I, Robot (SF) - Isaac Asimov ***

Without doubt, I, Robot is a classic of science fiction. Dating back to 1950 it collects Asimov's early short stories about robots in the shared setting of the US Robots and Mechanical Men corporation, mostly featuring robopsychologist Susan Calvin.

I read these stories many years ago, but have only recently re-aquired them when I bought The Caves of Steel in a six book package. There's some clever work here, with almost all the stories featuring Asimov's famous 'three laws of robotics' and specifically exploring ways that the robots interpret these 'laws' resulting in things going wrong. It's still an interesting read - but I don't think it has stood the test of time as well as The Caves of Steel.

Don't get me wrong - it's still an essential part of the SF canon, and even the collective title is iconic (the stories originally appeared in magazines, of course). But Asimov's limitations with characterisation come through more strongly here. Several of the stories feature a pair of robotic engineers, Donovan and Powell, whose interminable banter I assume is supposed to be amusing, but in reality is extremely irritating. The only significant female character is Calvin, who is a caricature of an emotionless scientist.

To make matters worse, there are the timescales involved. In The Caves of Steel, we have a kind of reverse anachronism where they still use 1950s IT (and smoke pipes) three thousand years in the future - for some reason, this is just charming. But in I Robot there are humanoid robot nursemaids by the 1990s (their only limitation being they can't talk) and pretty much perfect robots a decade or two later (by which time we are routinely sending people to locations as far reaching as Mercury and the asteroids, and a starship drive is well under way). This somehow feels significantly worse.

Two or three of the stories here are excellent - and any not featuring the humorous pairing are good (to be fair, even in those the problems faced are excellent). But this is very much an exercise in setting up hard robotic psychology problems and finding a solution, with little consideration given to an effective narrative. I'm glad I read it again, but I'm not sure if I'd bother to re-read it in the future.

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Review by Brian Clegg - See all Brian's online articles or subscribe to a weekly email free here

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