Over on Adventures Fantastic, I’ve been reviewing the nominees for the Retro Hugos. Isaac Asimov has two stories from his Foundation series on the ballot, one a novelette, and the other a short story. I haven’t read the original Foundation series since I was in high school. These two stories are the last two in Foundation. So I read the whole book. The last story in the book, “The Merchant Princes”, which was published under the title of “The Big and the Little” before the story that precedes it in the book. There’s a passage in the story where the central character travels outside the Foundation’s sphere of influence and talks to an old man. The old man tells him what’s happened in the Empire, which the Foundation has lost contact with, over the last few decades.
In addition to increasing my interest in history, that made me want to read something with an epic scale. I immediately thought of Poul Anderson’s Technic future history, particularly the Dominic Flandry subseries. Which made me want to reread H. Beam Piper, Dune, and and to read the rest of Christopher Ruocchio’s Sun Eater series. (If you haven’t read Ruocchio, you’re missing out. I’ve only read the first book, but I’ll be buying all the others.)
Watching the news, something I’m trying to quarantine myself from but my wife keeps breaking quarantine, has only added to this urge. I have to wonder if we’re seeing the American Empire start to collapse. But that’s a topic I don’t want to get into right now.
Maybe it’s my way of looking for comfort and certainty in uncertain times. Rereading favorite stories and novels and spending time with characters on worlds I haven’t visited in years may be what I need. Learning how to video myself doing labs so I can post them on YouTube is turning into a real grind.
So when the Retro Hugo posts are done, I’m going to try to focus on some intergalactic shenanigans. And not just the galactic empire stuff. I really like space opera, and there’s something about late spring and early summer that makes me want to read it. I’m sure there’s some deep psychological reason for that, but I’m not going to bother trying to figure out what. It might spoil my enjoyment of space opera.
So what are some of your favorite galactic empires or stories involving the fall of an empire (real or imaginary)?
I have been trying to decide if I should read “Foundation” or “Dune”. And by ‘decide’ I mean ‘waffling on it for years.’ Both are getting the modern day TV treatment and I’ve heard good things. I should read one and watch the other, but which one? Which one?!
On the one hand, I don’t even own a copy of “Dune”, but I do have a copy of “Foundation”–the very one you’ve got pictured.
On the other hand, Asimov in long-form can be some dry reading…
Regarding the question of favorite fallen galactic empire, I would recommend James Gunn’s “This Fortress World”.
Hi, Adrian.
I think you would probably enjoy Dune better.
You’re right about Asimov being dry at longer lengths. I’m not sure how well Foundation will translate to the screen. Each section is set some years after the previous section. There are very few characters who show up in more than one, although several are referenced in later sections. I haven’t heard any details about the film version, but I would guess they would focus on the part of the story where the Mule, a mutant, shows up and wrecks the plan. IIRC, those two sections from Foundation and Empire and Second Foundation were the longest and fairly close together in time. I’ll probably start Foundation and Empire by the end of July, assuming trying to teach an online class Summer II doesn’t kill me.
Thanks for the tip on This Fortress World. I’ll look it up.