Stanislaw Lem

Stanislaw Lem died on 26 March, 2006 but in this book his voice can be heard afresh for the benefit of all those who believe that, with his passing, a quintessential element of twentieth-century artistic and intellectual heritage has come to an end. Peter Swirski’s edited and annotated translation of Lem’s fifteen-year correspondence with his principal American translator offers an unparalleled testimony to the raw intellectual powers, smouldering literary passions, and abiding personal concerns from the central period of the writer’s life and career. Even as they reposition Lem as a consummate litterateur and an intellectual oracle, the letters reveal tantalizing glimpses of the man behind the giant. Fighting depression, at times hitting the bottle, plagued by ill health, obsessed by his legacy, driven to distraction by lack of appreciation in the United States, Lem the arch-rationalist emerges here at his most human, vulnerable, and... likeable.

A charming, mind-bending and anarchic book of imagined civilizations'Most cosmic civilizations long for things, in the depths of their souls, they would never openly admit to...'Trurl and Klapaucius are 'constructors' - they travel around the universe creating machines of astonishing inventiveness and power and visiting a bewildering variety of violent, peculiar and morose civilizations. The Cyberiad is oddly reminiscent of Gulliver's Travels, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, The Phantom Tollbooth and Alice in Wonderland. Charming, mind-bending and anarchic, it is perhaps Lem's greatest work. This edition includes all of Daniel Mroz's hallucinatory original illustrations.

The Polish writer Stanislaw Lem is best known to English-speaking readers as the author of the 1961 science fiction novel Solaris, adapted into a meditative film by Andrei Tarkovsky in 1972 and remade in 2002 by Steven Soderbergh. Throughout his writings, comprising dozens of science fiction novels and short stories, Lem offered deeply philosophical and bitingly satirical reflections on the limitations of both science and humanity. In Summa Technologiae-his major work of nonfiction, first published in 1964 and now available in English for the first time-Lem produced an engaging and caustically logical philosophical treatise about human and nonhuman life in its past, present, and future forms. After five decades Summa Technologiae has lost none of its intellectual or critical significance. Indeed, many of Lem’s conjectures about future technologies have now come true: from artificial intelligence, bionics, and nanotechnology to the dangers of information overload, the concept underlying Internet search engines, and the idea of virtual reality. More important for its continued relevance, however, is Lem’s rigorous investigation into the parallel development of biological and technical evolution and his conclusion that technology will outlive humanity. Preceding Richard Dawkins’s understanding of evolution as a blind watchmaker by more than two decades, Lem posits evolution as opportunistic, shortsighted, extravagant, and illogical. Strikingly original and still timely, Summa Technologiae resonates with a wide range of contemporary debates about information and new media, the life sciences, and the emerging relationship between technology and humanity.

WZ auf 200, 05.04.06 Daten neuer Umschlag vorhanden

"Soljaris" - besspornaja vershina tvorchestva Stanislava Lema, proizvedenie, povlijavshee na razvitie nauchnoj fantastiki XX veka, v tom chisle i na russkuju fantastiku. Roman dvazhdy ekranizirovan, po nemu byli postavleny radiopesy, spektakli - i dazhe balet! Itak, chto zhe takoe - Soljaris? Beskrajnij mysljaschij okean, presledujuschij neponjatnye cheloveku tseli, tonchajshij kamerton, preobrazujuschij ljudskie chuvstva v materialnuju formu? Voploschennyj koshmar psikhologa ili dukhovnyj tselitel? So dnja publikatsii knigi proshlo bolshe 50 let, a ee chitateli vse tak zhe prodolzhajut zadavatsja voprosami, otvety na kotorye nevozmozhno poluchit, ne zagljanuv v svoe sobstvennoe serdtse. Perevodchik: Bruskin D.

"Soljaris" - besspornaja vershina tvorchestva Stanislava Lema, proizvedenie, povlijavshee na razvitie nauchnoj fantastiki XX veka, v tom chisle i na russkuju fantastiku. Roman dvazhdy ekranizirovan, po nemu byli postavleny radiopesy, spektakli - i dazhe balet! Itak, chto zhe takoe - Soljaris? Beskrajnij mysljaschij okean, presledujuschij neponjatnye cheloveku tseli, tonchajshij kamerton, preobrazujuschij ljudskie chuvstva v materialnuju formu? Voploschennyj koshmar psikhologa ili dukhovnyj tselitel? So dnja publikatsii knigi proshlo bolshe 50 let, a ee chitateli vse tak zhe prodolzhajut zadavatsja voprosami, otvety na kotorye nevozmozhno poluchit, ne zagljanuv v svoe sobstvennoe serdtse.

"A fantastic book." --Steven Soderbergh When psychologist Kris Kelvin arrives at the planet Solaris to study the ocean that covers its surface, he finds himself confronting a painful memory embodied in the physical likeness of a past lover. Kelvin learns that he is not alone in this and that other crews examining the planet are plagued with their own repressed and newly real memories. Could it be, as Solaris scientists speculate, that the ocean may be a massive neural center creating these memories, for a reason no one can identify? Long considered a classic, Solaris asks the question: Can we understand the universe around us without first understanding what lies within? "A novel that makes you reevaluate the nature of intelligence itself." --Anne McCaffrey

These fourteen science fiction stories reveal Lem's fascination with artificial intelligence and demonstrate just how surprisingly human sentient machines can be. "Astonishing is not too strong a word for these tales" (Wall Street Journal). Translated and with an Introduction by Michael Kandel.

In Pilot Pirx, Lem has created an irresistibly likable character: an astronaut who gives the impression of still navigating by the seat of his pants-a bumbler but an inspired one. By investing Pirx with a range of human foibles, Lem offers a wonderful vision of the audacity, childlike curiosity, and intuition that can give humans the courage to confront outer space. Translated by Louis Iribarne. A Helen and Kurt Wolff Book