| The Stars, Like Dust | |
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Dust-jacket from the first edition |
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| Author(s) | Isaac Asimov |
| Country | USA |
| Language | English |
| Series | Empire Series |
| Genre(s) | Science fiction, Whodunit |
| Publisher | Doubleday |
| Publication date | 1951 |
| Media type | Print (Hardcover/Paperback) |
| Pages | 218 pp |
| ISBN | NA |
| Preceded by | Isaac Asimov's Utopia |
| Followed by | The Currents of Space |
The Stars, Like Dust is a 1951 science fiction book by writer Isaac Asimov.
The book is part of Asimov's Galactic Empire series. It takes place before the actual founding of the Galactic Empire, and even before Trantor has become important. It starts with a young man attending the University of Earth. Biron Farrill is the son of the greatest nobleman on the planet Nephelos, one of the Nebula Kingdoms. The story starts with the news that his father has been caught conspiring against the Tyranni.
The Tyranni (who come from planet Tyrann) are a minor empire that rule fifty planets near the Horsehead Nebula. Tyrann suppressed science and space-navigation training in the Kingdoms, to help maintain control over its subject worlds. The ruler of Tyrann in the story is called the "Khan". Asimov obviously took the Mongol dominion over the Russian principalities as a model, much as he used the declining Roman Empire for his Foundation series. (See the "Golden Horde" for the real-world history that Asimov drew upon, and adapted.)
The story's in-universe historical context is generally regarded as quite interesting, during the long period between the initial expansion and the rise of the Empire of Trantor. But the main action in the SF novel revolves around one small intrigue that really resolves nothing. It is occasionally considered to be one of Asimov's somewhat lesser novels, and Asimov himself once called it his "least favorite novel." [1]
The novel was originally serialized as Tyrann, and its first paperback edition was retitled The Rebellious Stars.
Contents |
The story is set long before Pebble in the Sky, though it was written one year later. Trantor is not directly mentioned — it would be located far away, having been settled not long beforehand, and before its first great wave of territorial expansion. Earth's radioactivity is explained here as the result of an unspecified nuclear war. This contradicts what Asimov later wrote in Robots and Empire. One could suppose that history has become muddled over the intervening centuries since the final Robot novel — "many of the inhabitants of the planets near the Horsehead Nebula now believe it was named after an explorer called Horace Hedd." Other theories exist. And when Biron pretends on Rhodia that he comes from Earth, the Earth is not recognized, and he has to identify it as "a small planet of the Sirian Sector".
In contemporary terms, however, Asimov wrote the Empire series in the early years of the Cold War, when a nuclear World War 3 seemed a realistic future; one whose widespread and enduring radioactive contamination might be remembered, at least in folklore, for thousands of years. By the time he wrote Robots and Empire, this was no longer so. However, in the intervening years he had mentioned the contamination, and the resulting abandonment of Earth, in many stories. He therefore retained both of these elements but gave a different cause than nuclear war.
Biron Farrill, about to complete studies at the University of Earth, is told by Sander Jonti that his father, a rich planetary leader known as Lord Rancher of Widemos, has been arrested and killed by the Tyranni and his own life may be in danger. On Jonti's advice, he travels to Rhodia, the strongest of the conquered planets. There he hears rumours of a world where rebellion against the Tyranni is secretly being plotted.
Escaping with Artemisia oth Hinriad, the daughter of the Director of Rhodia and his brother Gilbret in a Tyranni spaceship, they travel to the planet Lingane. It is not a part of the Tyranni conquests, but maintains "peaceful" relations with them.
There, they meet the Autarch of Lingane (who is revealed to be Sander Jonti, the man who sent Farrill to Rhodia from Earth), who seems to possess knowledge of a rebellion world. With him and his followers, the group travel to the heart of the Horsehead Nebula - they believe that for any rebellion world to exist and not be known to the Tyranni, it must be located in a place like the Horsehead Nebula.
The Tyranni spaceship stolen by Farrill is being tracked by a fleet of Tyranni vessels lea by Simok Aratap, the Tyrannian Commissioner. With him is the Director, who is shown to be nervous about his daughter's and brother's well-being. They keep themselves at a distance for fear of Farrill discovering them until Farrill lands on one planet in the heart of the nebula.
The Autarch believes that the planet is the rebellion world. However, there is no sign of life anywhere. When the Autarch and Farrill leave the spaceship to apparently set up a radio transmitter, Farrill faces the Autarch and accuses him of getting his father killed at the hands of the Tyranni. The Autarch affirms the accusation, to which Farrill adds that the Autarch feared of his father's growing reputation. That is why he arranged Farrill's father's death.
In a fight, Farrill subdues the Autarch with help from the Autarch's closest secretary, who reveals that he is ashamed of the Autarch for killing a great man like Farrill's father. Later, as Farrill and the Autarch's secretary try to explain everything to the rest of the crew they picked up from Lingane, the Tyranni fleet arrives and takes them prisoner. Aratap interrogates everyone and during one of the interrogations, the Autarch's secretary kills the Autarch with a blaster in order to keep him from giving the coordinates to the rebellion world to Aratap. But the Autarch manages to tell Aratap the coordinates before he dies, much to the secretary's dismay.
While Aratap interrogates Farrill, Gilbret manages to escape to the engine room of the spaceship and disables the hypermotors. Farrill, realising the danger, manages to contact Aratap. The engines are repaired, but Gilbret is injured and later dies.
The space jump is made with the coordinates given to them by the late Autarch. However, they find a planetless system consisting only of a white-dwarf star. Aratap lets Farrill and the others go, believing that there is no rebellion world. Biron and Artemisia are married, but Aratap makes it clear that he will never to be chosen as Director.
It is eventually revealed that there is indeed a rebellion in the making, located on Rhodia itself. The Director is its leader; he deliberately took on the persona of a nervous and timid old man to throw off suspicion from himself and his planet.
It is further revealed that the Director, who possesses a collection of ancient documents, has searched for, and found, a document that will help a future empire-yet-to-be (likely Trantor) govern the galaxy. This document is ultimately revealed to be the United States Constitution.
Asimov noted in his autobiography that the genesis of the Constitution subplot lay with H. L. Gold, editor of Galaxy magazine. Asimov felt that Gold's judgment was at fault by attributing too much power to the Constitution as a document. Asimov later considered the premise highly improbable, and became annoyed at Gold for having persuaded him to insert the subplot into the novel. [1] Whatever Asimov's opinion of the novel, he never actually withdrew it from publication.
On its initial book publication, reviewer Groff Conklin termed the novel "a first-rate piece of imaginative story-telling."[2] In Astounding Science Fiction, Villiers Gerson declared the novel successful, despite its "unidimensional" characters, due to "Asimov's skill as a story-teller of suspense."[3] The New York Times found the novel "a rousing adventure story of the remote future."[4]
| Preceded by: | Series: |
Followed by: |
|---|---|---|
| Isaac Asimov's Utopia by Roger MacBride Allen |
Empire Series Foundation Series |
The Currents of Space |
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