of, and develop psychohistory. Dors, as a historian, has been telling him that history is too complex for that⁠—at this late stage of the empire, too much is known to make a broad overview useful because it is too broad, or a detailed overview possible in one lifetime. History being written by the victors certainly doesn’t help either. So Seldon realizes here that history will not work perfectly the way he wants it to. Too little is known about Aurora to help him, too much is known about everything else. But he also sees in this isolated society truths that the more open university setting also allows. In short, he has looked at two extremes⁠—conservatives and liberals⁠—and seen the humanity that overlaps, seen the reasonings and premises of both, and is finally able to draw some conclusions towards psychohistory.

“There are many people, many worlds who believe in supernaturalism in one form or another... religion, if you like the word better. We may disagree with them in one way or another, but we are as likely to be wrong in our disbelief as they in their belief. In any case, there is no disgrace in such belief and my questions were not intended as insults.”

Dahl: Blue collar and violent. Shanty towns and always dreaming of being elsewhere. Yet this environment doesn’t lead to an all-in-this-together comaraderie, but rather yet another rigid social structure. It’s played as petty in the novel, but Seldon realizes that humans do separate themselves into social structures⁠—whether they are defined strictly like in the Imperial sector, or merely by unspoken convention like in Dahl, and all stages in between as shown in Mycogen and the University. He also learns that history can be contradictory, as he meets a woman who remembers tales of Earth and Aurora and these tales contradict Mycogen tales in interesting ways. He finally gives up his hope of short-cutting psychohistory through extrapolating from a focused historical study. He begins to realize that the psychology of humans had such a profound impact on history, that studying psych can help explain history.

There is a longing for a supposedly simple and virtuous past that is almost universal among the people of a complex and vicious society.

Wye: And then the foreshadowed kidnapping to Wye. Throughout the book the mayor of Wye is mentioned as a frustrated claimant to the throne, but once they get there, the characters find a “normal” society within the larger imperial sphere. It’s not the downtrodden of Dahl, or the isolationism of Mycogen, or the open temporary habitation of the Imperial sector or the university, this is middle class territory. This isn’t open or closed like the university and Mycogen, there are aspects that are open and some that are closed. It’s a balanced society. It’s not as poor as Dahl, nor as rich as the Imperial sector. Yet Seldon’s conclusions from those other sectors play out in how the mayoress loses her power: being close to her father’s power she is attracted to power, by not testing her power she doesn’t let the truth of the power change her life, she misinterprets the intentions of those around her, she illustrates the danger of living in the past and future at the expense of the present, and all of her failings are based on the psychology of humans more than the use of power. This section tends to confirm the earlier sections.

“It is not important what can or cannot be done. What is important is what people will or will not believe can be done.”

In this book, Asimov allows mystery. Where he usually explains all, here he leaves mysteries with the aircar, Dors’ nature as robot or not, and the inner workings of psychohistory. His tendency to point out that he has left mystery here unfortunately comes off heavyhanded, but the fact that there is mystery here adds to his repertoire as a writer in ways I appreciate. I like authors asking me to make up my own mind. I think the aircar was searching for him. Can I prove it? No. And that’s an important aspect of a book staying with me.

“Historians pick and choose and every one of them picks and chooses the same thing.”

In all, this is a good book. Not one I’ll be keen to reread again, as Asimov’s writing still seems aimed at a young adult audience in word choices, sentence structures, and heavy handedness. However, I liked this book more than I expected. I think Asimov is stronger as a short story author dealing with less ideas than a full novel typically relies on, and these short vignettes of Seldon’s journey across Trantor tend towards being like short stories. It’s an example of an author storytelling to his strengths.

“If people believe this, they would act on that belief. Many a prophecy, by the mere force of its being believed, is transmuted.”

Foundation and Earth by Isaac Asimov

Superhero Trevize, Intuition Man, tries to find Earth, getting up to all sorts of adventures in the attempt. He’s intuited that if he finds Earth he will know why he chose Gaia at the end of Foundation’s Edge. Trevize, Pelorat, and Bliss find five different human planets, then Earth. And, as is usual for a science fiction journey narrative, each of these societies shows off some aspect of humanity, extrapolated to a logical conclusion.

Gaia: The book starts on Gaia to give a reminder of the kind of wholistic oneness of all life and time that Trevize has chosen. Then the journey begins.

Comporellon: A Soviet analogy, but also with some puritanical leanings⁠—Victorian Soviets. Trevize and friends are trapped, but end up getting out through sexually satisfying their captor. The idea being communicated is that this repressed society bases power on taboo and might-makes-right. By flipping the power structure on its head (apparently Trevize is fairly demanding of his seduced, and rough, something she typically is to her lovers, and he impresses her) their captor cannot help but let them go⁠—Trevize bested her in her strongest suit, therefore he’s too dangerous to keep around. What if he realizes that he’s better and tries to manipulate her into doing his will? He cannot stay. These taboo societies cannot integrate any excession from outside their scope⁠—instead of integrating Trevize and friends, the idea is to ignore Trevize and friends by sending them away. Where Gaia is inclusive, from the littlest pebble to the most complex mind, and humble, Comporellon is exclusive and proud.

Aurora: Ecological disaster. At first everything appears alright, pastoral even. The husk of a robot is discovered, giving hope. But then packs of wild dogs appear. Made possible by mismanaged ecological balance on Aurora in the past⁠—basically, pets weren’t regulated and when humans left dogs were already everywhere⁠—these dog gangs threaten the heroes. Using weapons, the heroes escape back to the ship. The idea that on this dog-eat-dog world, a weapon capable of inflicting major pain can control the out-of-balance ecology, shows that past human error is dangerous to present humans. Here this idea applies ecologically to show the stupidity of unbalanced environments⁠—even this slight unbalance of having no real predators for the dogs, who breed rapidly and overrun the planet. Where Gaia involves an understanding of the wholeness of the complex systems of an environment, Aurora forgot to limit dogs and ended up going to them wholly.

Solaria: Individual isolationism taken to the extreme. These fine physical specimens, super-human really, with superpowers of controlling vast energy flows, shun all personal contact and are able to breed with themselves, without a partner. Their isolated nature makes them paranoid and only the unexpected power of Gaia through Bliss saves the heroes. They also take away a child, Fallom, who would be dead if not for their intervention. Obviously, this planet bears out the old Aristotelian adage that “humans are by nature political beasts”, and to change that too much too widely is deadly, even with tranhumanistic biotechnology. Yet this planet raises the most interesting questions concerning Gaia, as Bliss is forced to kill twice, an act which Gaia doesn’t typically countenance. The necessity of death is well within Gaia’s comfort zone, but this double killing in self-defense and other-defense is a gray area that Asimov explores. This is where I started to really enjoy the novel. Bliss becomes a bit of a character here, conflicted over the killings she did, but unconflicted over the result⁠—their escape and saving of the child Fallom. Gaia is all community, Solaria is all individual. The one forces the other to kill.

Melpomenia: A dead planet, the only life of which is a rapidly colonizing moss that feeds on traces of carbon dioxide in the thin atmosphere. The heroes overcome this infection through technology, and end up finding the coordinates for all 50 of the original Spacer Worlds, using them to project a sphere, at the center of which they believe they will find Earth. The idea here is that even a normal society⁠—with civic structures, appreciation of the past, and a library⁠—can turn their world dangerous and uninhabitable, yet technology can overcome the environmental danger. Where Gaia exists on a continuum, looking forever both forward and backward for guidance, by abandoning Melpomenia humanity has damned it, forgetting the future for the short term-comfort of abandoning a deteriorating, hard to live on planet.

Alpha: An idyllic, peaceful water world with a single island on which topless women live. This is a different type of isolationism than Solaria⁠—this is isolation of a community. Though they have advanced biotechnology and weather controls, they live a simple life and enjoy music and good food and community. They are paranoid that their existence will be known by the larger galaxy. Sex, music, conversation, good food, customs, tradition. But with a dark side of the isolated community distrustful of outsiders trying to murder the outsiders. Trevize’s liaison with a local woman saves them as she falls for him and warns the heroes to leave before the hour of their death. Gaia, on the other hand, is open to the rest of the galaxy and actively trying to integrate all of the galaxy into itself, without the paranoia that leads to attempted murder. This episode shows that even advanced biological and weather technologies will not save humanity from itself, though it may help overcome some of the problems on the other worlds.

The Spaceship: In the spaces between these stories, life on the spaceship is examined and also found to be wanting. The superhuman Fallom doesn’t understand its own powers or place in the galaxy. Pelorat is lost in the past and present, ignoring the future. Trevize clings to his individuality and worries at trying to take that away from future humans. Bliss attempts to bridge all these gaps, yet is coming from such a different perspective that she cannot be fully understood by any of the others. In contrast, on Gaia everything is understood in community, and shared in the wholistic oneness of being. However, this snapshot of how that community will relate to the larger galaxy tends to show that it’s a process which will take both sides coming to terms with temporary measures in order to achieve the future utopia. In science fiction, this willingness to show the between-times, between one state and another of existence, showing the amount of work needed to bridge the gap, is rare and well appreciated here. However, the point is to show that if all were already Gaia this whole process would go much smoother.

Earth: Of course, Daneel shows up, explains all, and Trevize’s mind is laid to rest. Obviously Gaia is better than what the galaxy currently has to offer, and Trevize is convinced that if aliens from outside the Galaxy invade, Gaia becoming Galaxia is the best defense for humanity. So he agrees to the community oneness of all life in the end, but it was already quite obvious Asimov was leading him there: through political, historical, ecological, societal, and logical processes.

The theme, the discussion of the whole book seems to be fear of the other: extra-galaxials eventually, but also the dogs fear others, the Comprolleans imprison others out of hand, the Solarians kill outsiders and each other due to fear of others, Melpomenia serves to show the heroes fear of the unknown outsider of the moss, the people of Alpha fear others but have no fear amongst themselves, and even Daneel fears that others will guide the galaxy in a different direction than he intends. Gaia, the ever present counterpoint, serves to show that more understanding and context and history will overcome the needs that lead to these fears. It’s an interesting argument that this book lays out, and nothing like any other Asimov I’ve read before. I hope I can find more like it. This book is the first Asimov novel I really liked. He writes poorly still, but the storytelling carries the poor writing.

Foundation's Edge by Isaac Asimov

Foundation’s Edge is the first novel in the series that started with short stories, then progressed into novellas. This is one of those books where the author relies upon the conclusion. I mean Trevize travels around, a master of intuition, and the thrust of the travels changes over time: go to Trantor, locate the Second Foundation, find Earth, find Gaia. And then, at the end, it’s all revealed to be a ruse as Gaia has been guiding his path all along, towards itself. This is a dangerous tactic—it can easily leave the reader feeling like the story missed the point and started way too late in the book, like the earlier chapters are a waste of time. Yet here, I don’t feel that way. I feel that Asimov knows where the story is going, and guided it there in a meandering but intentional path. Though the destination remains hidden, the amount of foreshadowing taking place makes me think Asimov had a firm grip on the overall tale, if not all of the details.

The foreshadowing mostly pertains to three aspects: Trevize’s gift of intuition, the Second Foundation’s manipulation, and the two mysteries slowly revealing themselves as the same mystery—the Second Foundation’s conundrum and Gaia. These aspects are brought up consistently, with the reader clearly knowing more than the characters, leading the reader to understand that something is going to happen with these foreshadowings. It creates a sense of anticipation, a kind of wondering how Asimov is going to tie all these together—although the flip side is wondering how in the world these three relate at all. Yet, a little trust in the author leads to an interesting, if far-fetched conclusion.

The conclusion clearly lays out three options. The novel already laid out these three options, though the purpose of laying them out is unknown until the decision point comes.
—First, the Foundation and “normal” parts of the Galaxy. Seldon’s Plan is to allow the Foundation to take over the galaxy, to establish a Galactic Empire, to shorten the period of dark age warring between the first and second Empires. Trevize, Pelorat, Gendibal, and Branno start the book off, and they clearly explain the Foundation, its goals, the negatives of its current state, and the early drive of the book—a belief in the existence of the Second Foundation leading two of the four desperately trying to search for it. They then travel off to explore part of the Galaxy outside of, but still related to, the Foundation, which shows the context of the issue at hand.
-—Second, the chapters of the Second Foundation show the complacency, lack of drive, and factional infighting of the Second Foundation. Instead of this almost all-powerful guardian deus ex machina—like they were portrayed in the earlier books—the Second Foundation is revealed to be breaking down. With no real crises to struggle against, their energy turns against themselves. However, their underlying beliefs show them becoming masters of the First Foundation when the time is ripe, a sort of mental aristocracy that can guide the ship of the war-born Empire.
—Third, when Pelorat and Trevize finally reach Gaia, the third option is fully explored. The planet Gaia is a hive-consciousness composed of animate and inanimate beings, all contributing to the sentience of the whole. Two avatars of Gaia drive this exploration through Asimov’s typical explanatory dialogue: Bliss and Dom. Gaia abhors early death. Since everything is a part of Gaia, the necessary death of things provides the necessary sustenance of everything else. In other words, Bliss may die, but her death and burial will feed the micro-organisms that compose the super-organism of Gaia. Her eating the plant life of Gaia is a sort of reincarnation of that plant life because it is already a part of Gaia, as is she, so it’s a transformation more than a death. This hyper-spiritualism, ecological consciousness, and hive-mindedness is the third option. Gaia’s goal is to transform into Galaxia, or a similar super-organism spanning the whole Galaxy.

By the time the decision point comes, I understand that the issue under discussion is the future of humanity. More Empire of force, a new Empire of the mind, or a wholistic embracing of all life, animate or inanimate, as a part of a larger whole wholeness. And that’s a bit farfetched, not only in the equating of the “lifespan” of rocks with rocks having a “life”. What themes can I draw out of this for my day-to-day life? This question still rolls around in my mind. Biographically, this is about the time Asimov was becoming an advocate for ecological issues facing Earth, and the book is a call to ecological action to prevent catastrophe. But the inbred intuitive superpower Trevize has is still slightly weak, and tends to undercut this ecological theme a bit (as well as the simply strange aside about the Eternals?). Trevize himself doesn’t understand why he chooses Gaia as the path forward for humanity (hence the next book in the series, of course). He’s the intuitive master of the Galaxy, which is explained in-world as “he has mysterious mental powers that would have been Second Foundation worthy.” And sure, maybe that works for some people, but it is a little weak to me, and in a book that relies so much on the conclusion, a little dissatisfaction with the conclusion magnifies across the whole novel. The future of humanity is a strong theme, but of the three options given, only one could really come to pass as far as we know—mentalist mind powers and super-organistic hive-minds are unknown at this time, in terms of human experience.

But I don’t want to belittle this book too much. I liked it. That opening is sensationally good. Trevize and Branno facing off over the question of the Second Foundation, the mayor in her moment of triumph, the councilman in his quest to question the nature of reality. Both are conflicted characters who are misunderstanding each other—and this is fairly rare for Asimov, who relies on same-sounding characters whose conflict comes from without. Here the conflict comes from within and it’s even explored a little. This is a better Asimov than anything I’ve read. It still has the conspiracies, the wild logical leaps, the backfilling of information, and the political intrigue, but by trying to work with actual characters, it all works better because I understand them more.

The feeling I have throughout isn’t, “where is Asimov going with this mess?” but, “I wonder what happens next?” And I think this feeling comes from the effective fore-shadowing, and strong chapters that are almost self-reliant. In a way, each chapter is a short story and this novel is a linked series of inter-related short stories telling an overarching story, like a pulp fiction novel. It’s a strong tactic that Asimov uses to its strengths here: he doesn’t even mention what the overall story is until everybody arrives at Gaia to let Trevize choose. That technique of telling three distinct stories that are all coming closer together in each chapter is one that I have enjoyed in Iain M Banks’ works, and Asimov does it well here too. So, I think the two main reasons Asimov’s novel doesn’t fail through a disconnect between the overall story and what’s actually on the page through most of the book are these: each chapter excites—especially that first one—in its own right; the foreshadowing is effective and consistent; and the reader can see the characters growing ever closer together physically and can easily sense that some showdown is coming. I think Asimov mainly avoids the dangers of these types of tales through these three techniques.

In all, this is a good book. Almost great, but the late switch to this far-fetched future of humanity through hyper-spiritualistic environmental consciousness is a bit too jarring because the switch is predicated on Trevize Intuition Man, the superhero. Intuition being an aspect that is mentioned consistently in service of foreshadowing the story, but never really explored. However, after “The Mule” and “Search by the Foundation” were such strong stories, this strong story made me genuinely excited to hit the next book in the series. Asimov has gotten better as a storyteller, and he was already strong to begin with. As a writer, well, he still leaves a lot to be desired. But for pulp fiction, he actually tackles some interesting themes and ideas. So I’m happy I’ve read this novel.

Second Foundation by Isaac Asimov

Another book composed of two novellas. These two are both about people searching for the Second Foundation, that of the psychologists, mentalists, and psychohistorians.

Part 1: “Search by The Mule”
The Mule returns to continue his obsessive search for the Second Foundation. Convinced they threaten his power, he has spent the five years since “The Mule” not expanding his empire much, not knowing where he can safely strike. He’s led on a merry chase by the Second Foundation that ends with his conversion to a benevolent dictator so that he can live out his days.

I’m not sure what to make of this story. I enjoyed reading it, but thinking back on my time reading the book—I couldn’t do my notes right away because of my broken arm—I recall this story dimly. It’s a cross and double cross, the final defeat of the Mule. And Asimov’s boring writing style does help keep the plot clear. But it still doesn’t thrill. It’s like somebody once said, “work on your descriptions, Isaac,” and he took that to mean, “add more boring sentences to your descriptions, Isaac.”

One thing here is that where “The Mule” talked about the soft people of the Foundation becoming too reliant upon Seldon’s Plan psychologically, Tazenda is a hard world to live on, a farming world full of snow and high winds, and it clearly creates hard people. These farmers are salt-of-the-earth folk, open with what little they have, used to isolation, and set in their ways.

The other point here is that the Mule’s downfall is precipitated on his inability to imagine people with power not wanting to use it—he can’t imagine people unlike himself. So, in his search for the Second Foundation, he’s always looking for a kingdom, a galactic power of some sort, even if he does look for a small one rather than a successful one. The Second Foundation instead hides in obscurity. This allows them to strike without warning, to plan safely, and to have time to set up their trap. In other words, because the Mule assumes other mentalists must be like himself, he falls. Similarly, because Seldon assumed that human reactions wouldn’t change, and yet the Mule was able to do just that for the ruling class of the Foundation, the Seldon Plan almost falls apart. These twin themes drive the point home well: just because you think you’re right, don’t expect others to rely on your same premises. This a great tactic too: both cause and effect in the plot are saying the same thing. The cause shows the Mule that assuming others agree with his view of reality, which both brings him to power and causes his downfall; while the effect shows the Foundation Seldon’s premise of human reactions, which both brings them to power and almost causes their downfall. Right now I can’t think of another book that pulls off this tactic, and it’s sensational.

Part 2: "Search by the Foundation"
Arkady Darell, a 14 year old girl and the granddaughter of Bayta Darell from “The Mule”, searches for the Second Foundation on behalf of the First Foundation. Some Foundationers want to eliminate the Second Foundation as a threat, they resent their influence and wish to act independently. Meanwhile, the Second Foundation struggles to figure out how to right Seldon’s Plan after the First Foundationers come to rely on their oversight for safety, sinking further into complacency and softness. The solution is to convince the Foundation that the Second Foundation exists underground on Terminus, then let them kill those Second Foundationers and think that they have won, when in reality the Second Foundation has stayed hidden and powerful behind a human shield of martyrs.

I think in one way Asimov improved as a writer here: every time I think, “huh, that’s strange”, it turns out to be intentional and part of the plot—the Second Foundation taking control of Arkady’s flight, being able to get her out of the spaceport, etc. Whereas in earlier stories there are always a number of things that are incongruous all the way through the story—the most egregious of which that I have come across is the “investigation” in Caves of Steel. In the preceding books of the Foundation Series, there are many of these incongruities, only a few of which are able to be post facto rationalized by the reader. Yet here he seems to have his writing consistent in a way that allows his storytelling to really succeed.

At the same time, the writing is still laughably bad. At one point he sets up a chase scene, and it’s getting exciting. He’s building tension well, and using quick sentences to drive the pace forward. The chase is getting more and more intense. I’m admiring that he seems to have written something a bit better than his norm. And then, this sentence, “She was running now—running wildly—searching madly for an unoccupied public booth at which one could press a button for public conveyance.” I burst into laughter and laughed for ten minutes. Asimov uses three phrases to support this tension ("running now—running wildly—searching madly", which show his typical tendency to redundantly insult the reader’s intelligence) yet subverts all of that tension by allowing himself an aside about the uses of a public booth (”at which one could press a button for public conveyance”). This disappointing lack of followthrough with the tone and scene—here even in a single sentence—shows why I read Asimov in spite of the writing. As Asimov puts it himself, “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.”

Yet, and this is something I need to think about more, something I need to discover more about, Asimov tells a story well. Yes, he has his “public booth” moments, but those are fairly rare—mostly because there’s often little in the way of chasing or fighting. Asimov writes dialogue and monologue, interspersed with sparsely narrated action. And he punctuates those typical scenes in his stories with action, but often has a hard time convincing the reader of the import of the action. It’s as if he thinks two or three phrases alone will set the reader on a new track, “What? I said ‘he was being followed now.’ After 30 pages of languid reflection, why isn’t me writing, ‘he is being followed’ enough to skyrocket the tension?” Tension is something to build, something to create and nurture. And Asimov isn’t great at it in any of the first three Foundation books. Yet I will still state that he tells a story well.

I’m trying to figure out why I think he tells a good story. The science fiction I like the best is that which explores characters and ideas. His dialogue explains the stories, and this helps focus his narratives on exploring ideas. So, I am finding that I personally tend to not mind Asimov’s poor writing because the ideas often carry his stories. His clear plots tend to ruminate on ideas more than human psychology. His characters are often two dimensional analogies for aspects or interpretations of the ideas. His window dressing, the worlds he creates, tend to act like his characters in being sketchy analogies of aspects of ideas. So, I think that’s probably why I find he tells good stories: the rigid focus on ideas. His dialogue, plots, characters, and worldbuilding all stay rigidly focused on the overall idea of the story. Everything is in service to the story—even to a fault in Asimov’s writing: there’s often a lack of applicable conclusions to draw from the stories because they are so farfetched that applying the Mule’s superpowers to day-to-day life or history is a stretch; the dialogue seems forced and doesn’t explain the samey-sounding characters so much as the story; the characters are typically caricatures and lack interest; and the worldbuilding leaves much to the imagination of the reader. But those are all the flipsides of the specific ways Asimov succeeds at telling stories.

There are only two memorable characters in the entire first three Foundation books: Arkady Darell and the Mule. The Mule, though driven by revenge for his mutated appearance forcing an outsider nature, is slightly inconsistent. He’s still a great example of treating the villain like a human character because all people are heroes to themselves. But Arkady seems consistent, strong, and a well-written character. She is headstrong, intelligent, curious, and trying to find her place in the world. She knows what she wants and Asimov allows that to enter the story. It’s refreshing to finally see characters in Asimov’s writing, and I hope there are more characters in his future stories.

The themes here center around paranoia and the already-mentioned Herodotus conclusion about softness. The whole narrative tries to resolve the softness problem, but the resolution comes about because a few people still retain their drive, despite the soft times of the Foundation at large. And instead of subverting the trope, the efforts of the Second Foundation reinforce the trope, hinting that Asimov believes Herodotus’ conclusion to be inescapable, but short-circuitable. These few hard people of the Foundation are hard because of their paranoia. Scared of the power of the Second Foundation, their cadre of pseudo-revolutionaries sparks this whole adventure tale. It’s difficult to determine what Asimov is trying to say about paranoia though—useful, but not to be trusted too far? Useful only when paired with accurate, intellectual analysis of reality?

Conclusion
“The Mule” and “Search by the Foundation” are the strongest stories of this series so far. Strong enough that I now want to go back and re-read the earlier tales and see if I missed something. “Search by the Mule” is a good tale, but aspects seem inconsequential to the story—why a frozen farming world? I think Asimov is a bad writer, and in my research have realized that he only ever did one draft, essentially, after imagining the ending, then the beginning, and exploring how to connect the two. His work could’ve really been improved by more revisions, but his storytelling can be superb. Having now read the Foundation Trilogy, or the first three books of the seven that Asimov wrote about the Foundation, I can’t really see the reasons for the one-off “Best Series of All Time” Hugo award, but it’s not a bad series. Maybe the later four books in the series will help me enjoy them because they come when Asimov is much more experienced as a writer. He has to be better later. He can’t be worse, can he?

Foundation and Empire by Isaac Asimov

There I was, stuck in bed healing from an arm broken in five places, and the only audiobook I could find while drugged out was Foundation and Empire. After disliking Foundation, I was not excited for this book—I sat on it without reading it for four years. Then, I tried to pump myself up to it by reminding myself how good of a short story writer Asimov is—this book is a collection of two novellas—and how much I liked two of the three novellas in The Gods Themselves. And after I turned on Foundation and Empire, I found out that I enjoyed it. These notes are trying to figure out why.

It’s certainly not that he has vastly improved as a writer. He’s not deplorable here, there’s no massive intro-info dump to drag the whole book down. But he still uses simple verbs too much and doesn’t explore the dictionary or sentence structures enough to keep me interested in his writing. His sentences are often redundant: he still insults and patronizes the reader’s intelligence by explaining too much. For instance, an Asimov tendency is to physically describe his characters—who are futuristic humans who have different fashion cues than we do—then take two more sentences or paragraphs to describe how that physical description should be interpreted by the reader. He tells some things poorly. Things like this annoy, especially when the storytelling is good and these descriptions distract.

And that is exactly where Asimov starts to shine here, the story pacing and scope. The first tale, “The General”, tells the story of the Empire’s last effort to seize The Foundation. The story apparently loosely follows the lines of Byzantine history regarding Belisarius (the General is named Bel Riose) and Justinian. The story is told from the perspective of two captives of Bel Riose: one a double agent, another an old politician who is forced to help the general because his family is hostage.

As a sequel to the earlier five short stories, this story retains a Foundation trader as a main character. Yet, here Asimov uses the switch of narrative focus to military science fiction as a springboard to start to explore themes other than economic or political ones with his series. Political themes still exist here, but the focus is on military intrigue. This variety is much needed, and it contributes to my enjoyment of the story. Where Asimov already created a vibrant, complex world, this story finally starts to use that complexity to explore other paths, and its narrative benefits from this exploration by being engaging for its own sake. I’m not saying that writing stories with easy to grasp risks—like military science fiction—is better, I’m just saying that Asimov does it well here, and he had already trod the economic and political whodunnit in the other five stories.

The second story is “The Mule”, where I really started to enjoy the storytelling. “The General” was a good foray into new territory. This is a good short story, full stop. Another military and political drama, this time two Foundation citizens save a clown from his master, an ambitious mutant known as The Mule, who has it out for the Foundation. They end up being entirely unable to stop him from conquering the Foundation, and when Seldon’s Crisis Speech is about a different crisis, the power goes out on Terminus and The Mule takes over. His power comes from mental powers to affect the brains of others. The first Foundation is helpless because they are physical scientists. However, the four heroes attempt to find the mythical Second Foundation—full of psychologists and psychohistorians—to seek help or warn them. One of the heroes dies while trying to share that he found the Second Foundation, killed by one of the other four, because another of the other four has been The Mule all along.

Typically, Asimov would just end it there. Instead, he spends a few pages actually marching back through the story and laying out the inconsistent and uncharacteristic choices the characters made that led this one to realize who The Mule was—portrayed as an interview between The Mule and the murderer. And then the friendship shown overpowers the villain’s sense of revenge and he lets his two friends go alive, so that he can then go continue his search for the Second Foundation, the unknown threat. This backtracking and resolution is a vast improvement over all six short stories that have come before in this series. I certainly had noticed that some choices seemed uncharacteristic, but honestly, based on Asimov’s usual writing skill, I thought it was just a lack of clarity. To have Asimov take me back through where his characters erred in hiding their identities is brilliant, and provides a nice cap on the story. Yet even the Mule’s reasons for letting the Darell’s go seems inconsistent with the tale of woe that led him to try and take over the galaxy.

The other thing so strong about this story is the length. The length allows some complexity and allows the content to have impact on the story itself. Instead of trying to do too much with too little, Asimov writes a longer tale, probably a novella more than a short story, so that he can discuss more of the implications of what he’s talking about. This allows things that happen early on to come back with power at the end, allowing the reader to feel that time has passed and the story is coming full circle, helping things make sense without more info dumping. Asimov doesn’t abandon concise narrative though. One thing he’s always done is allow the reader to figure some of the narrative out, to reflect on earlier parts and gain insight through hints dropped by Asimov. Though he often spends a lot of time spelling things out too far, it’s usually only description or character based.

This story also gets away from retelling Roman history in the Foundation series. Though the Mule can be analogous to charismatic figures from history, his specific superpowers do not line up with any known figure from history. This is more of a supervillain story, from the pages of comic books, and less of a historical narrative. But there still exists one obvious example from history: the Herodotus conclusion that soft times create soft men. After a number of Seldon Crises have passed, like the one in “The General”, and the Foundation realizes that none of their efforts were actually needed to survive some of the crises, they start to trust in the Seldon Plan more and more, becoming almost religious about it, yet also becoming complacent, losing some of their drive. The independent traders complain about the central government’s complacency and plan a revolution, a rebellion, yet are utterly derailed by The Mule.

I think this tenor and depth of writing suits Asimov, and the length is perfect for his voice. I quite like “The Mule” as a novella, and may go back and read it again soon. And this encouraged me to give the first book another try. Much improved, still bad writing, but the storytelling carries the writing well.

Foundation by Isaac Asimov

1. What a slow and uninteresting opening! This is exactly what I try to avoid in my writing—these couple of tedious chapters of pure world building. The intro info dump is awkward and slow and if I wasn't listening to it, I probably would've stopped reading it, I was that bored. The details of the world building are not even that different or interesting enough to allow this. I think the Game of Thrones does this much, much better, as did Dune. And if I start off not caring about the story or characters, what's going to get me interested in the middle of the novel?

2. The world building simply extremes everything—small things to us are now tiny in the future, big things are gigantic, empires last tens of thousands of years, space and science are god and the higher ups know religion is a fake-a power grab. The ideas just generally are not that interesting to me.

3. But the stories are! It's a classic case of misdirection, not giving the reader enough information to solve the mystery, and then revealing all the important stuff in the last chapter of the section. It's like a comic book's last page reveal. But I do not much mind it here. Somehow it works. Maybe it's that each episode is short enough to support this trick. I think this is pulp fiction, not literature. That's not a judgment. The stories–except for the first one–are good! They are interesting and revealing about the characters and the world. The pacifism in the midst of revolution and civil war is an interesting theme and I believe Asimov pulls this theme off. These are four good stories with a bad one at the beginning.

4. The pacing of the book is weird. It is a series of five short stories, or novellas, which are all paced fine within themselves. But, as an episodic novel, as a whole book, it doesn't quite work. Most episodic novels—The Canterbury Tales, Hyperion, etc.–have a framing structure to provide continuity and legibility. Asimov forgoes the frame narrative here, which is an idea that I love. But this novel does not pull it off. It comes off like a comic book, rather than a novel. And this awkwardness did not work for me as a reader. I am not saying that this type of structure needs a frame narrative, but here it would have helped because of the last page reveals: these are so key to understanding what was happening in each episode, that any overarching theme is buried immediately under the new episode's opening. The breaks between episodes were overly jarring and lost me as a reader.

5. The misdirection annoys me–the deus ex machina endings to every episode are patronizing and insult the reader's intelligence. It is like each episode is a mystery and Asimov does not give the reader enough information to solve it until all is revealed to the antagonists at the end–and it is revealed in such a patronizing and insulting manner by the protagonist to the antagonist, that I end up feeling insulted and patronized as a reader, because this is the first time I'm hearing it as well.

6. Due to this being an episodic novel in which each episode is fully revealed at the end, I feel like the characters are not really understood or known until the end either. So, every time I get interested in a character or start to understand one, they're moved off screen so that the new episode can start. This is not great. His character introductions are lacking.

7. The overarching theme may be common sense activity vs. passivity. And this is played in an interesting way. Mob mentality emotionalism is the bad guy here, and probably the main character of the book if it has one. War mongering, vengeance, relying upon accepted beliefs–these are all portrayed as incompetent. They start often innocently enough, these ideas, but then become intolerant to reason while the protagonists remain fairly uniform, confident, reasonable, and correct.

8. The writing communicates, but it never excites me. I remember no line from the book, good or bad.

9. I ended up enjoying the book much more than episode one implied that I would. It gets more interesting—what Asimov does with the uninteresting world building is somewhat interesting. The four later episodes are exciting and paced well. But I still just have not really enjoyed any book that I've read by Asimov. I will keep reading his works now and then in the hopes that one of them strikes me in the future and I can figure out why he's so popular. Even friends of mine who love Asimov's work can't really put their finger on why.

[It turns out, after looking this book up online, that it is a collection of five short stories written in the early 1940s. This is a fix-up novel.]