h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

I believe Isaac Asimov may have been the only author to publish a book in every major (hundredths place) dewy decimal category. Espically amazing, since most of what he wrote is fiction, and therefore not in the dewy decimal system.

er, most of what he wrote was not fiction, which is how it got into all those other places in the DDS. And there is a place for fiction: it is called Literature [800].

Isaac Asimov was one of the truely Renaissance men of the 20th Century. He was a scientist, a scholar, a philosopher, as well as an author of creative works of fiction.

Among just a few of the areas he wrote in [with authority] are:
science of all types
astronomy & space
geology
mythology
linguistics
humor
Shakespeare
religion
history

And he also was responsible for the first published Laws of Robotics, on which most of the ethical behavior of robots in literature is based.

Pretty damn busy man.

Very readable too. He had a remarkable gift to make any subject readable and enjoyable.

Indeed. Actually, he didn't write a book in every DDS category; he debunked this in his two-volume autobiography, I think. I believe he said he had no books in the 0-100 section, forget what that is, but anyhow it doesn't diminish him any. I love his books, myself, and read everything I can get my hands on by him.

0-100 is generalities, encyclopedias and computer stuff.

Is the film version of 'Bicentennial Man' worth watching do you know? It has to be my favourite of the Robot Short Stories, and Robin Wlliams is undoubtedly the kind of actor who might do it justice, but I was abroad when it was released in the Uk and have not been able to see a copy of it yet.

Similarly, do you know if it is true that the 'Black Widow Mysteries' are being made into a T.V. series?

I don't know about the Black Widowers, but as for Bicentenial Man: I was fully prepared for wreckage, which has been the fate of every other book I've read which a movie has been made out of (perhaps I exaggerate, but they screw things up so you have to wonder if they know even vaguely that a definite previous story existed, much less read the book. But I digress.). so I went to see it with my mom, who has not read the story. I didn't like it, because it diverged so far from the story - Andrew Martin falls in love and gets married, for instance, which I was furious about. And the First Law is calmly violated in the last scene. My mom enjoyed it - in fact, she cried - so my final analysis is that it is perfectly enjoyable to one who has not read the story, but to one who has read the story, the discrepancies will be so distracting that it will be impossible to become involved in the storyline. I think that they chose to make Andrew's progression to manhood more of a personal journey, rather than the long, drawn-out court battles that Asimov describes. It wouldn't be a waste if you saw it, but I don't know if you could really enjoy it.

How on earth did they manage to violate the First Rule of Robotics without making the rest of the story completely meaningless? The really annoying thing is, I am now gonna have to watch this film just to saciate my curiosities!

From the way you describe the film, I am reminded of one of Asimov's own stories in which film producers attempt to make a film of a book presented to them (which, from the description, is quite obviously 'The Gods Themselves') and succeed, the film producer having made very little money from the production since he was so immensely proud to have been able to do the story justice. This particular story is in the 'Gold' collection of Asimov annecdotes, and makes me wonder just how dissappointed the maistro would be if he learned of the flop that was Bicentennial Man!

Speaking of films that completely destroyed the books upon which they were based, I recently had the misfortune to watch 'IT', which automatically fails right from the beginning by having John Boy from the Waltons in what is supposed to be a strong and dramatic role - even more confusing is the fact that all of the actors were made to read the book beforehand.

However, I am truly looking forward to seeing 'Hannibal', although I doubt how popular it will be without Jodie Foster as Clarice. The wild boars should make for something of an amusing scene, along with the labotomy, of course!

Yes, I'm familiar wiht "Gold", too. I think that "rolling over in his grave" is not nearly descriptive enough a phrase to show what Isaac's reaction would be to this movie!

I think that perhaps the best example of a bad book-to-movie I have ever seen was Doctor Doolittle. That may sound silly, but it was the worst possible combination of the 12 books and they inserted a woman (the only female in the books of any significance is Polly, the parrot.). The problem with Hollywood is that they tyhink the only way a movie will sell is if there is a "love" story in it, so if they do a book that doesn't have one (like our friend Bicentennial Man), they inject one, and if there is one of eny sort already they twist it so as to get maximal sex scene screen time. And it's stupid. The reason to make a movie out of a book would seem to be to attract the readers of that book, but if they twist it so as to make it more appealing to the general audience, theu totally alienate the readers of the book. It's all insane in my opinion, and thank God for books and independent film (or at least non-Hollywood film).