In Memory Yet Green
In Memory Yet Green: The Autobiography of Isaac Asimov, 1920–1954, is the first volume of Isaac Asimov's two-volume autobiography.[1][2] It was published in 1979. This first volume covers the years 1920 to 1954, which lead up to the point just prior to Asimov's becoming a full-time writer. In Joy Still Felt: The Autobiography of Isaac Asimov, 1954–1978 (1980), the second part of Asimov's autobiography, covers the years 1954 to 1978.
In Memory Yet Green is Asimov's joint 200th book; it was published on the same day as Opus 200. It includes one of Asimov's first ever short science fiction stories, "The Weapon" (1938).
Title
The publisher, Doubleday, disliked Asimov's original title, so they asked him to provide another, suggesting he find a good quote from an obscure poem.[3] Asimov suggested the following poem:
- In memory yet green, in joy still felt,
- The scenes of life rise sharply into view.
- We triumph; Life's disasters are undealt,
- And while all else is old, the world is new.
Doubleday agreed to Asimov's new title, but couldn't find the source of the verse he had given them. When Doubleday inquired, Asimov confessed: "I wrote it myself".[3] In the end, the poem was attributed to "Anon."
Third volume
According to Asimov's second wife, Janet Asimov, this two-volume autobiography was too chronological (albeit highly detailed, owing to Asimov's eidetic memory and the copious notes he kept about his life in his daily diary), lending it an emotionless and reserved quality. As such she encouraged him to write a third autobiography, I. Asimov: A Memoir (1994), which would convey more of his feelings about the contents.[3]
