Solaris The Definitive Edition Free Excerpt (Audible Audio Edition) Stanislaw Lem Alessandro Juliani Bill Johnston translator Audible Frontiers Books
Download As PDF : Solaris The Definitive Edition Free Excerpt (Audible Audio Edition) Stanislaw Lem Alessandro Juliani Bill Johnston translator Audible Frontiers Books
At last, one of the world's greatest works of science fiction is available - just as author Stanislaw Lem intended it.
To mark the 50th anniversary of the publication of Solaris, Audible, in cooperation with the Lem Estate, has commissioned a brand-new translation - complete for the first time, and the first ever directly from the original Polish to English. Beautifully narrated by Alessandro Juliani (Battlestar Galactica), Lem's provocative novel comes alive for a new generation.
In Solaris, Kris Kelvin arrives on an orbiting research station to study the remarkable ocean that covers the planet's surface. But his fellow scientists appear to be losing their grip on reality, plagued by physical manifestations of their repressed memories. When Kelvin's long-dead wife suddenly reappears, he is forced to confront the pain of his past - while living a future that never was. Can Kelvin unlock the mystery of Solaris? Does he even want to?
Solaris The Definitive Edition Free Excerpt (Audible Audio Edition) Stanislaw Lem Alessandro Juliani Bill Johnston translator Audible Frontiers Books
Read this book if you're patient and you like asking questions more than getting answers. It's a book where, about two-thirds of the time, nothing happens.Here's why you should read the book:
1. Mood. Bleak. So bleak. The longest Sunday afternoon in the universe.
2. Structure. Defiantly weird. Page after page of digressions. A spectacular, brilliantly imagined sci-fi universe described via summaries of summaries of scientific texts. A first-person narrator who frequently specifies that nothing interesting happened.
3. Ideas. Mostly in the form of intriguing questions about what it means to be human, what it means to be alien, and what makes humans want to understand the alien.
4. Writing. This new, 2011 translation directly from the Polish is quite readable and sometimes rapturously beautiful. The descriptions go over better than the dialog, which can be pretty dense, but if you pay close attention, you won't get totally lost. It's very sophisticated writing, with metaphors and allusions that make the story even more intriguing.
5. It's unfilmable. I admit I haven't actually watched the movie adaptations all the way through, but I checked out some clips on YouTube and that's all I needed to see. So the book is the deal.
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Solaris The Definitive Edition Free Excerpt (Audible Audio Edition) Stanislaw Lem Alessandro Juliani Bill Johnston translator Audible Frontiers Books Reviews
I had the advantage of reading `Solaris' in its original language. English readers have a problem here because the translation of this edition was made from French. Some of the meaning was definitely lost in the dual translation process. Unfortunately, a direct translation can only be obtained in an audiobook or e-book format.
I couldn't get through the first two pages when I tried to read the book for the first time. But, when the next time I managed to get through the beginning, I couldn't put the book down. When I got to the end I was sitting there, wondering where the second half of the book could be found...
Whilst media, SF writers and the Hollywood kept exploring UFOs and alien civilisations, hoping for a direct dialog with the extra-terrestrials, Lem became increasingly sceptical in his writings. Written in 1961, `Solaris' shows the futile and bizarre attempts of two completely different kinds of intelligence to communicate. In his later writings he reached a point where he saw no possibility for any meaningful contact at all. Try `Eden' or `Fiasco' to appreciate why he had good reasons to think that way.
Despite belonging to SF genre, `Solaris' should be seen as a more of psychological drama, exploring the inaccessible part of the human mind, which the alien intelligence was able to tap into.
I have read a lot of SF and have many favourites, but `Solaris' still tops my list.
The theme pervading many of Lem's works, inability of us humans to comprehend and communicate with 'The Other' (or sometimes, for that matter, ourselves), be it a message from space (His Master's Voice), a planetary civilization (Eden ,Fiasco) or "necrosphere", a machine ecosystem (The Invincible) is also present here. In this case the 'other' is a planetary-size intelligent organism.
Lem, of course, uses "the other" to reflect on ourselves, here perhaps even more explicitly than in other of his works. In 'Solaris' the humans Lem examines are much more individualized, not merely examples of our species; their demons are very personal, and as different as we are. The huge intellect beyond the station portholes here serves primarily as a mirror in which to see parts of ourselves we try to keep forgotten.
BTW, two very different movies inspired by this work, while both recommended, don't quite do the justice to the novel.
This is the first work I have read by Lem and I was thoroughly impressed by the story. I am glad I purchased the version since Lem claims to have been satisfied with the translation and felt it captured and portrayed the original work (unlike the movie which was horrible).
The book affected and challenged me because of the unique perspective Lem presents concerning alien life. In Solaris the alien is the planet itself and its communications, it displays, it messages, are so beyond the expectations of the researchers that even after decade of attempts they are confounded and still trying to understand.
The relationship that Kelvin develops with the simulacron is haunting and frustrating and is metaphorical of all difficult human relationships. Do we want those with whom we intimate to be themselves or to be our mental construct? Is the pain of reality too much to bear? I find it interesting that Kelvin develops a genuine care (is it love?) for simulacron Harey that is similar to but distinct from dead Harey of memory. In particular, I like the way Lem hides the relationship aspects of the other crew members and leaves that unresolved throughout the novel adding to its overall mystery.
The descriptions of the planet and its spasms are incredible and yet one wonders if they are nothing more banal than muscle twitches just reinterpreted in human terms?
I read the book in less than 3 days - it was that compelling. I highly recommend it.
Read this book if you're patient and you like asking questions more than getting answers. It's a book where, about two-thirds of the time, nothing happens.
Here's why you should read the book
1. Mood. Bleak. So bleak. The longest Sunday afternoon in the universe.
2. Structure. Defiantly weird. Page after page of digressions. A spectacular, brilliantly imagined sci-fi universe described via summaries of summaries of scientific texts. A first-person narrator who frequently specifies that nothing interesting happened.
3. Ideas. Mostly in the form of intriguing questions about what it means to be human, what it means to be alien, and what makes humans want to understand the alien.
4. Writing. This new, 2011 translation directly from the Polish is quite readable and sometimes rapturously beautiful. The descriptions go over better than the dialog, which can be pretty dense, but if you pay close attention, you won't get totally lost. It's very sophisticated writing, with metaphors and allusions that make the story even more intriguing.
5. It's unfilmable. I admit I haven't actually watched the movie adaptations all the way through, but I checked out some clips on YouTube and that's all I needed to see. So the book is the deal.
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