"Asimov, Isaac - Foundation 00 - Introduction" - читать интересную книгу автора (Asimov Isaac)

Why shouldn't I write of the fall of the Galactic Empire and of the return
of feudalism, written from the viewpoint of someone in the secure days of
the Second Galactic Empire? After all, I had read Gibbon's Decline and Fall
of the Roman Empire not once, but twice.

I was bubbling over by the time I got to Campbell's, 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 built up the notion of a vast series of connected
stories that were to deal in intricate detail with the thousand-year period
between the First and Second Galactic Empires. This was to be illuminated
by the science of psychohistory, which Campbell and I thrashed out between
us.

On August 11, 1941, therefore, I began the story of that interregnum and
called it "Foundation." In it, I described how the psychohistorian, Hari
Seldon, established a pair of Foundations at opposite ends of the Universe
under such circumstances as to make 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 make 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 quickly wrote myself into an impasse, and the
Foundation series would have died an ignominious death had I not had a
conversation with Fred Pohl on November 2 (on the Brooklyn Bridge, as it
happened). I don't remember what Fred actually said, but, whatever it was,
it pulled me out of the hole.

"Foundation" appeared in the May 1942 issue of As tounding and the
succeeding story, "Bridle and Saddle," in the June 1942 issue.

After that there was only the routine trouble of writing the stories.
Through the remainder of the decade, John Campbell kept 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
printed as a two-part serial (the very first serial I was ever responsible
for) in the November and December 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 ItЦ" which appeared in