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WIKICOMMONS, GETTY“I DO NOT FEAR
COMPUTERS. I FEAR
THE LACK OF THEM”
ISAAC ASIMOV (1920 – 1997)
One of the ‘Big Three’ authors of the Golden Age of Science Fiction,
Isaac Asimov was also a hugely influential interdisciplinary thinker of his timeC
ONSIDERED one of the fathers of
the science fiction genre, Isaac Asimov
is also one of the most widely read
and prolific authors of all time, with more than
500 books to his name. Born between 1919
and 1920 (the exact date is considered
unknown, though he celebrated
it as January 2, 1920) in the
former Soviet Union, Asimov’s
family emigrated to the United
States of America when he
was only three.
His love for reading pulp
magazines – his father ran
a newspaper and concession
stand at which he devoured
numerous magazines and
newspapers – led him to make
the acquaintance of John W.
Campbell, editor of Astounding
Science Fiction magazine, who
grew to be both a mentor and
a friend. Campbell encouraged
the young Asimov to pursue his
dream, and, by March 1939, Asimov had his
first story published in Astounding Science Fiction.
This marked the start of a long, successful tryst
with writing. Asimov’s literary output remained
steady up until his death, marking a career of over50 years. Over this illustrious period, Asimov
wrote some seminal classics of the science-
fiction genre, including the Foundation series,
the Galactic Empire series and the Robot series.
During his lifetime, he won the Hugo Award,
the highest accolade for science fiction and fantasy
authors, multiple times. Asimov
was also posthumously inducted
into the Science Fiction and
Fantasy Hall of Fame in 1997.
Asimov’s legacy has endured
long after his passing. He was
the first person to coin the term
‘robotics’, which has come to be
one of the most essential fields
in technology today. His Three
Laws of Robotics and theory
of a positronic brain have had
a real world impact, often
serving as guidelines for actual
robotic experiments. Even in
fictional universes, the concepts
Asimov explored through his
work have become important
themes in such popular franchises as Star Trek:
The Next Generation and Doctor Who, and his
stories have been adapted for the screen several
times, the most recent being the 2004 Will Smith
starrer, I, Robot.DID YOU KNOW?
- In 2009, the Asimov Crater on Mars
was named in the author’s honour. - Asimov was such a prolific writer that
his books can be found in nine out of
the 10 categories in the Dewey Decimal
System of library classification. - In his autobiography, Asimov confessed to
a fear of flying; he flew only twice in his life. - Asimov had a love of small, enclosed
spaces, and had stated that his childhood
dream was to own a magazine stand in one of
New York’s underground subway stations. - Asimov is credited with introducing three
words to the Oxford English Dictionary:
Robotics, positronic and psychohistory.
92 98 February 2017February 2017