Something to keep in mind is that Asimov was very much a product of the age of pulp magazines, so early on in his career he was paid by the word for his work.
A side geek note: If you were active in NYC fandom from say the 50s on chances were very good that you would actually get to see Isaac in person at many local science fiction conventions. For some reason he disliked air travel, and would show up at almost any local convention that he was invited to.
If you want to read a really good book on being a geek from the depression era to about the 50s I would highly recommend reading The Way the Future Was by rederik Pohl.
Sigh. Isaac Asimov was willing to write about anything at all, whether he understood it or not.
As a teen I read Asimov's Guide to Shakespeare, Asimov's Guide to Humor, and a good fraction of the other 200 books he had published up to then. He more than doubled that number before he died. He was careful about his facts, though he had a policy not to look anything up anywhere but his own bookshelf. He also would not use vehicles: if he couldn't walk there, he wouldn't go. That was possible in New York.
Isaac Asimov is a science fiction author (a good one, too), but the work he created was not a real description of our universe -- it was fiction, and playing with ideas.
Asimov was a people person though. He wasn't a nerd in the typical sense; he went to parties, conventions, meetings, mingled with people, belonged to multiple clubs, etc.
From Wikipedia:
> "Asimov was an able public speaker and was regularly hired to give talks about science. He was a frequent participant at science fiction conventions, where he was friendly and approachable. He patiently answered tens of thousands of questions and other mail with postcards and was pleased to give autographs."
I think that, in driving home a valid point, this essay gives the wrong impression of Asimov as someone who would scold his readers.
I remember reading Asimov talking about his early relationship with Ellison. Ellison was the super smart way too young guy always showing up at the sci-fi conventions, hanging out with the grown ups, who everyone knew was gonna make it some day. (That's my recollection from many years back—pretty sure the gist is accurate though.)
I taught myself physics and learned to think scientifically by reading his collected monthly essays from The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction. I owe Asimov a huge debt and I'm very glad I got to tell him that once. I miss seeing him at SF cons.
He also wrote a lot about the early days of science fiction in his 1978 memoir, The Way the Future Was. I was particularly fascinated by his association with the Futurians, a NY-based science fiction club which included Isaac Asimov, James Blish, and Cyril Kornbluth.
A side geek note: If you were active in NYC fandom from say the 50s on chances were very good that you would actually get to see Isaac in person at many local science fiction conventions. For some reason he disliked air travel, and would show up at almost any local convention that he was invited to.
If you want to read a really good book on being a geek from the depression era to about the 50s I would highly recommend reading The Way the Future Was by rederik Pohl.
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