Isaac asimov mini biography of stalingrad

Except for two stories—" Liar! Virtually all plot develops in conversation with little if any action. Nor is there a great deal of local color or description of any kind. The dialogue is, at best, functional and the style is, at best, transparent. The robot stories and, as a matter of fact, almost all Asimov fiction—play themselves on a relatively bare stage.

Asimov addressed such criticism in at the beginning of Nemesis :. I made up my mind long ago to follow one cardinal rule in all my writing—to be 'clear'. I have given up all thought of writing poetically or symbolically or experimentally, or in any of the other modes that might if I were good enough get me a Pulitzer prize. I would write merely clearly and in this way establish a warm relationship between myself and my readers, and the professional critics—Well, they can do whatever they wish.

Gunn cited examples of a more complex style, such as the climax of "Liar! Sharply drawn characters occur at key junctures of his storylines: Susan Calvin in "Liar! Other than books by Gunn and Joseph Patrouch, there is relatively little literary criticism on Asimov particularly when compared to the sheer volume of his output. Cowart and Wymer's Dictionary of Literary Biography gives a possible reason:.

His words do not easily lend themselves to traditional literary criticism because he has the habit of centering his fiction on plot and clearly stating to his reader, in rather direct terms, what is happening in his stories and why it is happening. In fact, most of the dialogue in an Asimov story, and particularly in the Foundation trilogy, is devoted to such exposition.

Stories that clearly state what they mean in unambiguous language are the most difficult for a scholar to deal with because there is little to be interpreted. Gunn's and Patrouch's studies of Asimov both state that a clear, direct prose style is still a style. Gunn's book comments in detail on each of Asimov's novels. He does not praise all of Asimov's fiction nor does Patrouchbut calls some passages in The Caves of Steel "reminiscent of Proust ".

When discussing how that novel depicts night falling over futuristic New York City, Gunn says that Asimov's prose "need not be ashamed anywhere in literary society". Although he prided himself on his unornamented prose style for which he credited Clifford D. Simak as an early influence [ 16 ] [ ]and said in that his style had not changed, [ ] Asimov also enjoyed giving his longer stories complicated narrative structuresoften by arranging chapters in non chronological ways.

Some readers have been put off by this, complaining that the nonlinearity is not worth the trouble and adversely affects the clarity of the story. For example, the first third of The Gods Themselves begins with Chapter 6, then backtracks to fill in earlier material. This advice helped Asimov create " Reason ", one of the early Robot stories.

Patrouch found that the interwoven and nested flashbacks of The Currents of Space did serious harm to that novel, to such an extent that only a "dyed-in-the-kyrt [ ] Asimov fan" could enjoy it.

Isaac asimov mini biography of stalingrad: Isaac Asimov was a scientist

In his later novel Nemesis one group of characters lives in the "present" and another group starts in the "past", beginning 15 years earlier and gradually moving toward the time of the first group. Asimov once explained that his reluctance to write about aliens came from an incident early in his career when Astounding ' s editor John Campbell rejected one of his science fiction stories because the alien characters were portrayed as superior to the humans.

The nature of the rejection led him to believe that Campbell may have based his bias towards humans in stories on a real-world racial bias. Unwilling to write only weak alien races, and concerned that a confrontation would jeopardize his and Campbell's friendship, he decided he would not write about aliens at all. In the Hugo Award —winning novelette " Gold ", Asimov describes an author, based on himself, who has one of his books The Gods Themselves adapted into a "compu-drama", essentially photo-realistic computer animation.

The director criticizes the fictionalized Asimov "Gregory Laborian" for having an extremely nonvisual style, making it difficult to adapt his work, and the author explains that he relies on ideas and dialogue rather than description to get his points across. In the early days of science fiction some authors and critics felt that the romantic elements were inappropriate in science fiction stories, which were supposedly to be focused on science and technology.

Isaac Asimov was a supporter of this point of view, expressed in his letters to Astoundingwhere he described such elements as "mush" and "slop". To his dismay, these letters were met with a strong opposition. Asimov attributed the lack of romance and sex in his fiction to the "early imprinting" from starting his writing career when he had never been on a date and "didn't know anything about girls".

He claimed he wrote The Gods Themselves to respond to these criticisms, [ ] which often came from New Wave science fiction and often British writers. The second part of three of the novel is set on an alien world with three sexes, and the sexual behavior of these creatures is extensively depicted.

Isaac asimov mini biography of stalingrad: Well packaged, shipped timely, received timely.

There is a perennial question among readers as to whether the views contained in a story reflect the views of the author. The answer is, "Not necessarily—" And yet one ought to add another short phrase "—but usually. Asimov was an atheistand a humanist. During his childhood, his parents observed the traditions of Orthodox Judaism less stringently than they had in Petrovichi; they did not force their beliefs upon young Isaac, and he grew up without strong religious influences, coming to believe that the Torah represented Hebrew mythology in the same way that the Iliad recorded Greek mythology.

For a brief while, his father worked in the local synagogue to enjoy the familiar surroundings and, as Isaac put it, "shine as a learned scholar" [ ] versed in the sacred writings. This scholarship was a seed for his later authorship and publication of Asimov's Guide to the Biblean analysis of the historic foundations for the Old and New Testaments.

For many years, Asimov called himself an atheist; he considered the term somewhat inadequate, as it described what he did not believe rather than what he did. Eventually, he described himself as a "humanist" and considered that term more practical. Asimov continued to identify himself as a secular Jewas stated in his introduction to Jack Dann 's anthology of Jewish science fiction, Wandering Stars : "I attend no services and follow no ritual and have never undergone that curious puberty rite, the Bar Mitzvah.

It doesn't matter. I am Jewish. I am an atheist, out and out. It took me a long time to say it. I've been an atheist for years and years, but somehow I felt it was intellectually unrespectable to say one was an atheist, because it assumed knowledge that one didn't have. Somehow it was better to say one was a humanist or an agnostic. I finally decided that I'm a creature of emotion as well as of reason.

Emotionally I am an atheist. I don't have the evidence to prove that God doesn't exist, but I so strongly suspect he doesn't that I don't want to waste my time. Likewise, he said about religious education: "I would not be satisfied to have my kids choose to be religious without trying to argue them out of it, just as I would not be satisfied to have them decide to smoke regularly or engage in any other practice I consider detrimental to mind or body.

If I were not an atheist, I would believe in a God who would choose to save people on the basis of the totality of their lives and not the pattern of their words. I think he would prefer an honest and righteous atheist to a TV preacher whose every word is God, God, God, and whose every deed is foul, foul, foul. The same memoir states his belief that Hell is "the drooling dream of a sadist " crudely affixed to an all-merciful God; if even human governments were willing to curtail cruel and unusual punishments, wondered Asimov, why would punishment in the afterlife not be restricted to a limited term?

Asimov rejected the idea that a human belief or action could merit infinite punishment. If an afterlife existed, he claimed, the longest and most severe punishment would be reserved for those who "slandered God by inventing Hell". I tend to ignore religion in my own stories altogether, except when I absolutely have to have it. An unsympathetic reader might think that I am "burlesquing" Christianity, but I am not.

Then too, it is impossible to write science fiction and really ignore religion. Asimov became a staunch supporter of the Democratic Party during the New Dealand thereafter remained a political liberal. He was a vocal opponent of the Vietnam War in the s and in a television interview during the early s he publicly endorsed George McGovern.

Asimov's impression was that the s' counterculture heroes had ridden an emotional wave which, in the end, left them stranded in a "no-man's land of the spirit" from which he wondered if they would ever return. Asimov vehemently opposed Richard Nixonconsidering him "a crook and a liar". He closely followed Watergateand was pleased when the president was forced to resign.

Asimov was dismayed over the pardon extended to Nixon by his successor Gerald Ford : "I was not impressed by the argument that it has spared the nation an ordeal. To my way of thinking, the ordeal was necessary to make certain it would never happen again. Because of his academic background, the bureau briefly considered Asimov as a possible candidate for known Soviet spy ROBPROF, but found nothing suspicious in his life or background.

Asimov appeared to hold an equivocal attitude towards Israel. In his first autobiography, he indicates his support for the safety of Israel, though insisting that he was not a Zionist. Asimov especially worried about the safety of Israel given that it had been created among Muslim neighbors "who will never forgive, never forget and never go away", and said that Jews had merely created for themselves another "Jewish ghetto".

Asimov believed that " science fiction In a interview by Bill MoyersAsimov proposed computer-aided learningwhere people would use computers to find information on subjects in which they were interested. Also, the one-to-one model would let students learn at their own pace. In Asimov wrote: [ ]. Computerization will undoubtedly continue onward inevitably This means that a vast change in the nature of education must take place, and entire populations must be made "computer-literate" and must be taught to deal with a "high-tech" world.

He continues on education:. Education, which must be revolutionized in the new world, will be revolutionized by the very agency that requires the revolution — the computer. Schools will undoubtedly still exist, but a good schoolteacher can do no better than to inspire curiosity which an interested student can then satisfy at home at the console of his computer outlet.

There will be an opportunity finally for every youngster, and indeed, every person, to learn what he or she wants to learn, in his or her own time, at his or her own speed, in his or her own way. Education will become fun because it will bubble up from within and not be forced in from without. Asimov would often fondle, kiss and pinch women at conventions and elsewhere without regard for their consent.

According to Alec Nevala-Leeauthor of an Asimov biography [ ] and writer on the history of science fiction, he often defended himself by saying that far from showing objections, these women cooperated. The question is merely where, when, and how she should be touched. According to Nevala-Lee, however, "many of these encounters were clearly nonconsensual.

In support of this, he quoted some of Asimov's contemporary fellow-authors such as Judith MerrilHarlan Ellison and Frederik Pohlas well as editors such as Timothy Seldes. Asimov's defense of civil applications of nuclear powereven after the Three Mile Island nuclear power plant incident, damaged his relations with some of his fellow liberals.

In a letter reprinted in Yours, Isaac Asimov[ ] he states that although he would prefer living in "no danger whatsoever" to living near a nuclear reactor, he would still prefer a home near a nuclear power plant to a slum on Love Canal or near "a Union Carbide plant producing methyl isocyanate ", the latter being a reference to the Bhopal disaster.

In the closing years of his life, Asimov blamed the deterioration of the quality of life that he perceived in New York City on the isaac asimov mini biography of stalingrad tax base caused by the middle-class flight to the suburbs, though he continued to support high taxes on the middle class to pay for social programs.

His last nonfiction book, Our Angry Earthco-written with his long-time friend, science fiction author Frederik Pohldeals with elements of the environmental crisis such as overpopulationoil dependencewarglobal warmingand the destruction of the ozone layer. It's going to destroy it all You have to set up, you have to set up isaacs asimov mini biography of stalingrad for each person, you have to bang at the door, aren't you through yet, and so on.

And in the same way, democracy cannot survive overpopulation. Human dignity cannot survive it. Convenience and decency cannot survive it. As you put more and more people onto the world, the value of life not only declines, but it disappears. Asimov enjoyed the writings of J. The feelings were mutual, with Tolkien saying that he had enjoyed Asimov's science fiction.

He acknowledged other writers as superior to himself in talent, saying of Harlan Ellison"He is in my opinion one of the best writers in the world, far more skilled at the art than I am. I think science fiction isn't really science fiction if it lacks science. And I think the better and truer the science, the better and truer the science fiction".

The feelings of friendship and respect between Asimov and Arthur C. This stated that Asimov was required to insist that Clarke was the best science fiction writer in the world reserving second-best for himselfwhile Clarke was required to insist that Asimov was the best science writer in the world reserving second-best for himself. Thus, the dedication in Clarke's book Report on Planet Three reads: "In accordance with the terms of the Clarke—Asimov treaty, the second-best science writer dedicates this book to the second-best science-fiction writer.

InAsimov wrote a highly critical review of George Orwell 's He opines that if communism were to spread across the globe, it would come in a completely different form to the one inand by looking to Orwell as an authority on totalitarianism, 'we will be defending ourselves against assaults from the wrong direction and we will lose'. Asimov became a fan of mystery stories at the same time as science fiction.

He preferred to read the former because "I read every [science fiction] story keenly aware that it might be worse than mine, in which case I had no patience with it, or that it might be better, in which case I felt miserable". In my opinion, her mysteries are the best ever written, far better than the Sherlock Holmes stories, and Hercule Poirot is the best detective fiction has seen.

Why should I not use as my model what I consider the best? Asimov also enjoyed humorous stories, particularly those of P. In non-fiction writing, Asimov particularly admired the writing style of Martin Gardnerand tried to emulate it in his own science books. On meeting Gardner for the first time inAsimov told him this, to which Gardner answered that he had based his own style on Asimov's.

Paul Krugmanholder of a Nobel Prize in Economicsstated Asimov's concept of psychohistory inspired him to become an economist. John Jenkins, who has reviewed the vast majority of Asimov's written output, once observed, "It has been pointed out that most science fiction writers since the s have been affected by Asimov, either modeling their style on his or deliberately avoiding anything like his style.

Christian"understood better than Isaac Asimov what synoptic thinking is all about. His almost books—which he wrote as a specialist, a knowledgeable authority, or just an excited layman—range over almost all conceivable subjects: the sciences, history, literature, religion, and of course, science fiction. Over a space of 40 years, I published an average of 1, words a day.

Over the space of the second 20 years, I published an average of 1, words a day. Depending on the counting convention used, [ ] and including all titles, charts, and edited collections, there may be currently over books in Asimov's bibliography—as well as his individual short stories, individual essays, and criticism. For his th, th, and th books based on his personal countAsimov published OpusOpusand Opuscelebrating his writing.

An online exhibit in West Virginia University Libraries ' virtually complete Asimov Collection displays features, visuals, and descriptions of some of his more than books, games, audio recordings, videos, and wall charts. Many first, rare, and autographed editions are in the Libraries' Rare Book Room. Book jackets and autographs are presented online along with descriptions and images of children's books, science fiction art, multimedia, and other materials in the collection.

The Robot series was originally separate from the Foundation series. The Galactic Empire novels were published as independent stories, set earlier in the same future as Foundation. Later in life, Asimov synthesized the Robot series into a single coherent "history" that appeared in the extension of the Foundation series. All published by Houghton Mifflin except where otherwise stated.

Contents move to sidebar hide. Article Talk. Read Edit View history. Tools Tools. Download as PDF Printable version. In other projects. Wikimedia Commons Wikiquote Wikisource Wikidata item. American writer and biochemist — For other uses, see Asimov disambiguation. Photo c. Science fiction hard SF social SF. Popular science science textbooks essays history literary criticism.

Gertrude Blugerman. Janet Opal Jeppson. Stanley Asimov brother Eric Asimov nephew. Surname [ edit ]. Life [ edit ]. Early life [ edit ]. Education and career [ edit ]. Personal life [ edit ]. Illness and death [ edit ]. Writings [ edit ]. Overview [ edit ]. Three Laws of Robotics in popular culture. Roboethics Ethics of AI Machine ethics. Science fiction [ edit ].

Popular science [ edit ]. Coined terms [ edit ]. Other writings [ edit ]. Awards and recognition [ edit ]. Writing style [ edit ]. Alien life [ edit ]. Romance and women [ edit ]. Views [ edit ]. Religion [ edit ]. Politics [ edit ]. Social issues [ edit ]. Sexual harassment [ edit ]. Environment and population [ edit ]. Other authors [ edit ].

Influence [ edit ]. Bibliography [ edit ]. For full lists, see Isaac Asimov bibliography alphabeticalIsaac Asimov bibliography categoricalIsaac Asimov bibliography chronologicaland Isaac Asimov short stories bibliography. Main articles: Robot seriesGalactic Empire seriesand Foundation series. Lucky Starr series as Paul French [ edit ].

Main article: Lucky Starr series. Norby Chronicles with Janet Asimov [ edit ]. Main article: Norby. Novels not part of a series [ edit ]. Short-story collections [ edit ]. See also: Isaac Asimov short stories bibliography. Mysteries [ edit ]. Novels [ edit ]. Black Widowers series [ edit ]. Main article: Black Widowers. Other mysteries [ edit ].

Nonfiction [ edit ]. Other general science essay collections [ edit ]. Other science books by Asimov [ edit ]. Literary works [ edit ]. The Bible [ edit ]. Autobiography [ edit ]. Main article: Autobiographies of Isaac Asimov. History [ edit ]. Humor [ edit ]. On writing science fiction [ edit ]. Other nonfiction [ edit ]. Television, music, and film appearances [ edit ].

Adaptations [ edit ]. This section needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources in this section. Isaac Asimov c. January 2, [ a ] — April 6, was a writer of science fiction. Asimov celebrated his birthday on January 2. People know about Isaac Asimov because of his science fiction books and his science books for non-scientists.

Asimov's most famous books were the Foundation series. He also wrote the Galactic Empire, the Robot Seriesmysteryfantasyand non-fiction books. He wrote the Norby series with his wifeJanet Asimov. He wrote or edited over books and about 90, letters. Other subjects he wrote about were historythe Bibleliteratureand sexuality. Many of Asimov's early writings were short stories published in cheap science fiction and fantasy magazines.

Years later, most of them were collected and republished as collections. Asimov made a list of 15 of his science fiction books, which he advised should be read in this order:. Numbers 1—5 are 'Robot' books; 6—8 are 'Galacticos Empire' books; 9—15 are Foundation series books. Asimov's novels have influenced science fiction on television and movie.

Especially his ' Three Laws of Robotics ' is a lasting contribution to our thinking. Although ethnically a JewAsimov was an atheist :. The front pages of many newspapers wrote about his death. And two weeks later, CNN released a retrospective about his career and life. Prior to this, this was done only for politicians and movie stars. National radio aired his interview and his own words became an obituary.

When Isaac Asimov born, he was surprised to find that he was born on the territory of Soviet Russia in the town of Petrovichi near Smolensk. He tried to correct this mistake, and three years later, inhis parents moved to New York Brooklyn USAwhere they opened a candy store and lived happily ever after, with sufficient income to finance their son's education.

Isaac became a US citizen in It's scary to think what would have happened if Isaac had stayed in the homeland of his ancestors! Of course, it is possible that he would take the place of Ivan Efremov in our fantastic literature, but this is unlikely. Rather, things would have turned out much more gloomy. And so he trained as a biochemist, graduating in chemistry from Columbia University inand taught biochemistry at the Boston University School of Medicine.

Since he has been a professor at the same university. Professional interests were never forgotten by him: he is the author of many scientific and popular science books on biochemistry. But this is not what made him famous all over the world. In his graduation yearhe made his debut in Amazing Stories with the short story Captured by Vesta.

A brilliant scientific mind was combined in Asimov with daydreaming, and therefore he could not be either a pure scientist or a pure writer. He started isaac asimov mini biography of stalingrad science fiction. And he especially succeeded in books in which one could theorize, build intricate logical chains that involve many hypotheses, but only one correct solution.

These are fantastic detectives. In Asimov's best books, one way or another, there is a detective element, and his favorite characters - Elijah Bailey and R. Daniel Olivo - are detectives by profession. Asimov's books are set in the future. This future stretched out over many millennia. Here are the adventures of "Lucky" David Starr in the first decades of the exploration of the Solar System, and the settlement of distant planets, starting with the Tau Ceti system, and the formation of the mighty Galactic Empire, and its collapse, and the work of a handful of scientists, united under the name of the Academy, to create a new one, the best Galactic Empire, and the development of the human mind into the universal mind of Galaxia.

Asimov essentially created his own universe, extended in space and time, with its own coordinates, history and morality. And like any creator of the world, he showed a clear desire for epic. Most likely, he did not plan in advance to turn his fantastic detective story "Steel Caves" into an epic cycle. But then a sequel appeared - "Robots of the Dawn" - it is already becoming clear that the chain of individual crimes and accidents that Elijah Bailey and R.

Daniel Olivo are investigating is connected with the fate of mankind. And yet, even then, Asimov was hardly going to connect the Caves of Steel story cycle with the Academy trilogy. It happened by itself, as it always happens with the epic. It is known, after all, that at first the novels about King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table were not connected with each other, and even more so with the story of Tristan and Isolde.

But over time, they united into something in common. It's the same with Asimov's novels. And if an epic cycle is created, then it cannot fail to have a central epic hero. And such a hero appears. Daniel Olivo becomes them. Robot Daniel Olivo. In the fifth part of the "Academy" - the novel "Academy and the Earth" - he already takes the place of the Lord God, the creator of the Universe and the arbiter of human destinies.

Asimov's robots are the most amazing of all created by the writer. Asimov wrote pure science fiction, in which there is no place for magic and mysticism. And yet, not being an engineer by profession, he does not really strike the reader's imagination with technical innovations. And his only invention is more philosophical than technical.

Asimov's robots, the problems of their relationship with people is a subject of special interest. It is felt that the author thought a lot before writing about it. It is no coincidence that even his science fiction rivals, including those who spoke unflatteringly about his literary talent, recognized his greatness as the author of the Three Laws of Robotics.

These laws are also expressed philosophically, and not technically: robots should not harm a person or, by their inaction, allow harm to be done to him; robots must obey the orders of a person, if this does not contradict the first law; robots must protect their existence, if it does not contradict the first and second law. Asimov does not explain how this happens, but says that no robot can be created without observing the Three Laws.

They are laid in the very basis, in the technical basis of the possibility of building a robot. But already from these Three Laws a lot of problems follow: for example, a robot will be ordered to jump into a fire. And he will be forced to do this, because the second law is initially stronger than the third. But Asimov's robots - in any case, Daniel and others like him - are essentially people, only artificially created.

They have a unique and inimitable personality, an individuality that can be destroyed at the whim of any fool. Asimov was a smart man. He himself noticed this contradiction and resolved it. And many other problems and contradictions that arise in his books were brilliantly resolved by him.

Isaac asimov mini biography of stalingrad: STALIN: A Political Biography-pbk-Isaac Deutscher-Vintage-#Rst

It seems that he enjoyed posing problems and finding solutions. The world of Asimov's novels is a world of bizarre interweaving of surprise and logic. You will never guess what power is behind this or that event in the Universe, who opposes the heroes in their search for truth, who helps them. The endings of Asimov's novels are as unexpected as the endings of O'Henry's stories.

Nevertheless, any surprise here is carefully motivated and justified. Asimov has no mistakes and cannot be. The freedom of the individual and its dependence on higher powers are also intricately intertwined in Asimov's Universe. According to Asimov, many powerful forces operate in the Galaxy, much more powerful than people. And yet, in the end, everything is decided by people, concrete people, like the brilliant Golan Trevize from the fourth and fifth books of the Academy.

What happens in the end, however, is not known. Asimov's world is open and ever-changing. Who knows where Asimov's humanity would have gone if the author had lived a little longer The reader, having entered another disturbing, huge and full of confrontation Asimov's Universe, gets used to it, as to his own home. Daniel Olivo lived and operated many thousands of years ago, we feel sad and devastated, as if we were standing in the ashes.

This is the deep humanity and emotionality of such a seemingly personal-speculative world created by Asimov. He lived by Western standards for a short time - only seventy-two years and died on April 6, at the New York University clinic. But over the years he wrote not twenty, not fifty, not one hundred or four hundred, but four hundred and sixty-seven books, both fiction and scientific and popular science.

His work has received isaac asimov mini biography of stalingrad Hugo Awards,two Nebula Awards, and many other prizes and awards. There is something to envy. Included in the so-called "Big Three" science fiction writers. This fact speaks of the recognition of colleagues in the shop and of the gigantic contribution that he made to literature.

In addition, this trio of magnificent masters of fantasy can also be called enlighteners of our time. Asimov and Clark did a lot to popularize science. Petrovichi now Shumyachsky district of the Smolensk region is a place that was glorified by his birth on January 2,the boy Isaac, who later became the best science fiction writer of the 20th century, Isaac Asimov.

He later said that he was born on the same land as Yuri Gagarin, and therefore still feels as if he belongs to two countries at once. The writer's father, Yuda Asimov, was an educated person at that time. At first he was employed in the family business, and after the revolution he became an accountant. The writer's mother, Khana-Rachel, was from a large family and worked in a shop.

After the birth of their daughter inIsaac's parents receive an invitation from his mother's brother, who had long ago left for the United States and settled there. The family decides to emigrate to America. Isaac Asimov claimed that before coming to the United States, his parents had the surname Ozimov, but immigration officials entered them as Asimov and changed the name of the writer to the American way.

So he became Isaac. Parents could not master English well, so it was not possible to get a job. Then Yuda bought a small grocery store and opened a trade. Over the course of his career, Asimov won several Hugo and Nebula Awards, as well as received accolades from science institutions. He stated during a televised interview that he hoped his ideas would live on past his death; his wish has come to fruition, with the world continuing to contemplate his literary and scientific legacies.

We strive for accuracy and fairness. If you see something that doesn't look right, contact us! Nikki Giovanni. How Did Shakespeare Die? A Huge Shakespeare Mystery, Solved. Shakespeare Wrote 3 Tragedies in Turbulent Times. The Mystery of Shakespeare's Life and Death. William Shakespeare. Prolific and Varied Writer Asimov was also known for writing books on a wide variety of subjects outside of science fiction, taking on topics like astronomy, biology, math, religion and literary biography.