by Rick Bavera

Created on: March 18, 2009

There have been many books and short stories written about "the future" and many of them are apocalyptic in nature. That is, they look at a future after there has been a catastrophe of some sort that has more or less destroyed or greatly changed civilization as we know it.

Among relatively modern works that tell such a story is Mary Shelley's The Last Man (1826). Part of the story deals with the world being devoid of humanity, which has left one man still surviving after a plague.

Another recent novel with a similar theme is Stephen King's The Stand (1978), which has also been made into a mini-series that was aired on US television. This tells of the collapse of civilization after a "super flu" escapes from a government facility and more than 90% of the population dies. The survivors of the flu begin to gather to rebuild and hold on to the best of what is left.

George R Stewart's earlier (1949) Earth Abides tells the story of a man who survives a plague, and makes an effort to hold on to the leasrning and knowledge of what has passed away. He hopes to start everything over again, and make things better than before.

Several books have dealt with civilization's fall as a result of nuclear war and devastation. Among the best of them are Alas, Babylon (1959) by Pat Frank; On the Beach (1957) by Nevil Shute, set in Australia; and A Canticle for Leibowitz (1959) by Walter M Miller, Jr. In this last one, civilization has been preserved by the church, which has sanctified a scientist by the name of Leibowitz.

There are other proposed causes for the end of civilization. One of the best treatments of a drastic change coming from outside causes (rather than ourselves or the earth itself) is Lucifer's Hammer (1977) by Jerry Pournelle and Larry Niven. Lucifer's Hammer deals with the after-effects of a comet hitting the earth. The main setting for this book is southern California.

There are other, more positive stories available about the future as well, in which civilization has not ended or nearly ended, no catastrophe has occurred.

Among the very best of these tales are those told by Isaac Asimov, centering around his Foundation Trilogy. The "Foundation" is an organization started by a man named Hari Seldon, who as a psychhistorian has looked at humanity at predicted what could or "should" happen, and his foundation moves behind the scenes to influence civilization and trends and future history, in order to keeps things "on track." The three books in the trilogy are Foundation, Foundation and Empire, and Second Foundation. They were first published in 1951-1953, and received a Hugo Award (one of the writing awards in the science fiction field) in 1966 for "best all-time series." Many other works by Asimov are written in the same "Foundation Universe."

There was a second trilogy written about the Foundation by three more recent science fiction "greats" as a tribute and expansion of the story. Janet Asimov, Isaac's widow, approached the authors to have them write these as way to fill in some of the missing pieces of the story. The books in the second Foundation trilogy are Foundation's Fear (1997) by Gregory Benford; Foundation and Chaos (1998) by Greg Bear; and Foundation's Triumph (1998) by David Brin.

These are a few of the best among the many books written about the future. There really is hope for the future. At least these authors seemed to think so, as they wrote stories for us to read in their future. Some of the tales are more positive than others, but they all foresaw a future for humanity.

May you have much happy reading, far into the future.

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