Life and creation
Stanisław Herman Lem was born in 1921 in Lviv, and the exact date of his birth was probably September 13, but the date was entered in the files on September 12, allegedly to avoid bad luck. Stanisław was the only child of a respected ENT specialist, Samuel Lem (another pronunciation – Lehm) and Sabina Woller, a wealthy Jewish couple. Lem spent his childhood in happiness and prosperity, and in 1940 he was even admitted to the Medical Faculty of the University of Lviv, but his education was interrupted by the sudden invasion of the USSR by Germany. After years of changing identities and addresses of residence, as part of an extensive repatriation campaign, in 1945 the family moved to Krakow, while losing most of its property.
At that time, the Lem’s financial situation deteriorated significantly, and at the urging of his father, Stanisław continued his medical studies at the Jagiellonian University. However, he did not take his final exams because he was put off by the sight of blood, and the mere vision of a career in medicine was not attractive to him. It was then that the future genius of science fiction began to create and publish his first short stories, and occasionally humorous epics, published e.g. in “Tygodnik Powszechny”. In 1946 he wrote his first novel The Man from Mars, published in installments in “Nowy Świat Przygód”, but it went unnoticed. Only another book from 1951, The Astronauts,turned out to be a spectacular success, which guaranteed Lem recognition and a place in the Polish Writers’ Union. In the following years, other works by the writer were published, including the novel The Magellanic Cloud, and 10 years later its film adaptation was made, the Czechoslovakian Ikarie XB-1 (you can find our review here ).
In 1961, Stanisław Lem’s most famous novel was written, permanently recording his name in the history of science fiction. Of course, we are talking about the groundbreaking Solaris , which saw many film, theater and even opera adaptations and gained great publicity around the world. His subsequent works, such as Fables for Robots , Cyberiada, Return from the Stars or a collection of philosophical essays by Summa Technologiae only strengthened the writer’s position as one of the leading authors of science fiction in Europe, at the same time attracting masses of new fans to him.
In the meantime, the writer married Barbara Leśniak, and in 1968 their only son, Tomasz, was born. In 1981, the Lem family emigrated to Vienna, from which they returned to Kraków in 1988 and lived in a newly built house. The last years of Lem’s life were marked by numerous diseases – the writer suffered from diabetes, fainted and suffered from hemorrhages, which ended with frequent visits to the hospital. Stanisław Lem passed away on March 27, 2006 at the age of 84, and the urn with his ashes was placed at the Salwator Cemetery in Kraków.
The themes of works and philosophy
As a creator of science fiction, the writer often touched upon topics related to extraterrestrial civilizations, the development of technology and its consequences for the world. The most characteristic, however, is how Lem presented a different reality. Unlike many typical SF stories, the worlds he created are painfully ordinary, as if we were reading not about advanced systems and modern machines, but about common everyday objects. Supercomputers and huge spacecraft break down frequently, people are lost among unreliable machinery, and technology is not always as helpful as you might assume. However, despite its apparent familiarity, reality in the far reaches of the universe is very often shown as alien, and therefore disturbing: the crew of the Ikarie XB-1 in isolation glides through the cosmic void to a goal that will not be achieved in her lifetime; Ijon Tichy, the hero of The Star Diaries, he is sometimes at the mercy of incomprehensible processes that he cannot control himself; scientists stationed on Solaris have to deal with an uncharted planet and its influence on their psyche.
Let us not forget, however, that Stanisław Lem was also an outstanding essayist, which he showed for example in the aforementioned Summa Technologiae , as well as other philosophical works. The writer made numerous reflections on how technological development would affect the role of man in the future, and even how it could replace him. Homo sapienshe is an extremely defective creature in Lem’s work, prone to numerous failures, which is significantly superior to the technology he has constructed. The reality we create is to serve us, while very often it turns out that we actually become its slaves. Even our high-minded ideas and ambitious plans lose any meaning because, in our pursuit of perfection, we are simultaneously heading towards the inevitable doom. However, these are not distant predictions, and something that is happening before our eyes – an extremely consumerist, submissive, manipulated and morally degenerated society can only wait for a decline.
In addition to gloomy, dark visions, the work of Stanisław Lem also has a sense of humor, which can be found, for example, in the moralizing Fables for Robots. After all, who would take seriously, for example, a machine that removes only “N” things, or people mimicking turtles in order to maintain longevity? The less known Dictations are also full of jokes, created as a learning aid for little Michas, the nephew of the writer’s wife. The collection includes absurd descriptions of animals, everyday objects and dishes, and a perfect example is a fragment of the description of a liver with onions: “[a] to prepare it, you should buy a car and drive it until you run over it”. Although the grotesque is not the first thing associated with the writer, it is definitely worth getting acquainted with his lighter, more playful side.
Trivia:
- The famous American writer Philip K. Dick argued that “Lem” was in fact a group of communist writers aimed at promoting socialist ideology abroad. According to the author, it was supported by the fact that Lem used many unique writing styles suspiciously, and that his non-Slavic name was supposed to be an anagram of a secret organization. Ironically, Dick was one of the few American writers to be highly appreciated by Lem, who wrote about him flatteringly in his essays.
- Despite the extremely unfavorable opinion on the American SF, Lem was an honorary member of the American Science Fiction Writers Association. Later, he was offered permanent membership in the Association, but the writer rejected the invitation.
- The asteroid (3836) Lem, discovered in 1979, was named after him.
- Many SF writers have managed to anticipate the technological breakthroughs that we use in our time. Of course, Lem was no exception, and his accurate predictions continue to surprise even science fiction enthusiasts to this day. One of the best examples is the book reading device found in Return from the Stars :
Books were crystals with recorded content. They could be read with the opton. It even looked like a book, but with one and only page between the covers. After touching it, subsequent pages of text appeared on it.
- September 12 is also the day of the pavers, the Battle of Vienna took place, the paintings in Lascaux were discovered, and the author of this text was born.
