For some reason The Last Answer, an Isaac Asimov short story from 1980 was popping up on the Internet this week. Oddly, I’d never read it before and being an Asimov fan, I thought I’d read most of his fiction. Being that he started publishing short stories in 1939, this story was written fairly late in his career—he died in 1992. On the other hand, he was active right up until the time of his death so perhaps it wasn’t that late.
In any event, The Last Answer is the quintessential Asimov short story: short and pithy. It reminds me of The Feeling of Power, one of my favorite Asimov short stories. If you like SF, and especially if you like Asimov’s SF, you should definitely spend 5 minutes to read this story, even if you’ve read it before. I’m sure you won’t be sorry.