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"If you think that a sex-ridden society, or a permissive society, or a think-as-you-please society is not healthy, you have but to try the kind of society in which unbridled repression sees to it that you think, write, say, and do only what some dominating force says you may, and you will then find out what an unhealthy society really is." (Isaac Asimov, "The Choking Grip")
I'm currently reading a collection of Asimov's essays on various subjects, titled Past, Present, and Future. I've long been a fan of Asimov in general, having been introduced to him via The End of Eternity in junior high school. (No, I didn't have that cool of an English teacher. On the days we had double English periods, part of the first one was taken up with silent reading of whatever books we chose.) His "Black Widowers" stories are the only mystery stories I ever liked, and indeed, one of them was the only mystery I ever solved before reaching the conclusion.
In the arena of non-fiction, he writes generally in a humorous and engaging way that makes it easier to follow sometimes difficult material. He has a galloping devotion to rationalism (who can blame him), however, that bothers me now where it never used to before. A good deal of his non-fiction writing now feels quite banal to me (in the Changeling sense). I kind of get the creeps when I see his words denouncing magic, superstition, and fantastical ideas and theories (in one case, elves specifically got mention!), because I sense something more than just "well, of course everyone knows there's no such thing as Santa Claus" behind it.
I'm currently reading a collection of Asimov's essays on various subjects, titled Past, Present, and Future. I've long been a fan of Asimov in general, having been introduced to him via The End of Eternity in junior high school. (No, I didn't have that cool of an English teacher. On the days we had double English periods, part of the first one was taken up with silent reading of whatever books we chose.) His "Black Widowers" stories are the only mystery stories I ever liked, and indeed, one of them was the only mystery I ever solved before reaching the conclusion.
In the arena of non-fiction, he writes generally in a humorous and engaging way that makes it easier to follow sometimes difficult material. He has a galloping devotion to rationalism (who can blame him), however, that bothers me now where it never used to before. A good deal of his non-fiction writing now feels quite banal to me (in the Changeling sense). I kind of get the creeps when I see his words denouncing magic, superstition, and fantastical ideas and theories (in one case, elves specifically got mention!), because I sense something more than just "well, of course everyone knows there's no such thing as Santa Claus" behind it.