Con-Foundation Introduction

by Richard Schwartz (rex@kf6.so-net.ne.jp)
1980-ish

First came BORED OF THE RINGS, the parody of Tolkien's classic trilogy.

Then came DOON, which spoofed Frank Herbert's science-fiction series.

And now, completing this thought, comes CON-FOUNDATION, which takes on all seven books of Asimov's Foundation Trilogy!

Inside the clear partition, a mechanical arm twisted, selected a record, and placed it on the turntable. As it began spinning, a figure materialized above it. It was that of a wizened old man, decrepit with age and confined to the confines of a wheelchair, and yet whose amber eyes sparkled clear, belying the age betrayed by his features. He spoke, in digital stereo.

"Hi gang. No need to introduce myself, since my picture is on every stamp, calendar and T-shirt ...

"Before I go on, I'd better warn you that I'm not going to be a very popular guy in the next few minutes. Basically, I've been putting you on. You've been working your tails off for the last fifty years, all for what you think is a good cause – the re-comedization of the Universe. In fact, you've been wasting your time. The Humor Foundation is a joke ... and that is no play on words!”

WINNER OF THE YUGO AWARD FOR GREATEST SCIENCE FICTION PARODY OF ALL TIME!

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Page 1........................1
Page 3........................3
Page 9........................9
Page 16....................16
Page 23....................23
Page 30....................30
Page 36....................36
Page 46....................46
Page 50....................50

Author's Foreword

I started this foreword by writing eight words, then thought that looked a little skimpy so I added another thirteen words. Then I went back and counted all the words and double-checked that I had a grand total of forty.

After that it was a simple matter of staring at the ceiling until I could boost the word count to sixty-two words. I experimented briefly with going back and counting all the compound words as double, such as “fore-word” and “double-checked” and, well, why not, “sixty-two.” That would have given me a new high of one hundred five words, but I decided not to be so greedy, and just settled for one hundred fourteen. I did, however, opt to count the words "Author's Foreword" at the top of the page in my new total of one hundred forty.

A scary thought came over me, so I rushed to the phone and called my agent, and she assured me that I was getting paid by the word, so I walked back from the Seven-Eleven and wrote down forty-one more words.

I finally decided that two hundred ten words was about the limit for an author's foreword, so I wrote the adjoining book, which is well over nine thousand words.