Isaac Asimov

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from the Library Thing:

Isaac Asimov holds the enviable title of being the only author to have written at least one book for each dewey class. I figured if anybody might be impressed by that it would be you guys. I’m not going to go out of my way to read Asimov books for the challenge (I’ve got my own thing going seeing how many different dewey sections I can fill with Russell) but I’d like to read him for at least one section since he went to the trouble of writing so many books.
And so I salute Isaac for writing a ridiculous number of books (of which this is just a fraction):
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001 Unidentified Flying Objects
081 The Roving Mind
081 Opus
081 Past, Present and Future
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150 The Human Brain: Its Capacities and Functions
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213 In the Beginning: Science Faces God in the Book of Genesis
220 Asimov’s Guide to the Bible
222 Words from the Exodus
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304 Earth, Our Crowded Spaceship
363 Space garbage
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422 Words From History
422 Words From the Myths
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And on and on . . .
I used to read a lot of Asimov, he was certainly prolific but I never knew he covered all the Dewey bases
 
Here’s a list of Asimov books, but I’m not sure it’s complete. I liked his early science fiction work, such as the Foundation trilogy, the Robot novels, and The Gods Themselves. He also wrote crime mystery stories, and a lot of non-fiction. He was good at explaining things. But like most scientists of the twentieth century, his knowledge of philosophy and theology was lacking, because it was thought to be unimportant.
 
He wrote more than 400 books in all. His Foundation novels sold more than 20 million copies.
 
Asimov always amused me because his non-fiction was light-hearted and his fiction quite serious!

Thanks for sharing that he wrote at least one book for each Dewey hundred. Now I need to find out what he wrote for the 700s (arts and music).
 
Asimov’s Annotated Gilbert and Sullivan :lol: Yes, truly a Renaissance Man!

Thanks for the link!
 
Dear doctor Asimov! He was my first utterly favorite author. I have an entire bookcase - case, mind you – devoted to him. I have all of his science fiction, many essay and short story anthologies, his standalone novels, his histories, his guides to Shakespeare and the Bible…an entire case, I kid you not. His collections of short stories hooked me, especially the Black Widower mysteries. His sci-fi concepts seem charmingly retro now, but his Foundation series, with its allusions to the Roman Empire’s rot and the creation of medieval Europe , is a delight for an ardent student of history like myself. The man’s comprehensive imagination, his ability to connect various disciplines (as he did with his guide to the Bible, drawing on literature, art, tradition, archaeology, etc), astounds me. The only reason he is not my very favorite author is that I’ve discovered Wendell Berry in recent years, and his work is not only wise but moving. I can delight in Asimov, be intellectually stimulated – but moved to the depths of my soul? Nah.

Even so, I have a lot of love for the maestro. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve re-read the Widower books and the first Foundation stories.
 
I have not read even one of his books. I thought he was strictly science fiction.
 
I think of the “big three” (Asimov, Arthur C. Clarke and Robert A. Heinlein) he was the worst at actually writing, i.e. coming up with characters who felt real or interesting plots. But it’s been a long time since I’ve read anything of his.
 
Asimov was never big on characterization, and his plots, at least his SF plots, tended to the cosmic scale. I never read much of the murder mysteries, but I presume that they may have had better characters. He was, after all, a biochemist by trade originally, and sold his first story to Astounding Stories magazine at age 18.

His story “The Last Question,” might have made me into a pantheist if I had not already been a devout Catholic. It reads rather stilted now. How can a writer describe advanced computers before the computer age even arrived? I was also intrigued by his novel, “The God’s Themselves,” which, if I recall correctly, involved intelligent beings who had three sexes, not two.

Asimov was afraid to fly. He traveled little, and when he did, went by train or car.

Everything anybody ever wanted to know about Asimov can be found here.
 
JimG said:
Asimov was never big on characterization, and his plots, at least his SF plots, tended to the cosmic scale. I never read much of the murder mysteries, but I presume that they may have had better characters. He was, after all, a biochemist by trade originally, and sold his first story to Astounding Stories magazine at age 18.

His story “The Last Question,” might have made me into a pantheist if I had not already been a devout Catholic. It reads rather stilted now. How can a writer describe advanced computers before the computer age even arrived? I was also intrigued by his novel, “The God’s Themselves,” which, if I recall correctly, involved intelligent beings who had three sexes, not two.

Asimov was afraid to fly. He traveled little, and when he did, went by train or car.

Everything anybody ever wanted to know about Asimov can be found here.
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Despite what I wrote above, “The Ugly Little Boy” was a very memorable story that was truly touching. But I could never get into the Foundation novels.

Come to think of it, Clarke’s human characters were fairly colorless too. But there was more action and suspense in a Clarke novel than an Asimov one.
 
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