Foundation THE STORY BEHIND THE “FOUNDATION”

By ISAAC ASIMOVThe date was swaggering 1, 1941. World War II had been raging for two geezerhood. France had f in allen, the Battle of Britain had been fought, and the Soviet Union had just been invaded by Nazi Germ some(prenominal). The bombing of Pearl Harbor was four months in the future.But on that day, with Europe in flames, and the evil shadow of Adolf Hitler on the face of it falling all over all the world, what was chiefly on my mind was a meeting toward which I was hastening.I was 21 old age old, a graduate student in interpersonal chemistry at Columbia University, and I had been paper science fiction professionally for unrivaled-third years. In that time, I had exchange five stories to John Campbell, editor of Astounding, and the fifth tale, Nightfall, was slightly to appear in the September 1941 personate under of the magazine. I had an appointment to see Mr. Campbell to tell him the plot of a bracing story I was think to create verbally, and the catch was t hat I had no plot in mind, not the trace of one.I therefore tried and true a device I neartimes use. I opened a book at haphazard and come down up free association, beginning with whatever I start-off saw. The book I had with me was a collection of the Gilbert and Sullivan plays. I happened to open it to the picture of the Fairy Queen of lolanthe throwing herself at the feet of Private Willis. I thought of soldiers, of military empires, of the Roman conglomerate of a Galactic Empire ahaWhy shouldnt I write of the fall of the Galactic Empire and of the return of feudalism, written from the viewpoint of someone in the secure years of the Second Galactic Empire? After all, I had read Gibbons Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire not once, besides twice.I was bubbling over by the time I got to Campbells, and my enthusiasm must have been catching for Campbell blazed up as I had never seen him do. In the course of an hour we construct up the notion of a vast serial of conne cted stories that were to deal in intricate concomitant with the thousand-year period between the First and Second Galactic Empires. This was to be illuminated by the science of psycho recital, which Campbell and I thrashed come in between us.On venerable 11, 1941, therefore, I began the story of that interregnum and confabed it substructure. In it, I described how the psychohistorian, Hari Seldon, open up a pair of Foundations at opposite ends of the Universe under such circumstances as to bewilder sure that the forces of history would bring about the second Empire after one thousand years instead of the thirty thousand that would be required otherwise.The story was submitted on September 8 and, to put one over sure that Campbell really meant what he said about a series, I ended Foundation on a cliff-hanger. Thus, it seemed to me, he would be forced to buy a second story.However, when I started the second story (on October 24), I found that I had outsmarted myself. I quickl y wrote myself into an impasse, and the Foundation series would have died an ignominious close had I not had a conversation with Fred Pohl on November 2 (on the Brooklyn Bridge, as it happened). I dont call up what Fred rattling said, moreover, whatever it was, it pulled me out of the hole.Foundation appe ared in the May 1942 issue of Astounding and the succeeding story, Bridle and Saddle, in the June 1942 issue.After that there was only the routine trouble of typography the stories. Through the remainder of the ten-spot, John Campbell unbroken my nose to the grindstone and made sure he got additional Foundation stories.The Big and the Little was in the August 1944 Astounding, The Wedge in the October 1944 issue, and Dead Hand in the April 1945 issue. (These stories were written while I was working at the Navy Yard in Philadelphia.)On January 26, 1945, I began The Mule, my personal favorite among the Foundation stories, and the longest yet, for it was 50,000 words. It was pri nted as a two- jump serial (the very first serial I was ever responsible for) in the November and celestial latitude 1945 issues. By the time the second part appeared I was in the army.After I got out of the army, I wrote Now You See It which appeared in the January 1948 issue. By this time, though, I had grown tired of the Foundation stories so I tried to end them by setting up, and solving, the secret of the location of the Second Foundation. Campbell would have none of that, however. He forced me to change the ending, and made me promise I would do one practically Foundation story.Well, Campbell was the course of editor who could not be denied, so I wrote one more Foundation story, vowing to myself that it would be the last. I called it ?And Now You Dont, and it appeared as a three-part serial in the November 1949, December 1949, and January 1950 issues of Astounding.By then, I was on the biochemistry cleverness of Boston University School of Medicine, my first book had just been publish, and I was determined to move on to naked as a jaybird things. I had spent eight years on the Foundation, written nine stories with a total of about 220,000 words. My total earnings for the series came to $3,641 and that seemed passable. The Foundation was over and done with, as far as I was concerned.In 1950, however, hardcover science fiction was just coming into existence. I had no objection to earning a small-minded more gold by having the Foundation series reprinted in book form. I offered the series to Doubleday (which had already published a science-fiction sassy by me, and which had contracted for another) and to Little-Brown, just both rejected it. In that year, though, a teensy publishing firm, Gnome Press, was beginning to be active, and it was prepared to do the Foundation series as three books.The publisher of Gnome felt, however, that the series began too abruptly. He persuaded me to write a small Foundation story, one that would serve as an introd uctory section to the first book (so that the first part of the Foundation series was the last written).In 1951, the Gnome Press edition of Foundation was published, containing the introduction and the first four stories of the series. In 1952, Foundation and Empire appeared, with the fifth and sixth stories and in 1953, Second Foundation appeared, with the 7th and eighth stories. The three books together came to be called The Foundation Trilogy.The mere fact of the existence of the Trilogy pleased me, just Gnome Press did not have the financial clout or the publishing knowhow to get the books distri furthered properly, so that few copies were sold and fewer still salaried me royalties. (Nowadays, copies of first editions of those Gnome Press books sell at $50 a copy and up?but I still get no royalties from them.) smash Books did put out paperback editions of Foundation and of Foundation and Empire, but they changed the titles, and used cut versions. Any money that was involved w as paid to Gnome Press and I didnt see much of that. In the first decade of the existence of The Foundation Trilogy it may have earned something like $1500 total.And yet there was some unconnected interest. In early 1961, Timothy Seldes, who was then my editor at Doubleday, told me that Doubleday had received a request for the Lusitanian rights for the Foundation series and, since they werent Doubleday books, he was passing them on to me. I sighed and said, The heck with it, Tim. I dont get royalties on those books.Seldes was horrified, and now set about getting the books forth from Gnome Press so that Doubleday could publish them instead. He paid no attention to my loudly expressed fears that Doubleday would lose its shirt on them. In August 1961 an intellect was reached and the Foundation books became Doubleday property. Whats more, Avon Books, which had published a paperback version of Second Foundation, set about obtaining the rights to all three from Doubleday, and put out nice editions.From that moment on, the Foundation books took off and began to earn increasing royalties. They have sold well and steadily, both in hardcover and softcover, for two decades so far. Increasingly, the letters I received from the readers communicate of them in high praise. They received more attention than all my other books put together.Doubleday also published an omnibus volume, The Foundation Trilogy, for its Science legend Book Club. That omnibus volume has been continuously featured by the Book Club for over twenty years.Matters reached a climax in 1966. The fans organizing the World Science Fiction Convention for that year (to be held in Cleveland) decided to award a Hugo for the best all-time series, where the series, to qualify, had to live of at least three connected novels. It was the first time such a category had been set up, nor has it been repeated since. The Foundation series was nominated, and I felt that was going to have to be glory enough for me, si nce I was sure that Tolkiens Lord of the Rings would win.It didnt. The Foundation series won, and the Hugo I received for it has been sitting on my bookcase in the livingroom ever since.In among all this litany of success, both in money and in fame, there was one annoying side-effect. Readers couldnt help but notice that the books of the Foundation series covered only three hundred-plus years of the thousand-year hiatus between Empires. That meant the Foundation series wasnt exhausted. I got innumerable letters from readers who asked me to finish it, from others who demanded I finish it, and still others who threatened dire vengeance if I didnt finish it. Worse yet, various editors at Doubleday over the years have pointed out that it might be wise to finish it.It was flattering, of course, but irritating as well. Years had passed, then decades. Back in the 1940s, I had been in a Foundation-writing mood. Now I wasnt. scratch in the late 1950s, I had been in a more and more nonficti on-writing mood.That didnt mean I was writing no fiction at all. In the 1960s and 1970s, in fact, I wrote two science-fiction novels and a mystery novel, to claim nothing of well over a hundred short stories but about lxxx percent of what I wrote was nonfiction.One of the most indefatigable nags in the matter of finishing the Foundation series was my erect friend, the great science-fiction writer, Lester del Rey. He was constantly telling me I ought to finish the series and was just as constantly suggesting plot devices. He even told Larry Ashmead, then my editor at Doubleday, that if I refused to write more Foundation stories, he, Lester, would be leave aloneing to set about on the task.When Ashmead mentioned this to me in 1973, I began another Foundation novel out of sheer desperation. I called it Lightning Rod and managed to write fourteen pages before other tasks called me away. The fourteen pages were put away and additional years passed. In January 1977, Cathleen Jordan, then my editor at Doubleday, suggested I do an authoritative book a Foundation novel, perhaps. I said, Id rather do an autobiography, and I did 640,000 words of it.In January 1981, Doubleday apparently lost its temper. At least, Hugh ONeill, then my editor there, said, Betty Prashker wants to see you, and marched me into her office. She was then one of the senior editors, and a pleasantness and gentle person.She wasted no time. Isaac, she said, you are going to write a novel for us and you are going to sign a contract to that effect.Betty, I said, I am already working on a big science book for Doubleday and I have to revise the Biographical Encyclopedia for Doubleday and It corporation all wait, she said. You are going to sign a contract to do a novel. Whats more, were going to come back you a $50,000 advance.That was a stunner. I dont like large advances. They put me under too great an obligation. My reasonable advance is something like $3,000. Why not? Its all out of royalt ies.I said, Thats way too much money, Betty.No, it isnt, she said.Doubleday will lose its shirt, I said.You keep telling us that all the time. It wont.I said, desperately, in all right. nurse the contract read that I dont get any money until I notify you in writing that I have begun the novel.Are you crazy? she said. Youll never start if that clause is in the contract. You get $25,000 on signing the contract, and $25,000 on delivering a completed ms.But suppose the novel is no beloved.Now youre organism silly, she said, and she ended the conversation.That night, Pat LoBrutto, the science-fiction editor at Doubleday called to express his pleasure. And remember, he said, that when we say novel we mean science-fiction novel, not anything else. And when we say science-fiction novel, we mean Foundation novel and not anything else.On February 5, 1981, I signed the contract, and within the week, the Doubleday accounting system cranked out the check for $25,000.I moaned that I was not m y own master anymore and Hugh ONeill said, cheerfully, Thats right, and from now on, were going to call every other week and say, Wheres the manuscript? (But they didnt. They left me strictly alone, and never even asked for a get on report.)Nearly four months passed while I took care of a vast number of things I had to do, but about the end of May, I picked up my own copy of The Foundation Trilogy and began reading.I had to. For one thing, I hadnt read the Trilogy in thirty years and while I remembered the general plot, I did not remember the details. Besides, before beginning a bare-assed Foundation novel I had to immerse myself in the musical mode and atmosphere of the series.I read it with mounting uneasiness. I kept waiting for something to happen, and nothing ever did. All three volumes, all the nearly quarter of a million words, consisted of thoughts and of conversations. No action. No physical suspense.What was all the fuss about, then? Why did everyone want more of that stuff? To be sure, I couldnt help but notice that I was turning the pages eagerly, and that I was upset when I finished the book, and that I wanted more, but I was the author, for goodness sake. You couldnt go by me.I was on the edge of deciding it was all a stern mistake and of insisting on giving back the money, when (quite by accident, I swear) I came across some sentences by science-fiction writer and critic, James Gunn, who, in connection with the Foundation series, said, Action and romance have little to do with the success of the Trilogy virtually all the action takes place offstage, and the romance is almost invisible but the stories provide a detective-story fascination with the permutations and reversals of ideas.Oh, well, if what was needed were permutations and reversals of ideas, then that I could supply. Panic receded, and on June 10, 1981, I remove out the fourteen pages I had written more than eight years before and reread them. They sounded good to me. I didnt remember where I had been headed back then, but I had worked out what seemed to me to be a good ending now, and, starting page 15 on that day, I proceeded to work toward the new ending.I found, to my unnumbered relief, that I had no trouble getting back into a Foundation-mood, and, fresh from my rereading, I had Foundation history at my finger-tips.There were differences, to be sure1) The original stories were written for a science-fiction magazine and were from 7,000 to 50,000 words long, and no more. Consequently, each book in the trilogy had at least two stories and lacked unity. I intended to make the new book a single story.2) I had a particularly good chance for development since Hugh said, permit the book find its own length, Isaac. We dont mind a long book. So I planned on 140,000 words, which was nearly three times the length of The Mule, and this gave me plenty of elbow-room, and I could add all sorts of little touches.3) The Foundation series had been written at a time when our knowledge of astronomy was primitive compared with what it is today. I could take advantage of that and at least mention black holes, for instance. I could also take advantage of electronic computers, which had not been invented until I was half through with the series.The novel progressed steadily, and on January 17, 1982, I began final copy. I brought the manuscript to Hugh ONeill in batches, and the poor fellow went half-crazy since he insisted on reading it in this broken fashion. On expose 25, 1982, I brought in the last bit, and the very next day got the second half of the advance.I had kept Lightning Rod as my working title all the way through, but Hugh finally said, Is there any way of putting Foundation into the title, Isaac? I suggested Foundations at Bay, therefore, and that may be the title that will actually be used. *You will have noticed that I have said nothing about the plot of the new Foundation novel. Well, naturally. I would rather you buy and read the book.And yet there is one thing I have to confess to you. I generally manage to tie up all the loose ends into one neat little bow-knot at the end of my stories, no matter how complicated the plot might be. In this case, however, I noticed that when I was all done, one glaring little item remained unresolved.I am hoping no one else notices it because it clearly points the way to the continuation of the series.It is even possible that I inadvertently gave this away for at the end of the novel, I wrote The End (for now).I very much fear that if the novel proves successful, Doubleday will be at my throat again, as Campbell used to be in the old days. And yet what privy I do but hope that the novel is very successful indeed. What a quandary*Editors discover The novel was published in October 1982 as Foundations Edge.