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app103:
The 1973 BBC Radio broadcast of Isaac Asimov's The Foundation Trilogy is available on archive.org.

The Foundation Trilogy concists of:
1. Foundations
2. Foundation and Empire
3. Second Foundation

The Foundation Trilogy is an epic science fiction series written over a span of forty-four years by Isaac Asimov. It consists of seven volumes that are closely linked to each other, although they can be read separately. The series is highly acclaimed, winning the one-time Hugo Award for "Best All-Time Series" in 1966.

The premise of the series is that mathematician Hari Seldon spent his life developing a branch of mathematics known as psychohistory, a concept devised by Asimov and his editor John W. Campbell. Using the law of mass action, it can predict the future, but only on a large scale; it is error-prone for anything smaller than a planet or an empire. It works on the principle that the behavior of a mass of people is predictable if the quantity of this mass is very large (equal to the population of the galaxy). The larger the mass, the more predictable is the future. Using these techniques, Seldon foresees the fall of the Galactic Empire, which encompasses the entire Milky Way, and a dark age lasting thirty thousand years before a second great empire arises. To shorten the period of barbarism, he creates two Foundations, small, secluded havens of art, science, and other advanced knowledge, on opposite ends of the galaxy.

The focus of the trilogy is on the Foundation of the planet Terminus. The people living there are working on an all-encompassing Encyclopedia, and are unaware of Seldon's real intentions (for if they were, the variables would become too uncontrolled). The Encyclopedia serves to preserve knowledge of the physical sciences after the collapse. The Foundation's location is chosen so that it acts as the focal point for the next empire in another thousand years (rather than the projected thirty thousand).

Audio has 8 parts
--- End quote ---

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Foundation_Trilogy_%28BBC_Radio%29

http://www.archive.org/details/IsaacAsimov-TheFoundationTrilogy

zridling:
Wow, nice find!

IainB:
Ah, thankyou @app103, how nice. I had not realised this classic had been put up on archive.org
Oh dear, another time bandit...     :)
I felt sure I'd be able to put those Sony wireless headphones to good use.

I remember listening to this series on the Beeb in the '70s (I think it was). I read the trilogy later, but I think I preferred the Beeb's rendition. The books are a bit slow. I used to wonder if Asimov wasn't being paid by the word.
I remember now. The Beeb didn't do the 4th book in the trilogy (!) - Foundation's Edge.

Some moronic reviews on that website.

I had a quick search there for the Beeb's Earthsearch, but didn't turn anything up.
I also want the Beeb's HHGTTG now...(sigh). (Though I do have it on cassette tape.)

Deozaan:
I read the first book of Foundation years ago in my early teens.

I thought it was okay but kind of boring and pointless because IIRC the solutions to all the crises were all the same:

SpoilerDo nothing because it was predicted to happen this way!

I started on the second book but after not getting much Sci-Fi satisfaction from the first, I didn't get very far into it before moving on to other books I was enjoying at the time. e.g. the Xanth series by Piers Anthony.

40hz:
Read it in my youth. Put it right up there with such classics as Stand on Zanzibar and Babel-17 for masterful world-building. Years later I still think Foundation is very good even though I'm still not much of an Asimov fan. (No knock on his talent - I just don't care for his writing style.)

It was a very frustrating series for me when I first read it however. Because I kept wanting to see some of those cool math formulas they were using.

Hadda keep reminding myself it was a work of fiction... ;D

Addendum:

A couple of other good places for free audio scifi can be found here and here.

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