looking for a quote of his

Afraid my recall here is pretty vague, but hopefully
the description will jog someone's memory.

More or less, The Good Doctor is quoting
some French (?generals?) about another
country's military mis-adventure (?Light Brigade?).

Asimov writes something like: to which the
French said (snippage of the French comment,
which is the thing I can't recall...), which,
loosely translated, is "that's very pretty,
but is no way to win a war".

Again, this is based on a few misfirng
and aged neurons.

Ring a bell with anyone? Thanks

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danny burstein wrote:
> Afraid my recall here is pretty vague, but hopefully
> the description will jog someone's memory.
>
> More or less, The Good Doctor is quoting
> some French (?generals?) about another
> country's military mis-adventure (?Light Brigade?).
>
> Asimov writes something like: to which the
> French said (snippage of the French comment,
> which is the thing I can't recall...), which,
> loosely translated, is "that's very pretty,
> but is no way to win a war".
>
> Again, this is based on a few misfirng
> and aged neurons.
>
> Ring a bell with anyone? Thanks

My guess is it's "A Sacred Poet," from the September 1987 issue of the
Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction (F&SF). It is also collected
in Out of the Everywhere. It is one of Asimov's most popular essays
from that series, one that he said (in the introduction to OotE) failed
to garner even one negative comment.

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