In Search of Isaac Asimov

Throughout my life I have encountered Isaac Asimov’s writings in book stores, casual conversations, libraries, and book reviews. To me, he was a popularizer of science who also wrote science fiction. I was, and am, awed by the breadth of his knowledge. He was writing guides to biology, chemistry, physics, and Shakespeare, subjects which I had studied in college, as well as to astronomy, the Bible, computers, and an incredible number of things which were -- and in some cases still are -- a total mystery to me. As I prepared to offer my first avowedly psychohistory course in 1972, a bright student made reference to the Foundation Trilogy (Asimov 1951-1953) and could not believe that I was about to teach psychohistory without having read these books by the man who, he assured me, had invented the field and term. A quick perusal of the Trilogy reassured me that Asimovian and Elovitzian psychohistory were based upon and working within two different paradigms. At the time I was much more interested in reading every article on psychohistory and psychoanalytically-informed biography I could find, rather than a science fiction fantasy which glorified psychohistorians.