Books

First edition, first printing, of the author's landmark collection of science fiction short stories, which includes "Runaround", in which Asimov sets out for the first time his Three Laws of Robotics. "Historically, Asimov is undeniably important to the establishment of both the scientific and fictional realms of artificial intelligence. In May 1941 the word 'robotics' was first used in print by Asimov in his short story 'Liar!', published by Astounding Science Fiction (OED). Upon realizing he had coined a new and lasting word, Asimov recognized the uniquely profitable position he had created for himself, and along with the successful prediction of space travel, self-driving cars, and war-computers among others, would go on to position himself as a sort of friendly-but-rough-around-the-edges technological herald, someone entertaining, trustworthy, and often right" (Jung). Octavo. Original red cloth, spine lettered in black, robot design to front cover in black. With dust jacket. Housed in a custom red cloth folding box by the Chelsea Bindery. Ink ownership signature of one Ruth Rayson, dated 1950, to front free endpaper, and her blind stamp to title page. Spine ends lightly bumped; dust jacket price-clipped, minimally rubbed, slight sunning to spine, as usual, the fugitive red still bright, just a few small creases to spine ends and one small chip: a near-fine copy in very good jacket. Gia Jung, "Our AI Overlord: The Cultural Persistence of Isaac Asimov's Three Laws of Robotics in Understanding Artificial Intelligence", Emergence, 5 June 2018.

I, Robot is a collection of nine science fiction short stories by Isaac Asimov, first published in 1950. It was Asimov's first book of robot stories, containing tales of positronic robots that are often conflicting with the famous Three Laws of Robotics.