Under the rule of the Galactic Empire, humanity has spread to the far corners of the Milky Way Galaxy. The book is broken up into five sections, beginning 12,000 years in the future. Asimov writes with intelligent prose and an expansive scientific vocabulary, while somehow managing to maintain accessibility. Had I not observed the publication date as being 1951, I could easily have placed it in the past decade. The first thing that struck me about this novel was the timeless quality it possessed.

A 21 year old author wrote a book that nearly 70 years later, is still considered a cornerstone of the sci-fi genre. He published the first book in the Foundation series in 1951, at the shockingly young age of 21. Isaac Asimov is considered one of the most influential sci-fi authors of all time, and not without good reason. One millennium will do the work of thirty thousand.” Coming generations will build on it, and will not have to rediscover it for themselves. But, if we now prepare a giant summary of all knowledge, it will never be lost. They will be lost through the generations. The bits of lore, meaningless, will not be passed on. They will be helpless and useless by themselves. Individuals will know much of exceedingly tiny facets of what there is to know. With the destruction of our social fabric, science will be broken into a million pieces.

“The sum of human knowing is beyond any one man any thousand men. Mankind’s last best hope is faced with an agonizing choice: submit to the barbarians and be overrun–or fight them and be destroyed. He calls his sanctuary the Foundation.īut soon the fledgling Foundation finds itself at the mercy of corrupt warlords rising in the wake of the receding Empire. To preserve knowledge and save mankind, Seldon gathers the best minds in the Empire–both scientists and scholars–and brings them to a bleak planet at the edge of the Galaxy to serve as a beacon of hope for a fututre generations. But only Hari Sheldon, creator of the revolutionary science of psychohistory, can see into the future–to a dark age of ignorance, barbarism, and warfare that will last thirty thousand years. For twelve thousand years the Galactic Empire has ruled supreme.

Foundation by isaac asimov 1951