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The Foundation Trilogy (Dramatized)

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The Foundation Trilogy (Dramatized)

By: Isaac Asimov, Patrick Tull - adaptation, Mike Stott - adaptation
Narrated by: Geoffrey Beevers, Lee Montague, Julian Glover, Dinsdale Landon, Maurice Denham, Angela Pleasence, Prunella Scales
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About this listen

The opening episode begins on Trantor, capital of the Galactic Empire, with the meeting of Seldon and Dornick, their trial, and their exile to Terminus. The action then jumps forward 50 years, to the first Seldon Crisis, where the repercussions of the recent independence of the Four Kingdoms of the Periphery are being felt on Terminus, and are handled by the first Mayor, Salvor Hardin. The scene then moves forward a further 20 years, as Mayor Hardin faces down the domination of the nearby and most powerful Kingdom, Anacreon.

The Merchant Princes
One-hundred-fifty years after the Foundation was established, the now powerful trading nation faces its greatest threat to date, guided by master trader Hober Mallow.

The General
Two hundred years after its creation, the Foundation battles Bel Riose, the last powerful General of the dying Galactic Empire.

The Mule
A further hundred years have passed, and the Foundation is challenged by an unexpected threat named The Mule.

Flight from the Mule
During the war against The Mule, with things going badly for the Foundation, some key figures under the leadership of the Foundation's greatest scientist, Ebling Mis, flee Terminus in search of the Second Foundation, to warn it of the danger from The Mule.

The Mule Finds
The Mule attempts to find and overthrow the Second Foundation.

Star's End
Sixty years later, and a teenage girl is at the center of the Foundation's renewed search for the Second Foundation.

Changes from the written Trilogy: The conflict between The Foundation and Anacreon takes place 70 years into the Foundation era; in the novels it occurs at 80 F.E. A small segment in Foundation titled "Traders" has been removed entirely. General editing for time has been done throughout. A large, rather comedic section on farming on Rossem has been added to "The Mule Finds".

Please note: This is an historical broadcast recording, produced by the BBC in 1973. The audio quality represents the technology of the time when it was produced.

©2011 ABN (P)2011 ABN
Fantasy Science Fiction
All stars
Most relevant  
great story
varying volumes for LOUD 70's sound effects were painfull in my ears though

👍

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Obviously, this is a heavily abbreviated version, and it suffers from the age of the recording. The underlying story is superb, though, and the voice acting is great when audible.

Poor audio quality lets it down

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typical old school BBC radiophonic workshop with antiquated sound effects which way too loud. interesting representation of Asimov classic

poor recording

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Unbalanced effects with audio, really hard to hear, not good for while driving and the sounds effects make hard to hear the story.

Hard to hear

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The audio is way too loud in places and soft on the dialogue. I was riding the volume buttons up and down constantly to hear it

Audio mixing is too loud and soft.

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Recording is aged and sound effects terrible. recommend you buy a different recording. story is still good

Poor recording

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Sound was illegible and sound effects, while effective, were not balanced with the dialogue. to hear dialogue you need to dial the sound to max, but then you get nailed by the sound effect. should be refunded and removed. sorry BBC, I assume it is from the archives, but need to be remixed. fail.

Quality is not adequate

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old, terrible recording. eq and reverb have made this an unlistenable track. do not download.

do not download - unlistenable quality

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The Foundation trilogy is classic sci-fi written by a master of the genre. This audio adaptation is very entertaining and certainly a viable alternative to reading the books. I did find the old 'radio drama" style a little grating at times and some of the sound effects are reminiscent of 1960's sci-fi TV but that could be a good thing too.

It's Asimov. What's not to love.

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Difficult to decipher in parts, but this is not for first timers. For fans of Asimov and his most well known works, this audio lends a sense of nostalgia through it's Theremin-esque special effects and British accents. While the majority of the non spoken content is dropped, past readers will remember the intermediary details and can refresh their memory through the dialogue to relive the events leading to the reveal of Seldon's plan.
It certainly gave me the sense of desiderium I came for.

Brilliant Nostalgia

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