Book Report: Asimov’s Foundation Series

By Russell Kurtz

The last report ended with the beginning of a major change for the Foundation — the change from religious control over their area of the galaxy to economic control. There is one more story in this time period, which also shows how the economic control can be misused.

This story opens on board the ship of a Master Trader named Lathan Devers. He was originally trained to become a Foundation priest, but showed so much promise in the technological part of his studies that they converted him to a scientist. He became a Trader by temperament.

Another Trader brings a personal message capsule to Devers, who opens it and reads it. He tells the Trader that the message says a third Trader has been captured by Askone, a planet that resists Foundation influence. It is Devers’ job to try to retrieve the arrested Trader. What Devers does not tell the messenger, however, is that he recognizes the arrested Trader as an agent of the Foundation whose job was to get Askone to start buying atomic appliances. Then Askone would come under the Foundation’s influence, because the Foundation is the only group able to supply these appliances. Devers will have to go to Askone, where he can’t sell his products, and he’s already behind quota.

Devers lands on Askone and admits that his reason for visiting is to meet with the arrested Trader. Posing as a priest (since he was educated as one), he is allowed to meet that Trader in private. He finds out that the Askonians are serious about executing him, but would choose not to if supplied with sufficient gold. They believe that atomic devices are cursed by their ancestors and therefore Askonians would risk their own souls if they used these deveices.

Devers sets up a presentation, in which he claims he will be able to convert iron into gold. In front of the ruling council, including the ruler and the Prime Minister, he converts a guard’s belt buckles into gold. The Prime Minister claims the gold is from a cursed source and should not be used. Devers recognizes that the Prime Minister is his main opponent, the true conservative on the council, and therefore picks him as Prime Victim.

Devers argues that the gold is just gold, and since no one in the council has touched his machine, any curse on the gold will fall on him, not them. Finally, he suggests they put the gold buckles on an altar for two weeks while keeping him in jail as a surety. This will show whether or not the Askonian ancestors disapprove of the gold Devers has created. If no disasters fall within two weeks, it is a sign the ancestors approve of the gold — that the value of the gold is greater than the difficulty with its source.

Partway through Devers’ imprisonment, the Prime Minister visits him in jail. After an extended conversation, the Prime Minister leaves with the transmutation device that changes iron into gold. At first glance, it seems that Devers and the other Trader will be executed and the Prime Minister will be rich.

The next scene in the book opens with the two Traders conversing on Devers’ ship; they have both been released. The agent of the Foundation is planning to go back to Askone to continue his attempts to sell atomics to the Askonians. Devers tells him it is unnecessary; he has sold his entire cargo to the Prime Minister — at double market price. How?

It seems that, when Devers gave the Prime Minister his transmuter, he attached an automatic, three-dimensional recorder. When the Prime Minister–now Prime Victim–used this supposedly cursed device at his own mansion, Devers was recording it. He replayed the recording for the Prime Victim and convinced him that there was a projector ready to play it in the main square on Devers’ signal. His price for not playing it was freedom for the two Traders and for the Prime Minister to purchase the atomics. The result will be that the Prime Minister will push through laws allowing him to use his devices, which will in turn allow others to purchase similar items, and make Askone financially dependent on the Foundation.

Thus, virtually the last external enemy of the Foundation has been defeated. But there is still internal strife, as typified by the conversation between Devers and the head of the Traders Guild at the end of this story. Devers points out that, with the high taxes the Guild puts on all Traders, it’s not really worth it to continue trading. He tells the Guild leader that there is enough discontent among the Master Traders that it may lead to civil war.