Critical Explorations in Science Fiction and Fantasy

Characters, Places and Terms in the Robot/Empire/Foundation Metaseries

By: Donald E. Palumbo, III C. W. Sullivan (Editor)

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Paperback | 5 May 2016

At a Glance

Paperback
196 Pages

Age
18+

Dimensions(cm)
21.5 x 15.5 x 1.5

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A prolific author, Isaac Asimov is most admired for his science fiction, including his collection of short stories I, Robot and his Robot, Empire and Foundation series novels. While each of these narratives takes place in a different fictional universe, Asimov asserted at the end of his career that he had, with his last Robot and Foundation novels, unified them into one coherent metaseries.

The Encyclopedia Galactica, a compendium of all human knowledge, is prominent in the Foundation series as a key plot element but is also widely cited in the text itself. Palumbo and Sullivan's major new reference work book contains 1,000 selected excerpts from the Encyclopedia, identifying and describing all of the characters, locales, artifacts, concepts and institutions in Asimov's metaseries. The authors argue that Asimov successfully integrates the three series through the retroactive use of chaos theory, the underlying principle behind both psychohistory and Three Laws of Robotics-respectively the crucial concepts in the Foundation and Robot stories.

Industry Reviews

"full of information...valuable"-The Journal of American Culture; "a treasure trove of characters, places, and terms in the Metaseries"-ARBA; "Palumbo balances a very densely and intricately worked theoretical introduction with a very concrete set of encyclopedia-style entries that will be a rewarding read for fans of the vast trio of interlocking fictional series by the late Isaac Asimov...recommended"-Journal of the Fantastic in the Arts.

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