  == Historical Works Of Isaac Asimov, a Historiographical Analysis ==  I, Historian     Stephen: “But you are telling me, Susan, that the ‘Society for Humanity’ is right; and that Mankind has lost its own say in its future.”  Susan: “ It never had any, really. It was always at the mercy of economic and sociological forces it did not understand – at the whims of climate, and the fortunes of war. Now the Machines understand them; and no one can stop them as they are dealing with the Society, - having as they do, the greatest of weapons at their disposal, the absolute control of our economy.”  Stephen: “How horrible!”[1]                 The author of this dialogue is Isaac Asimov. Similar references to the history of humanity are widely used in his literature works. The author is a well-known writer of future societies, not only in fiction but also as treatises of the ‘march of humanity’ into the future. Neither in his stories, nor in the historical essays of Asimov can one easily find references to great changes in a society through the works of great men, great ideas or greatness of an arbitrary institution. This paper will investigate the historiographical method and mode of historical writing of Isaac Asimov.      The Writer:  Seldom thought of as a scientist, less even as an essayist, and almost never as a historian. The famous author of some of the best-known science fiction literature... Hailed as a “Grand Master” in 1986 by the Science Fiction and Fantasy writers of America Inc., Isaac Asimov has produced over 470 books on a large variety of subjects[2]. Among his portrayals as a writer are, as listed by one of his publishers Houghton Mifflin Company, novelist, humorist, futurist, current world record holder in literary output etc. Yet, more importantly Asimov was a PhD holder in the field of chemistry, a professor in Boston University. More relevant still for the purpose of the present work is the historian persona that Asimov assumed numerous times.[3]                Asimov was born in January 2, 1920 in Petrovichi, Russia to a Jewish family that emigrated to the United States. He grew up in Brooklyn and graduated from Columbia University in 1939, obtaining his PhD in the same establishment in 1948. He joined the faculty of Boston University thereafter, and remained associated to B.U., however not in a teaching capacity from 1958 on. He died in 1992, his death was later revealed to have been as a result of contracted HIV from a bypass surgery he received in 1983[4].               Despite the fact that there are various different elements to his character, Asimov was a writer first and foremost. His first publications were in the genre of science fiction, first of which was published in an issue of Amazing Stories magazine in March 1939. Asimov claims that writing had been “ . . . merely an amusement,” and that he had hoped for a few dollars to help pay his college tuition.[5] Furthermore, for the introduction of his one hundredth work, he professes that he had never planned anything at all in his writing career, and that his commercial success was an “incredulous relief.” As for his historical works he claims that they were “primarily intended for non-historians,” as his science books were primarily intended for non-scientists.               He is not only an amateur that has deep interests in history, but also a science-fiction novelist, whose literature work is influenced by his knowledge of history. Asimov’s major works, the Foundation and Robot series to name a few, depict the future not through the wars and technological accomplishments of humanity but they portray the human societies of the future, with a dominant preconception of formation and function of the past societies. To name a specific case; he declares that the fictitious Galactic Empire that is in power in the Foundation Series were written with certain periods of the Roman history; “Justinian and Belisarus of the sixth century and a little bit Tiberius and Sejanus of the first century…” to be exact, in mind.[6]      The Works:  Isaac Asimov is interested in history not only out of personal curiosity, but he can also justify this curiosity in terms of his profession. Asimov states; “… we surely cannot grasp the significance of population, energy, technology, and other subjects today without seeing them in the context of the past.” Therefore as a professional author of science fiction, and a speculator of future societies, Asimov believes that “… without knowing where we came from, we cannot easily detect where we are going.”[7]              His outlook of history is pre-deterministic and conceptualized materialistically; and for the most part simplistically. In dealing with the rise and fall of political unities, he ofte