Asimov's style: Simple and Clear
Asimov once said:
"I type quickly- 90 words a minute, when I am happy, care free and in a good mood. I don't believe in fancy stuff. In my writing, there is no poetry, no complexity, no literary frills. Therefore, I need only to barrel along, saying whatever comes to mind, and waving cheerfully at people who happen to pass my type writer." (Asimov Roving Mind 337)
That's one of the great things about Asimov- he was completely open to talking about his own writing style. Several times an interviewer would ask him about his writing, and he would answer plain and straight. This desire to be straightforward and truthful is reflected in his own writing style. So how realistic was the quote he gave? Dead on. Because the way in which Asimov sought to convey his ideas did not require any such literary frills. In fact, to him they were unnecessary to achieving his ultimate goal: clarity. For through this clarity was Asimov able to convey and contribute remarkable ideas to the world of science fiction. He achieves this clarity by paying special attention to diction, organization and detail. There appears to be no substantial evidence of intentional usage of shifts in points of view and irony because they are either not necessary or reduce the clarity of his writing. But before we can look at how he writes, we must first briefly examine who Isaac Asimov was and what he wrote about.
Dr.Isaac Asimov was one of America's most prolific writers, with nearly five hundred books to his credit. Although best well known for his works in science fiction, Asimov also wrote books in almost every category of the Dewey decimal system. Among them are the Arts, Applied Science & Technology, Religion, Languages and Pure Sciences (Seiler and Jenkins 26). Many people often jump to the conclusion that Asimov's writing topics must be juvenile in order for him to write so many books. But if you take a random sampling of his works, you will quickly come to find that he tackles what many would consider as complex subjects. Among his non-fiction works, you would find titles such as Inside the Atom , Asimov's guide to the Bible (in two volumes) and The Roman Empire . Asimov wrote to a wide range of readers including children, teenagers and students of higher education. In fact, it was one of Asimov's personal goals to take each field of science and explain it in laymen terms. In the realm of science fiction, Asimov invented ideas such as "The Three Laws of Robotics" and "Psychohistory." Both concepts heavily influenced the "Golden age" of science fiction- the first established robots as logical thinkers while the latter helped to establish the concept of a galactic empire. Asimov is even credited for inventing the word "robotics" among others (Asimov, The Naked Sun 10). Asimov's love for literature started as young as elementary school in which he was quoted:
"Once I could read, and as my ability to read improved rapidly, I had nothing to read. My schoolbooks lasted me just a few days. I finished every one of them in the course of the first week of the term and thereafter was educated for that half year. The teacher had very little to tell me..." (Judson 12)
The public library soon became one of Asimov's favorite places. It did not occur to him that he could produce his own books until he discovered the science fiction magazines that the family run newsstand sold. As his interest in science fiction grew, he experimented with friends until he submitted several short stories for publication. After several rejections, he was accepted with his first publication at age 19 and his first book at age 30 (Judson 25). With one down, 499 were to follow. The good doctor was a full time writer even up to his death in 1992 in which he was working on the third volume of his autobiography. Now that we have a better understanding about him and his works, it is now possible to examine the first of three literary devices that Asimov employs to achieve clarity: diction.
"The typical Asimov sentence is short and clear. They gain length not by accumulation of dependent clauses, but by the addition of more simple sentences," Joseph F. Patrach, Jr (Howard 3).
So, what defines a simple sentence? A simple sentence can be defined through word choice, numbers of words per sentence and sentence structure (whether it be simple, compound or complex). As we are examining word choice, it is convenient to first define diction. The American Heritage Dictionary defines diction as "the choice of words and the way in which they are used." In order to provide data on this matter, I turned to author Neil Goble who in his book Asimov Analyzed did a remarkable and painstaking statistical study on Asimov's writing. First, we will examine sentence length (the way in which the words are used). In a random sampling from Asimov's science fiction novel, The Naked Sun , there is an average of 9.7 words per sentence (Goble 46). Further examination of other science fiction novels such as The Foundation trilogy , I, Robot , and The Currents of Space reveal 11.2, 11.2, and 10 respectively (Goble 46). The average (based on 12 books total) is 10.6. By any standard, these can be considered extremely short sentences (For example, this sentence contains 10 words). Keeping in mind that these are science fiction novels (and thereby geared toward a "general" audience), Asimov's choice to use short sentences helps him in both explaining his idea as well as making the reading easy and enjoyable. Long sentences by comparison leave the risk of loosing the reader, especially if the concept or idea is foreign as in his science fiction works. Additionally, Asimov's heavy usage of dialogue in his science fiction works also forces him to use short sentences to make the dialogue, fluid and realistic. Next we will examine his non-fiction works to prove that short sentences are not simply a habit of Asimov. He in fact varies sentence length according to the intended audience.
Asimov's non-fiction works too are written for a variety of reading levels. The first we will look at is geared toward students of higher education. Biochemistry and Human Metabolism for example, averaged 20.3 words per sentence- nearly double the amount as seen in his science fiction (Goble 53). Additional examples include The Human Body , The Human Brain , and Planets for man with 20.4, 18.8 and 24.2 respectively (Goble 53).. The average based on seven books yields 20.8 words. This doubling of words per sentence confirms that Asimov varies his sentence length depending on the intended audience. The long sentences here do not reduce Asimov's clarity- the intended audience is familiar with the concepts and can follow along without becoming lost. Thus, for one audience (general audience) he may need to explain a concept in several sentences while only a few for another type of audience (educated) in order to achieve the same level of clarity. Further proof can be found by examining the two extremes of the audience spectrum: children and medical professionals. His science books for children average 11.3 words per sentence while his medical dissertation average 28.3 (Goble 53, 63).
Now that we have examined the way in which the words are used, we can now examine how the words are organized- the second literary device that Asimov employs to achieve clarity.
Drawing from Goble's data again, we will now focus our attention on organization through average words per paragraph and sentence structure. For science fiction (the general audience), we arrive at an average of 27 words per paragraph (Goble 81 ). In comparison, his non-fiction work (specialized audience), we get 87 words per paragraph. Again, we see a large difference between his science fiction and non-fiction works. Asimov deliberately sub-divides ideas in his science fiction work to make them easier to follow and read. This difference parallels itself in sentence structure as well. In science fiction, 58% of the sentences are "simple" while 28% are "complex" (Goble 80 ). As we would predict, the opposite is apparent in his non-fiction works with 20% simple and 75% complex. The extreme case here is his medical dissertations, with 100% complex sentences. Goble's labeling of simple, complex and compound are defined by the Flesch-Kincaid grade scale. Once again, we see that Asimov's writing style varies from audience to audience. This specific tailoring of writing styles to certain readers enables him to fine-tune his level of clarity.
Now that we have seen the statistics on Asimov's writing, let us examine some real examples. The analysis that follows each quotation seeks to examine the amount of detail as well as the organization that Asimov provides- the third literary device that Asimov employs to achieve clarity. It should be apparent based on your own observations whether the sentences are long or short and whether they are simple or complex.
"He was dressed in the Earth fashion, trousers tight at the waist, loose at the ankle, and color-stripped down the seam of each leg. He wore an ordinary Textron shirt, open collar, seam zipped, and ruffled at the waist, but he was a Spacer. There was something about the way he stood, the way he held his head, the calm and unemotional lines of his broad, high-cheekboned face, the careful set of his short bronze hair lying flatly backward and without a part, that marked him off from the native Earthman," (Asimov, Caves of Steel 24) >>CONTINUEDAuthor: Roland Saekow (saekow@sbcglobal.net)