Isaac Asimov

Isaac Asimov (c. 1920 to 1992) was a Russian-born American writer and biochemist, author of the Foundation and Robot stories and one of the most prolific writers of the twentieth century, with more than 500 books written or edited.

Born in Petrovichi in Soviet Russia (his exact birth date is uncertain), he became a naturalised US citizen in 1928, took a doctorate at Columbia in 1948 and taught biochemistry at Boston University. He began publishing short stories in 1939; the Foundation stories ran in Astounding Science Fiction from 1942 to 1944. His first novel, Pebble in the Sky, came from Doubleday in January 1950, and Gnome Press issued I, Robot on 2 December 1950, a collection of nine robot stories that includes his Three Laws of Robotics. Gnome, the trilogy's original publisher, then issued Foundation (1951), Foundation and Empire (1952) and Second Foundation (1953), which Doubleday later bought and reissued. In 1966 the trilogy won a special Hugo Award as the best all-time series. From the late 1950s he wrote mainly popular science, including 399 monthly columns for The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, before returning to fiction with The Gods Themselves (1972, winner of the Hugo, Nebula and Locus awards) and Foundation's Edge (1982). He died in Manhattan on 6 April 1992.

For collectors

The Gnome Press first editions are the key books: I, Robot (1950, first printing of 5,000 copies with Edd Cartier cover art) and the three Foundation volumes of 1951 to 1953. Pebble in the Sky (Doubleday, 1950) is his first novel and a natural companion.