I interviewed Isaac Asimov on November 7, 1972—Election Day—for my high school alternative newspaper, Kong. When I ran across the tape last year, I discovered to my horror that three years later, I’d recorded over the first 31 minutes of that tape with a second interview, this one with Steve Gerber. So all that remains of my Asimov interview are these concluding five minutes.

Please don’t hate me … but you’re free to hate the impetuous 19-year-old me who reused the tape!

The photo embedded on the video below shows us in Doubleday’s Park Avenue offices. Isaac is wearing his traditional bolo necktie. Unfortunately, I can be seen wearing a puka shell necklace, which I guess I thought was cool back when I was 17.

We discuss the sexual aspects of The Gods Themselves, the number of typewriters he owns, his advice for breaking into the business, and more.

I’m the one who asks the first complete question about the collection The Early Asimov, and it’s Asimov, of course, who answers. The third voice is that of high school classmate Eric Shalit.