Ratings1,103
Average rating4
My husband and I chose books for the other to read - he is now reading the Chronicles of Narnia, and I'm reading the Foundation trilogy. I don't think I would have ever picked up this series on my own, but I was pleasantly surprised by how much I actually enjoyed reading Asimov's first installment in the trilogy. Initially, I felt intimidated by the technical jargon and quick movement from one character to the next. However, it's incredibly clever how Asimov does not rely on character development or attachment to characters to further the plot. The technical jargon is, of course, fictional and I just told myself not to worry as I was reading and very much enjoyed reading all the more. Clearly I don't read science fiction much, but I look forward to starting the next novel and seeing what comes next.
It's a shame this book is so damn dry because conceptually it's quite interesting. I like that it poses the question (or at least makes passing gestures at the question): to what degree do we owe moral consideration to future generations? Should we abandon our current civilization's demise and focus solely on preparing for the rebirth of society so as to minimize total suffering? What if the means necessary to accomplish that end are ethically objectionable (e.g., intentionally using religion to subjugate the lower classes)? I also like that it pulls back the camera to showcase a vast landscape of history. Yet at the same time, its episodic format means that it mainly focuses on Great Men of History who end up being out-and-out Gary Stus (I had to put the book down when one character was hoisted into the air and carried out of a courtroom by a chanting posse of fans after DESTROYING his opponent with FACTS and LOGIC). It's a shame because the premise is fertile ground for a story about how human accomplishments are often the result of collaboration by multitudes of individuals across large swathes of both space and time.
Also, holy shit if ever there was a book that could benefit from more female characters, it's this one. I don't think there's a single woman with more than a handful of lines of dialogue and it shows.
tl;dr: It brings up some ideas that I've had a lot of fun tossing around in my head. Much more fun than I had reading the actual book. :\
The book has an interesting premise - a scientist predicts the fall of the Galactic Empire, and the subsequent dark ages to come after. As time goes by it seems more and more evident that his predictions are coming true, however, he devised a plan to minimize the damage, and one key element of that was withholding the information from the following generations.
I have to say, most of the book is very exciting! As a reader, you get to meet intelligent characters and marvel at their brilliant use of logic and acute intuition to solve problems. Since the story progresses in time, you get to witness the sociopolitical evolution of the outskirts of the Galaxy. I would even say there's enough political intrigue to call it Game of Thrones in space (sans magic and gore)!
However, the beginning of part five does get a bit boring, and as it progresses, Asimov relies more on exposition to push the story forward. Nevertheless, it does pick up pace again.
There are some other things that I didn't like as much.
Psychohistory
Psychohistory - a mix of sociology, history and mathematics - is what Hari Seldon used to predict the fall of the Empire. Even though in general I do love this concept, it does, in times, stretch my suspense of disbelief. Don't get me wrong - it contributes to the majority of this book's excitement, but I guess my beef is with the extent individuals without the knowledge of phychohistory are able to make decisions that correlate with the psychohistoric predictions they barely know any details of. The characters seem to make ground-braking decisions, sometimes I would even call them gambles, which miraculously work out. Why? Because psychohistory, that's why.
Characters
It seems like the main theme in the book is how future-oriented intuitive intellectuals prove conservative people wrong, which I did enjoy for the most part, but it sadly produces a lot of self-indulgent egotism.
Another problematic area is the tremendous lack of female characters. Throughout the entire book there have been three women, only one of which had any significant role. Granted, she was portrayed as an intelligent and capable person, so I guess little, yet quality representation is better than a lot of bad representation. And I am also aware the book was written in the 50s, so I don't hold it against the author. It just felt very surreal to me. It's like that entire sector of the Galaxy is solely populated by men.
Overall, I enjoyed reading this book a great deal and I can't wait to read the next one in the series!
I've wanted to read Foundation for years. I had seen it mentioned in countless “best of” sci-fi lists, but reading it now, in 2018, I found myself just a little disappointed. I'm not sure why the reverie for this - one of Asimov's most popular works. The story is intriguing, driven forward by the ghost of Hari Seldon, a mathematician who develops a new form of prescience called “psychohistory”. Using this prescience (a kind of twist on “big data analytics”) he maps out the fall of a 12,000 year old Galactic Empire, and the rise of a new order of scientists who will reduce the 30,000 year dark ages to come down to 1,000 years of strife.
There are interesting sentiments that help propel this story. Salvor Hardin's statement that “violence is the last refuge of the incompetent,” is intriguing and fashionable in today's political atmosphere. I like the use of “Space!” as an expletive. I'm highly captivated by the concept of psychohistory to guide a civilization along a path of millenia.
...but the telling of the tale is very dull. The narrative is overbearingly cliche and the dialogue is tired and dated. Much of the book consists of two people discussing the hijinks that are transpiring on some other planet, or how to avoid them.
Great concept here. Poor to moderate execution. Sorry, Mr. Asimov.
Just brilliant
This was a fantastic exploration of the power that religion, science and trade all play over the populace.
Many very clever setups are paid off beautifully, and several times I shook my head with a giddy smile over how well the characters meet their goals.
I'll definitely be reading more of this classic series.
It's a masterpiece and everything about it has been said at least a thousand times. Maybe except one thing - you want to tell me that humankind still uses imperial units 25 000 years in the future instead of metric system?! We deserve the dark era, then!
[Spoiler] The beginning left me wondering at first as only after a few pages the main character seldon had already died due to a fifty year time jump. I was not sure what to think about the book at first, but once the vault got mentioned and the several peoples' thoughts on it, I got hooked. Not because the vault is something very special in the story line, but the thought processes when discussing the topic of the vault. The book continued with great mind games by genius characters and left you in awe (some criticize that they are TOO smart).
Immidiately ordered the next two novels in the foundation series to know the fate of terminus. I'm also really curious about what happened to the second foundation on the opposite edge of the galaxy.
Interesting premise of psychohistory! Particularly since I was reading Homo Deus at the same time, using data to predict the movements and actions of society is not too far fetched. Lots of interesting plot twists and turns, so I'll be picking up book 2 soon! I will admit that the frequent gaps in time from chapter to chapter threw me off in the middle.
I forgot that chronologically the story begins with The Prelude to Foundation and at first was a bit confused, because expected to hear another story )))
From all the Foundation series books this one was (and apparently still is) one of the most difficult to enjoy. All those time jumps with so little context make the book a bit chaotic and impossible to “live in” for me. Plus I'm very bad with names, so having three sets of characters doesn't help much )))
I was thinking about going down to 4 stars, but decided to let it be. It's still Asimov and I still know that these are basically pieces of a puzzle that will play out in later books.
I know Isaac Asimov is known as a genius in the field of Sci Fi, but for me, I found this book dull. I felt as though it dragged on and on. There was no action in the book at all, just endless dialogue. Perhaps this was the wrong Isaac Asimov book to start with, however, I won't be reading another.
Il faudra un jour que je relise et que j'écrive une critique plus complète de ce grand classique de la science-fiction, un roman et une saga que j'avais lu avec énormément de plaisir quand j'étais plus jeune.
So the Galactic Empire is about to come down big time, as predicted by the sciencey science of master psychohistorian (empirical sociologist?), Hari Seldon. The rest of the book is about the post-Empire centuries in the periphery of the galaxy, and how Seldon's psychohistorical predictive analysis was amaaaazing (is he Nate Silver?), and a bunch of great men in future history shepherd the galactic stragglers through the usual Dark Ages pattern of Medieval religion preserving scientific insight, followed by increased trade and Renaissancey stuff, and the promise of a second Empire down the line.
Uggggghhhh.
So the entire book is literally a series of two-man conversation scenes, where Great Man X explains his position in the future history to us (since he always Gets It, and we have big time-jumps which require sooo much clunky “as you know” dialogue), while Minion Man or perhaps Enemy Man go either “oh wow jeez” or “i disagree!”. It's incredibly boring and depressing. Depressing that the first woman who shows up does so at 76% of the way through (to try on a dress, people, A DRESS), and the first woman to SPEAK is at 79%. And she's a shrewish wife of one of the Great Men's enemies. So, basically, pointless.
Yeah. It's clunky, and oh God boring, and just a bunch of exposition, and I AM NOT UNDERSTANDING ASIMOV'S POSITION IN THE SCI-FI CANON. I admit this is one book. I will read a few Asimov more, but, let's just say, this one confirmed by ~~dark thoughts~~ about some pre-1960s sci-fi: that it's chauvinistic and narrow-minded and dull as hell.
I kinda just started reading this as a sort of “classic” that I should read, but I really ended up enjoying it. I know this is more or less just a collection of connected short stories, but I really liked having a novel that spandex across centuries and didn't have a real main character (though Seldon is a presence throughout). Some of it is a little clumsy or on the nose, but I like the idea of psychohistory and the way the foundation operates. Fun read.
Being of it's time this book is refreshingly straight forward but saying that it does feel more if an intro instead of a book.
Enjoyable read but nothing more.
Foundation was pretty good if not for ending so abruptly... It was interesting on how it is still timely in the “future” technologies for being written so long ago. I am very interested in sticking with this series!
When looking into Sci-Fi books that I should have already read, this trilogy kept coming up. It won the Hugo award for “Best Trilogy” - an award created just to give it to this series. It was short, but lived up to the hype. The premise relies on “psychohistory”, a way of mathematically predicting the future. The first book was actually based on a number of short stories and parallels the fall of Rome. I enjoyed the series, but not enough to read the other 11 books in the series.
When looking into Sci-Fi books that I should have already read, this trilogy kept coming up. It won the Hugo award for “Best Trilogy” - an award created just to give it to this series. It was short, but lived up to the hype. The premise relies on “psychohistory”, a way of mathematically predicting the future. The first book was actually based on a number of short stories and parallels the fall of Rome. I enjoyed the series, but not enough to read the other 11 books in the series.
This book has long been on my to read list as has Asimov in general. It's the first thing I've read by him mostly due to it being a pick from my Sword & Laser book club.
I'd maybe rate the book at a 3.5, but having to choose between like (3) and really like (4) I chose to go for 3 in this case.
I enjoyed the book, but it hasn't aged very well. The story was good but many parts of it made it obvious to me how old the book is.
In particular the fact that they seemed to making a paper encyclopedia rather than digital (although this wasn't explicit). In general there seemed to be no notion of an internet where a character visiting the encyclopedia office ask for a copy to be transcribed for him. Another major sign is the prevalence of nuclear power/weapons. Man is pretty innovative, and I doubt over 15,000 years of humanity hasn't led to even more powerful deadly/weapons or new/improved power sources
Despite feeling dated, I enjoy the overall story and plan to check out other books in the series at some point in the future.
Certainly I understand why the book has the reputation it does. It is certainly a more enjoyable and comprehensible way to process vast historical movements than any textbook that was ever thrown at me. That said, the serial nature of it makes it harder for me to really bond with the story. I'd just start to like a character, and then boom it's 70 years later and I have a new character to process. I think the sacrifice is worth it for the amount of ground Asimov gets to cover. If the book were today, I'm sure it would have an epic length to go along with its themes, and honestly I prefer a more stream-lined read.
Appreciated as the series of connected short stories as it was originally published, I loved it. Collected as a novel, I just wanted to get to know everyone a little bit better.
Mostly just dudes sitting around talking, and the occasional woman nagging or getting distracted by shinny things and fancy dishwashers. Also, statistics is a soft math and psychology is a soft science–I have a hard time believing that when you put them together you can predict the future.
So its the first book in The Foundation series by the great sci-fi writer Issac Azimov and i can say that im only half impressed.The first half was good to read with the novel idea and great characters and layout and all....but the second half is only readable.
I liked the characters and the plot he created esp Salvor Hardin,I liked the fact this novel has a lot other than science fiction like politics,pseudo sciences,psychology,religion.
But the main problem is that trying to tell the story of 3 generations means all the characters wont register properly in a busy reader's mind like mine :) .The story was overdone too with 3 successive Seldon crisis being solved very wisely and artificially..i cant say i liked the idea of the religionists and the traders very much.but am i commenting too early without reading the rest of the series?but this book hasn't motivated me to read the rest so i think i just cant say.
Not too excited so far. Too grand a scale, too little detail. I hope the decline of technology gets explained in the future books...