(Drivebycuriosity) - Stanislav Lem belongs to the most underestimated science fiction authors. Most people may just know his novel "Solaris" from the film adaptions by Andrei Tarkovski (1972) & Steven Soderbergh (2002). But the Polish author wrote a lot more and blended science & logic into fascinating plots. A while ago I posted about his novel "The Invincible", a thriller about technology, evolution and humans role in the universe ( driveby).
Lem also wrote funny fairy tales about artificial intelligence (AI). The short story collection "The Cyberiad" - first published 1965 - is set in a far future where humans had expired and got replaced by machines, which are more or less intelligent ( amazon). Lem borrowed the term from Cybernetics, a science about self-regulating systems, which was especially popular in the 1960s and 70s.
The book collects funny fairy tales about cybernetic beings (highly advanced robots, not created by humans but by machine evolution), which are surreal, hilarious & mind boggling. The stories focus on Trurl & Klapaucius, two hyper-smart & almost omnipotent inventors & engineers, called "constructors". They act in a pseudo-medieval environment which reminds of Brother Grimm`s stories: "There are kingdoms, knights, princesses, and even dragons in abundance" (wikipedia ).
Lem mixed sciences, like logistic, particle physics, quantum mechanics & cosmology, with absurd ideas and characters into a baroque & bizarre cosmos. I am also impressed by Michael Kandel who translated Lem`s hilarious absurdities into English without ruining the fun. "The Cyberiad" is so much fun to read.
Lem deserves more readers.
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