I haven't by any stretch of the imagination read all (or even a small
fraction) of Asimov's incredible oeuvre, but I did very much enjoy his
two-volume memoir, "In Memory Yet Green" and "In Joy Still Felt," which has
provided me at least one anecdote I cite frequently. He admits he has a
photographic memory, but even so, he was a very quick study (I believe he
discusses this in connection with writing a book on Shakespeare starting
from square one).

--
Suzanne S. Barnhill
Microsoft MVP (Word)
Words into Type
Fairhope, Alabama USA
http://word.mvps.org

"Peter T. Daniels" wrote in message
...
What;s Flying Ace?

Asimov lived for many years in Newton, Mass., a suburb of Boston not
convenient to any univesity library -- he was allowed to use the
Professor at Boston University title forever even though he only
taught there for a year or two but apparently this didn't include any
of the rights or privileges of the position. When he moved to New
York, they lived in one of those fabulous Upper West Side apartment
houses.

On Jul 17, 9:14 am, The DixieFlatline
wrote:
Biggles was a Flying Ace type. Hugh Walters wrote basically the same sort
of
thig, but set in space, and to be honest I can't remember a single plot,
but
I loved 'em at the time. The SSR was a Harry Harrison series of novels,
since
"sequalled" to death andDoc Smith's lensmen is definitley only readable
until
about the age of 15, tops, even if they're not actually classed as
juveniles.
Banks is sort of space-opera for adults, galactic in scope but without all
the empire and blue-jawed heroics. He's written some good none-genre
novels
as well, under the same name but minus the middle initial.

I seem to remember reading somewhere that Asimov had a near eidic memory
and
was a very fast reader.

Yep! Both were English, Eric Frank Russel, too; another oft passed-over
great. It's odd, I can think of English, Scottish and Irish SF writers,
but
no Welsh.

"Peter T. Daniels" wrote:
Nothing wrong with incomplete sentences.

I don't know who Biggles, Walters, Stainless Steel Rat, or Banks are.
I don't think I read (though I did buy) Asimov's last two or three
novels. I had already discovered that he is unrereadable -- he
provided story, not style -- and his ego and sexism the several times
I met him or saw him on TV were awfully offputting.

I did ask him why he had never written anything on linguistics (my
field), and he did say he had to know something about a topic before
he wrote about it ... and I always regretted that I didn't think of
asking how he kept up on current research in his fields (since he was
notoriously reclusive). He went to P D Q Bach concerts and G & S
Society meetings, and to SF conventions if they didn't require flying.

Is Lensmen the Doc Smith series? I did try him once, because Asimov
said he was so important, but he was more like Agatha Christie: didn't
play fair with the reader.

Isn't John Brunner English also? And John Wyndham.

On Jul 17, 6:46 am, The DixieFlatline
wrote:
I meant to mention ...
If you stopped reading SF when Heinein went odd, you've missed all of
Iain M
Banks' work. It might tempt you back ...
(Incomplete sentences, a habit I picked up from Arthur C Clarke ...)-