"Obituary" question

External Since: Jul 08, 2003 Posts: 69

I was rereading _Asimov's Mysteries_ the other day, and noticed something
interesting in the story "Obituary." The narrator's husband has a plan that
will make him famous: he will "bring back" a copy of himself from the
future, but (as was always the case of animals brought back in that fashion),
the copy will be dead. After he passes the point in time from which the
copy was taken, the copy will disappear, and he will come out from hiding,
appearing to have returned from the dead. In the story, the body is taken
from three days in the future. No particular comment is made on the
subject, but does anyone else think that the choice of time between his
"death" and "resurrection" is almost certainly not a coincidence?

-----
Richard Schultz schultr.DeleteThis@mail.biu.ac.il
Department of Chemistry, Bar-Ilan University, Ramat-Gan, Israel
Opinions expressed are mine alone, and not those of Bar-Ilan University
-----
"Logic is a wreath of pretty flowers which smell bad."

External Since: Dec 05, 2006 Posts: 35

schultr.RemoveThis@mail.biu.ack.il (Richard Schultz) writes:

>I was rereading _Asimov's Mysteries_ the other day, and noticed something
>interesting in the story "Obituary." The narrator's husband has a plan that
>will make him famous: he will "bring back" a copy of himself from the
>future, but (as was always the case of animals brought back in that fashion),
>the copy will be dead. After he passes the point in time from which the
>copy was taken, the copy will disappear, and he will come out from hiding,
>appearing to have returned from the dead. In the story, the body is taken
>from three days in the future. No particular comment is made on the
>subject, but does anyone else think that the choice of time between his
>"death" and "resurrection" is almost certainly not a coincidence?

I'd be stunned if it were coincidence. Even if the narrator's
husband ... ah ... Doctor Jerkface, whatever it was, were oblivious to
the cultural and religious overtones of dying and on the third day
returning, Asimov could not possibly be.

What might be coincidence is that this would neatly fit with
the time it takes for news to be reported, be verified, and get out to
all the people that Doctor Jerkface knew, and to then give them a bit
of a surprise.

--
Joseph Nebus
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