Susan Calvin

Dr. Susan Calvin is a fictional character from Isaac Asimov's Robot Series. She was the chief robopsychologist at US Robots and Mechanical Men, Inc., the major manufacturer of robots in the 21st century. She was the main character in many short stories from the books "I, Robot" and "The Complete Robot".

Character profile

Typically, Asimov portrays Dr. Calvin as a highly driven woman, focused on her work and divorced from normal emotions, almost more "robotic" than her mechanical characters. She likes robots considerably more than human beings; in "Evidence", when asked "Are robots so different from men?", she replies, "Worlds different. Robots are essentially "decent"." Asimov's own stories leave her misanthropy largely unexplained, but Harlan Ellison's screenplay adaptation of "I, Robot" investigates its origins, in the end concluding that her attitudes are rather well-founded. One of the continuing themes in Asimov's work is the essential irony that, although the Three Laws of Robotics make robots value human beings over themselves, Susan Calvin's estimation of robotic decency may not be entirely wrong.

An excerpt from Harlan Ellison's "I, Robot" has this to say about Dr. Calvin: "She is a small woman, but there is a towering strength in her face. Tensile strength, that speaks to endurance, to maintaining in the imperfect world. Her mouth is thin, and her face pale. Grace lives in her features, and intelligence; but she is not an attractive woman. She is not one of those women who in later years it can be said of them , 'She must have been a beauty when she was younger.' Susan Calvin was always plain. And clearly, always a powerful personality."

It was not until a mention of her in "The Robots of Dawn", Asimov's third Elijah Baley Robot novel, that the events of her era (the 21st century) were concretely tied into those of Baley's era, at least two-and-a-half millennia further into the future, and thus into the greater Foundation universe as a whole.

Portrayals in other media

She was played by Wendy Gifford and Beatrix Lehmann in "Liar!" and "The Prophet", two episodes of British television series "Out of the Unknown" based on Asimov's short stories, and by Margaret Robertson in the BBC Radio 4 adaptation of "Satisfaction Guaranteed". Bridget Moynahan played Susan Calvin in the movie adaptation of "I, Robot" (not based on the aforementioned script by Harlan Ellison).

References by other writers

Arthur C. Clarke also mentions Susan Calvin, in his novel "." She appears alongside Ada Lovelace and Grace Hopper as a female "role-model" in "the battle of wits between man and machine" (Chapter 36: Chamber of Horrors). It is unclear whether Clarke is referring to Calvin in the sense of Asimov's fictional character or as a character who existed in his fictional universe.

Susan Calvin also appears in David Wingrove's illustrated fiction "The Immortals of Science Fiction" (1980). Here she is interviewed, along with 9 other famous science fiction characters.

List of Stories Featuring Susan Calvin:

*"Escape!"
*"Evidence"
*"The Evitable Conflict"
*"Feminine Intuition"
*"Galley Slave"
*"Lenny"
*"Liar!"
*"Little Lost Robot"
*"Risk"
*"Robbie"
*"Robot Dreams"
*"Satisfaction Guaranteed"
*"Foundation's Friends":
**"Balance"
**"PAPPI"
**"Plato's Cave"
**"The Fourth Law of Robotics"

In "I, Robot"

In the film "I, Robot", Calvin is played by Bridget Moynahan and serves as an operative who "makes the robots seem more human" and is completely dependent on the Three Laws of Robotics. She initially does not believe in Del Spooner's assertion that robots can be bad, despite running into the Law-less NS-5 "Sonny". She eventually finds out both that Sonny actually did kill Dr. Alfred Lanning and that Spooner's entire left arm is mechanical.