Posted by ColinWright 2 days ago
The writing is okay, but the ending is kind of trite (especially given the author's humanist beliefs. And there's much too much exposition.
Convince me I'm wrong.
I suspect you've read a lot of works derived from Asimov, and now the original seems trite (when you read it after all the stuff derived from it). But the work remains foundational.
Also it was written in 1980,.almost three decades after The Last Question. I wonder if part of the difference (to me) is in the evolution of the author's writing practice, or development of themes in SF over that time?
> I suspect you've read a lot of works derived from Asimov
You're probably right, although the transitive chain of derivation is necessarily long. Clarke - probably not derivative. Blish and Cherryh (some), Stapeton, Lem, Heinlein (the juveniles, as a kid), Baxter, Banks, Gibson, Ken MacLeod, Charles Stross, Peter Watts... I dunno.
I did grind through the Robot books as a child, and the Foundation books that he wrote. But just because they're foundational (no pun intended) doesn't stop them feeling stuffy and dated now.
(And as an aside, it strikes me now that Clarke's The Nine Billion Names of God is kind of the anti-particle to The Last Question.)
I consider these other two also great stories that I must read every time:
I Don't Know, Timmy, Being God Is a Big Responsibility
https://qntm.org/responsibilit
Gorge