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Stanislaw Lem: Difference between revisions
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{{quote|''"These days no one ever reads anything. [[Viewers are Morons|If they read, they don't understand. If they read and understand - they forget immediately.]]"''|attributed to Lem in an interview}}
{{quote|''"[...] Lem is probably a composite committee rather than an individual, since he writes in several styles and sometimes reads foreign, to him, languages and sometimes does not [...]"''|[[Philip K. Dick]]'s [http://www.lem.pl/english/faq#P.K.Dick letter to FBI]}}
Stanisław Lem (12 September 1921 – 27 March 2006) was a Polish novelist, most credited for his [[Science Fiction]] writings. His works range from philosophical books and analyses to "tall tales", to light and [[Black Humor|darkly comic]] satire; and he enjoyed subverting many common genre tropes. He is one of the most recognized and respected Polish writers, as well as one of the most prolific science-fiction writers; and was named a Knight of the Order of the White Eagle.
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[[Pungeon Master|He loved word-plays]], making up new words and divining the future of civilisation from them; it was one of the many ways in which he subjected plot to paradoxical associations rather than to the straight and narrowly reasonable prognoses. He was particularly fond of satirizing religion, technology, and human foibles; typically with a sharp and incisive wit. Later in his career, he grew increasingly critical of technology, particularly the Internet, which he considered little more than a gathering of idiots. Many of his works, both novels and short stories, feature the recurring character Ijon Tichy; an intelligent, accident-prone, adventurer who varies between being the [[Only Sane Man]], and an [[Unreliable Narrator]], occasionally veering into [[Parody Sue]].
Lem had [[Sturgeon's Law|a low opinion of most of science fiction]], and thought that the existence of the [[Sci Fi Ghetto]] was justified, not because the genre is inherently worthless, but because the authors haven't used the possibilities in it. The only contemporary author he considered worthwhile was [[Philip K. Dick]]; Dick did not return his respect, but considered Lem's attacks on American science fiction to be unjustified and insulting. At the same time, he also became a target of Dick's increasing paranoia.<ref>It stemmed from a series of publishings of foreign science-fiction in communist Poland, signatured by Lem - Dick received payment, but in Polish złotys, which he couldn't exchange to dollars. He was already super paranoid, so it added fuel to the fire.</ref> Despite Lem's views, he was defended by [[Ursula K. Le Guin|Ursula LeGuin]] in his conflict with the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America.
==== His works include: ====
* ''[[
* ''Eden'' (1959)
* ''[[Return From the Stars]]'' (Powrót z gwiazd, 1961; trans. 1980)
* ''[[
* ''The Invincible'' (Niezwyciężony, 1964)
* ''Summa Technologiae'' (1964/67)
* ''[[His
* ''[[
* ''[[
* ''[[
* ''The Futurological Congress'' (Kongres futurologiczny, 1971)
* ''Memoirs Found in a Bathtub'' (Pamiętnik znaleziony w wannie, 1971)
* ''The Chain of Chance'' (Katar, 1975)
* ''Golem XIV'' (1981)
* ''[[Fiasco (
* ''Peace on Earth'' (Pokój na Ziemi, 1987; transl. 1994)
----
=== His work includes examples of: ===
* [[A Worldwide Punomenon]]: Quite a lot in his less serious works. Especially ''[[
* [[Altum Videtur]]: more frequently in his non-fictional works. Arguably, that was less a personal trait of Lem than it was common for the educated Poles as a whole. Due the immense influence the [[Catholic Church]] and its liturgical language, Latin, had in Polish culture and history, literary Polish itself became heavily latinized, and it shows.
** He studied medicine in Lwów, although he did not finish the studies because he did not want to succumb to the party-mandated doctrine of Lysenkoism. The fact that medicine is the most prominent (if not only) field in which Latin is actually used, probably had its influence too.
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* [[Casual Interstellar Travel]]: Exaggerated: Ijon Tichy once turned his rocket around and headed back several parsec because he had left his pocket knife in a spaceport cafeteria.<ref>Turns out it was in his pocket all along.</ref>
* [[Celibate Hero]]: Most of Lem's protagonists are solitary males who also show no interest in romance over the course of the story.
** Subverted with [[Tales of Pirx the Pilot
** In ''Return from the Stars'', the astronaut protagonist returns to Earth after 120 years. While trying to find a partner (and succeeding, after a fashion), he ultimately stays isolated in a society that has changed too much to re-integrate him.
* [[Cold Sleep, Cold Future]]: In ''Return from the Stars'', astronauts who have completed a century-long interstellar exploration mission return to an Earth where violence and risk-taking is so foreign to the population that the returning astronauts are regarded as dangerous beasts.
* [[Continuity Nod]]: In the first chapter of ''Fiasco'', the protagonist goes on a mission to rescue the titular character of ''[[
* [[Crapsack World]]
* [[Crap Saccharine World]]: ''Return from the Stars''. And ''The Futurological Congress'' even more so {{spoiler|but it was all a dream.}}
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* [[Deus Est Machina]]: Golem XIV in the book of the same name.
** Golem XIV--despite expressing itself in human language--experiences a rarified world of pure intellect, so far above and beyond human concerns, it has become a [[Starfish Alien]] in every sense except the physical. One wonders the extent to which the almost painfully-rigorous Lem felt similarly alienated from his fellow human beings (and, therefore, was an ideal writer to depict what a [[Deus Est Machina]] might think about).
*** In the US, "Golem XIV" appears as a "story" in Lem's [[Real Trailer, Fake Movie|anthology]] ''Imaginary Magnitude''; it takes the form of an article from an academic journal, albeit one eventually given over entirely to the title AI, reproducing its attempt to communicate with humanity. All of the book's contents are in peculiar formats with which Lem was experimenting: such as [[Fictional Document|Fictional Documents]], or prefaces which can only hint at the nature of the as-yet-unrealized media they purport to be introducing.
** Also the [[Fun
* [[Dystopia]]: He portrayed many dystopian societies, and wrote about the impossibility of creating an [[Utopia]].
* [[Executive Meddling]]: And they were [[Big Brother Is Watching|party executives]]! He was forced into [[Sequelitis|creating two sequels of]] ''Hospital of the Transfiguration'', because [[Happy Ending|happy endings]] were mandatory at the time. A few paragraphs praising communism in ''The Astronauts'' also qualify.
* [[Fun
* [[Genius Loci]]: The eponymous planet in ''[[
* [[Genre Shift]] : In ''Fiasco'' the sci-fi story suddenly switches to some extracts of an adventure novel the main character is reading in the story.
* [[Getting Crap Past the Radar]]: "[http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/kurwa#Polish Awruk!]" is probably the most famous instance, [[Gone Horribly Right|which especially tends to be]] [[Lost in Translation]]. Also of [[Big Brother Is Watching|political]] [[Executive Meddling|variety]].
* [[God Is Inept]]: At the end of ''[[
* [[Hard
* [[Human Aliens]]: Averted in most of his serious works. Played with a few times in ''The Star Diaries'':
** In the twenty-first voyage, Lem creates an alien species having the exact appearance of humans for speculating on the future of bioengineering; throughout the story, [[Lampshade Hanging|he even calls them humans "for convenience"]].
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** "It's comforting to know, when you think about it, that only man can be a bastard."
* [[Humans Are Cthulhu]]: ''Robot Tales'' treats humans like this.
* [[Humans Are Ugly]]: In ''[[
* [[Lost in Translation]]: Lem's love of puns and wordplay often make him a daunting task for a translator. For example his SF whodunnit ''Katar'' is translated into English as ''The Chain of Chance'', but is often dubbed ''The Cold'', from its Polish title. Unfortunately the Polish word "katar" ''does not'' mean "cold", it just means "runny nose": the hero didn't have a cold, but a hay fever ("katar sienny") -- which was an important plot point, but was lost on the translator.
* [[Mechanical Evolution]], [[Mechanical Lifeforms]]: ''The Invincible'' the most prominent example, though the latter trope is recurring in his work.
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** To the point [[Orwellian Editor|he sometimes prohibited re-publishing books he didn't like]].
* [[Random Number God]]: A theme of many Lem's works, especially ''The Investigation'' and ''The Chain of Chance''.
* [[Real Trailer, Fake Movie]]: His book ''Imaginary Magnitude'' contains introductions to nonexistent books. Also ''A Perfect Vacuum'' that contains reviews of these. Among Lem's readers, they are collectively known as "apocrypha".
* [[Recycled in Space]]: He wrote several short stories that are fairy tales <small>IN SPACE! WITH ROBOTS!</small>
* [[Religious Robot]]: ''The Star Diaries'' has robot monks. They are aware that if they connected to a robot with all the facts on religion they would become atheists, so they choose not to connect to other robots out of religious principle.
* [[Riddle for
* [[Ridiculously-Human Robots]]: In ''[[
* [[Scenery Porn]]: The description of the spaceport given in ''[[
* [[Sex Is Cool]]: Deconstructed and parodied. For example, in the twentieth voyage of ''[[
** This theme was revisited in ''Observation On The Spot''.
* [[Sex Is Evil]]: One of Ijon Tichy's ancestors created a substance that made sex painful, so humanity wouldn't be controlled by carnal desires anymore. When he put it into the water supply of his city, he was lynched.
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* [[Space Pirates]]: Ijon Tichy mentions that [[Black Sheep|his grandfather made a committed attempt]], but it didn't pay off.
* [[Starfish Aliens]]: A recurring theme in his works is the portrayal of profoundly alien civilizations, and the impossibility of understanding them.
* [[Sufficiently Advanced Alien]]: The HPLD civilization (meaning ''[[Exactly What It Says
* [[Time Travel]]: Ijon Tichy gets handed the [[Timey-Wimey Ball]] several times, the most amusing instance probably being the episode when Tichy, [[Temporal Paradox|caught in a time loop]], is [[Amusing Injuries|banged on the head with a saucepan]] wielded by a [[My Future Self and Me|future version of himself]] ([[Foregone Conclusion|then goes on to bang a saucepan on the head of a past version of himself]]). For ''a week''.
{{quote| [[Crowning Moment of Funny|"You dog!" I cried. "Tricking your own self - that's really low!"]]}}
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* [[Through the Eyes of Madness]]: Ijon Tichy experiences this in ''[[The Futurological Congress]]'' after he and his colleagues are dosed with powerful hallucinogenic drugs by a terrorist group.
* [[Twenty Minutes Into the Future]]: ''The Chain of Chance''
* [[Used Future]]: in ''[[
* [[Viewers Are Geniuses]]: His work is usually loaded with science and philosophy.
* [[We Come in Peace, Shoot
{{reflist}}
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