Isaac Asimov's 'Feminine Intuition'

a) When trying to classify Isaac Asimov´s story “Feminine Intuition” a number of characteristics arise that make us think of the story as one belonging to the science-fiction genre, nonetheless the story is not only that. The writer introduces several features that allow the reader to go beyond this first classification and contribute to enrich Asimov´s work in some way. These features seem to be more typical of crime fiction and there are several instances in the text that might help us demonstrate this assertion.

First of all, one of the key elements of crime fiction, mystery, is present in the story. Something weird has happened to Madarian and the robot, Jane 5, on their way back from Flagstaff. A meteorite struck and both were destructed,

In fact, this made me think of another story we read in this course: Michael Connelly´s “Suicide Run”, in which there is a woman police that helps the detectives to solve the crime, just as in Asimov´s story, in which it is also a female character, Kizmin Rider, the one who solves it. I believe the detective´s gender is indeed important in both stories. Nevertheless, the authors´ approach to issues that have to be with gender is different in each case. In Connelly´s story there is not a sexist approach, for as we can infer after reading it, Harry Bosch expects women to be different and better than men. Harry sees them as supportive and as not corrupted by reality, just as opposite to men. In Asimov´s work, however, there seems to be a more sexist approach in the sense that the detective, Susan Calvin, is depicted as a more or less grumpy, and to some extent, bossy woman who is not taken seriously by her mates, precisely because she is a woman. Notwithstanding, her method in order to solve crimes has proven to be successful over years, and that is the reason why she is the one who takes control of the situation at the end of the day. Susan Calvin is the one the male characters turn to when they need help, and the one who in a sense “plays” with them, by telling them what she wishes and hiding other pieces of information (for instance, she

There is a tension that has to be solved, and that tension contributes to keeping the attention of the reader awake until the very end of the story.

Furthermore, this mystery helps to intensify the fear and paranoia that the science-fiction writer is showing in his story about the consequences of an unstoppable development of technology. Without the mystery, an essential part of what Asimov wants to communicate would be lost. The story would be just about the positive effects of technology, but not about the negative ones. Hence, the mystery is needed in order to make the reader question the fast growing of technological advances.

To conclude, we could say that the crime-fiction elements serve precisely to highlight and question the science-fiction elements found in Isaac Asimov´s story. Thanks to them the writer is able to keep the reader´s attention until the end of the story and make sure that they perceive his purpose: to make the reader aware that technology is only good when it is used correctly, and that an abuse of it might turn precisely against the ones responsible for its