Spoilers Below
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Alberto Monteiro wrote:
> The problem is that the BBB didn't have much to work
> on; telling more Hari Seldon stories seemed, IMHO,
> totally uninteresting. And I guess they did the right
> thing: they abused the flashbacks to tell the *whole*
> Empire and pre-Empire history.
>
> For example, in _Stars like Dust_, we end the book
> without knowing what happened to the "revolution". I
> thought it failed, because the star-cluster g*vernment
> that Tyrann was building was a step to the galactic
> g*vernment that Trantor imposed, some years later.
> But Brin not only told us that they succeeded, but also
> that they succeeded in remaining semi-independent from
> the worse tyranny of R.Daneel Olivaw.
>
> Also, in _Foundation_ we are given the idea that The
> Empire was an Evil Thing, causing lots of harm to
> human beings. This clearly contradicts the Zeroth Law,
> so the BBB explained the Empire as a Good Thing in
> Decadence.
Alberto, your knowledge of the Foundation stories and the BBB trilogy is
really impressive, much greater than mine. I'm going to have to go look up
"Stars Like Dust." It's been quite a few years.
Those are very good examples. They bring up an interesting point, too: Is
the history of Asimov's universe as presented in the new trilogy any more
"real" than the one that readers may have imagined for themselves? Do we
have to take it as cannon because it was endorsed by the Asimov estate?
Personally, I'd like to think of them as being a sort of alternate
history.
Kevin Street
