The End of Eternity
The End of Eternity is a 1955 science fiction novel by Isaac Asimov , in which a time-traveling bureaucracy, "Eternity," ensures that human history proceeds within acceptable parameters. When eternity has to condition its own existence through the receipt of a time loop, humanity intervenes in a time that is beyond the sphere of influence of eternity , as the leveling influence of the “time bureaucrats” will lead to the end of humanity.
Asimov later linked the novel with his famous Foundation cycle by pointing out in the novel Foundation's Edge (Eng. Title: "The search for the earth") that the "Foundation" story takes place in a universe in which the "Eternity" was destroyed.
The novel was published in German translation in 1958 under the title Das Ende der Ewigkeit .
action
From the 27th century onwards, mankind established "eternity", an organization outside of time that observes mankind and prevents blatant historical outbreaks or catastrophes through the smallest possible "changes in reality". The aim is to reduce human suffering to a minimum. The "primitive" period before the 27th century is taboo. In addition, the "eternal" is the time between the 70,000. and 150,000. Century inaccessible for unknown reasons. The time afterwards cannot explore "eternity".
Andrew Harlan is an "Eternity" technician, one of the specialists who implement changes in reality. He is very interested in the primitive times and, at the behest of his superior, senior computer Laban Twissell, should bring them closer to the newcomer Cooper. While Harlan was spending a week in the 482nd century, he fell in love with Noÿs Lambent. In order to protect them from a change in reality, he hides them, against the rules of "eternity", in an empty station in one of the 100,000 hidden centuries.
When Harlan is later prevented from returning to Noÿs by an inexplicable time blockade, he suspects the upper floors of "eternity". He confronts Twissell and makes a discovery for him: He has already understood that his student Cooper should become the inventor of the time field. Twissel confirms the time loop that they have to condition to ensure "eternity", but also asserts that no one, not even the eternity council, is able to set up a time block. Harlan, believing that he will be separated from his lover, sabotages Cooper's journey through time, who is now stranded in a deeper past.
Twissell is desperate; but since "eternity" still exists, he theorizes that you have the option to undo Harlan's mistakes - time is sluggish and resists major changes. They discover a reference to Cooper's landing time in old magazines collected by Harlan. Harlan demands Noÿs, but Twissell knows nothing about the time blockade. As they travel into the empty centuries, this can be done without any problems. Both are puzzling as to who or what could have triggered this blockage.
Harlan is now supposed to go back in time and pick up Cooper; he demands that Noÿs accompany him. In the past, he reveals to her that he saw through her: she had suggested the knowledge about the time loop to him. It comes from the hidden centuries, manipulated him and wanted to destroy "eternity". Noÿs confirms his suspicions and says that "eternity" would be on the conscience of mankind, who developed interstellar space travel too late and, when they did so, found an already populated galaxy and then, locked up, passed away on earth through their own inertia. Together they destroy the time travel vessel and thus begin a new infinity (in which humanity will develop interstellar space travel earlier).
Film adaptations
A first full-length adaptation with the name A halhatatlanság halála (literally: The Death of Immortality ) was made for Hungarian television in 1976/1977. Screenwriter and director was András Rajnai , Jácint Juhász plays the leading role of the technician Harlan. The final sequence in which the "eternity" is destroyed, this piece of the On the Run from the album The Dark Side of the Moon by Pink Floyd accompanied.
In 1987 the novel was largely filmed in the Soviet Union under the title "Konets vechnosti". However, the film ends in Germany instead of California.
expenditure
- First edition: The End of Eternity. 1955.
- Different version in: Isaac Asimov: The Alternate Asimovs. 1987.
- German first translation: At the end of eternity. Translated by Rainer Eisfeld . Pabel (Utopia large volume # 73), 1958.
- New translation: At the end of eternity. Translated by Walter Brumm. Heyne books # 3088, Munich 1967, DNB 455564736 .
- Also under the title: The End of Eternity. Translated by Walter Brumm. Heyne, 2016, ISBN 978-3-453-31686-7 .
Individual evidence
- ↑ https://www.npr.org/2011/07/14/134978930/isaac-asimov-time-travel-and-the-end-of-eternity?t=1553695719714
- ↑ A halhatatlanság halála. Retrieved November 11, 2019 .
- ↑ https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0298960/