Stanisław Herman Lem (Polish:[staˈɲiswafˈlɛm]ⓘ; 12 September 1921 – 27 March 2006) was a Polish writer. He was the author of many novels, short stories, and essays on various subjects, including philosophy,futurology, andliterary criticism. Many of his science fiction stories are ofsatirical and humorous character. Lem's books have been translated into more than 50 languages and have sold more than 45 million copies.[2][3][4] Worldwide, he is best known as the author of the 1961 novelSolaris. In 1976,Theodore Sturgeon wrote that Lem was the most widely read science fiction writer in the world.[5]
Lem was the author of the fundamental philosophical workSumma Technologiae, in which he anticipated the creation ofvirtual reality,artificial intelligence, and also developed the ideas of human autoevolution, the creation ofartificial worlds, and many others. Lem's science fiction works explore philosophical themes through speculations on technology, the nature ofintelligence, the impossibility of communication with and understanding ofalien intelligence, despair about human limitations, and humanity's place in the universe. His essays and philosophical books cover these and many other topics. Translating his works is difficult due toLem's elaborate neologisms andidiomatic wordplay.
House No. 4 onBohdan Lepky Street in Lviv, where, according to his autobiographyHighcastle, Lem spent his childhood
Lem was born in 1921 in Lwów,interwar Poland (nowLviv, Ukraine). According to his own account, he was actually born on 13 September, but the date was changed to the 12th on his birth certificatebecause of superstition.[7] He was the son of Sabina née Woller (1892–1979) and Samuel Lem[note 1] (1879–1954), a wealthylaryngologist and former physician in theAustro-Hungarian Army,[9][10] and first cousin to Polish poetMarian Hemar (Lem's father's sister's son).[11] In later years Lem sometimes claimed to have been raisedRoman Catholic, but he went to Jewish religious lessons during his school years.[1] He later became anatheist "for moral reasons ... the world appears to me to be put together in such a painful way that I prefer to believe that it was not created ... intentionally".[12][13] In later years he would call himself both an agnostic[14] and an atheist.[15]
During that period, I learned in a very personal, practical way that I was no "Aryan". I knew that my ancestors were Jews, but I knew nothing of theMosaic faith and, regrettably, nothing at all ofJewish culture. So it was, strictly speaking, only theNazi legislation that brought home to me the realization that I had Jewish blood in my veins.
During that time, Lem earned a living as a car mechanic and welder,[10] and occasionally stole munitions from storehouses (to which he had access as an employee of a German company) to pass them on to thePolish resistance.[18]
In 1945, Lwów was annexed into theSoviet Ukraine, and the family, along with many other Polish citizens,was resettled toKraków, where Lem, at his father's insistence, took up medical studies at theJagiellonian University.[10] He did not take his final examinations on purpose, to avoid the career of military doctor, which he suspected could have become lifelong.[19][16][note 2] After receivingabsolutorium (Latin term for the evidence of completion of the studies without diploma), he did an obligatory monthly work at a hospital, at a maternity ward, where he assisted at a number of childbirths and acaesarean section. Lem said that the sight of blood was one of the reasons he decided to drop medicine.[20]
Lem started his literary work in 1946 with a number of publications in different genres, including poetry, as well as his first science fiction novel,The Man from Mars, serialized inNowy Świat Przygód [pl] (New World of Adventures).[10] Between 1948 and 1950 Lem was working as a scientific research assistant at theJagiellonian University, and published a number of short stories, poems, reviews, etc., particularly in the magazineTygodnik Powszechny.[21] In 1951, he published his first book,The Astronauts.[10][22] In 1954, he published a short story collection,Sezam i inne opowiadania [pl] [Sesame and Other Stories] .[10] The following year, 1955, saw the publication of another science fiction novel,The Magellanic Cloud.[10]
During the era ofStalinism in Poland, which had begun in the late 1940s, all published works had to be directly approved by the state.[23] ThusThe Astronauts was not, in fact, the first novel Lem finished, just the first that made it past the state censors.[10] Going by the date of the finished manuscript, Lem's first book was a partly autobiographical novelHospital of the Transfiguration, finished in 1948.[10] It would be published seven years later, in 1955, as a part of the trilogyCzas nieutracony (Time Not Lost).[10] The experience of trying to pushCzas nieutracony through the censors was one of the major reasons Lem decided to focus on the less-censored genre of science fiction.[21] Nonetheless, most of Lem's works published in the 1950s also contain various elements ofsocialist realism as well as of the "glorious future of communism" forced upon him by the censors and editors.[21][24] Lem later criticized several of his early pieces as compromised by the ideological pressure.[10]
Lem became truly productive after 1956, when thede-Stalinization period in theSoviet Union led to the "Polish October", when Poland experienced an increase infreedom of speech.[10][21][24] Between 1956 and 1968, Lem authored seventeen books.[24] His writing over the next three decades or so was split between science fiction and essays about science and culture.[21]
In 1957, he published his first non-fiction, philosophical book,Dialogs, as well as a science fiction anthology,The Star Diaries,[10] collecting short stories about one of his most popular characters,Ijon Tichy.[25] 1959 saw the publication of three books: the novelsEden andThe Investigation, and the short story anthologyAn Invasion from Aldebaran (Inwazja z Aldebarana).[10] 1961 saw the novelsMemoirs Found in a Bathtub,Solaris, andReturn from the Stars, withSolaris being among his top works.[10] This was followed by a collection of his essays and non-fiction prose,Wejście na orbitę (1962), and a short story anthologyNoc księżycowa (1963).[10] In 1964, Lem published a large work on the border of philosophy and sociology of science and futurology,Summa Technologiae, as well as a novel,The Invincible.[10][24]
From the late 1980s onwards, Lem tended to concentrate on philosophical texts and essays, published in Polish magazines includingTygodnik Powszechny,Odra, andPrzegląd.[10][21] These were later collected in a number of anthologies.[10]
In the early 1980s literary critic and historianStanisław Bereś conducted a lengthy interview with Lem, which was published in book format in 1987 asRozmowy ze Stanisławem Lemem (Conversations with Stanisław Lem). That edition was subject to censorship. A revised, complete edition was published in 2002 asTako rzecze… Lem (Thus spoke... Lem).[26]
In the early 1990s, Lem met with the literary critic and scholarPeter Swirski for a series of extensive interviews, published together with other critical materials and translations asA Stanislaw Lem Reader (1997). In these interviews Lem speaks about a range of issues he rarely discussed previously. The book also includes Swirski's translation of Lem's retrospective essay "Thirty Years Later", devoted to Lem's nonfictional treatiseSumma Technologiae. During later interviews in 2005, Lem expressed his disappointment with the genre of science fiction, and his general pessimism regarding technical progress. He viewed the human body as unsuitable for space travel, held that information technologydrowns people in a glut of low-quality information, and considered truly intelligent robots as both undesirable and impossible to construct.[27]
One of Lem's major recurring themes, beginning from his very first novel,The Man from Mars, was the impossibility ofcommunication between profoundly alien beings, which may have no common ground with human intelligence, and humans.[28] The best known example is the living planetary ocean inSolaris. Other examples include the intelligent swarms of mechanical insect-likemicromachines inThe Invincible, and strangely ordered societies of more human-like beings inFiasco andEden, describing the failure offirst contact.
Another key recurring theme is the shortcomings of humans. InHis Master's Voice, Lem describes the failure of humanity's intelligence to decipher and truly comprehend an apparent message from space.[29][30][31][32] Two overlapping arcs of short stories,Fables for Robots andThe Cyberiad provide a commentary on humanity in the form of a series of grotesque, humorous,fairytale-like short stories about a mechanical universe inhabited by robots (who have occasional contact with biological "slimies" and human "palefaces").[10][33] Lem also underlines the uncertainties of evolution, including that it might not progress upwards in intelligence.[34]
Dialogs andSumma Technologiae (1964) are Lem's two most famous philosophical texts. TheSumma is notable for being a unique analysis of prospective social, cybernetic, and biological advances;[10] in this work, Lem discusses philosophical implications of technologies that were completely in the realm of science fiction at the time, but are gaining importance today—for instance,virtual reality andnanotechnology.
Throughout the entirety of his life, Stanisław Lem remained deeply attached to his original hometown of Lwów (then in Poland, now Lviv in Ukraine) and missed it greatly. Although he never called for Poland to retake the city, he expressed sorrow and felt a sense of injustice at Poland losing the city to the USSR after the Second World War.[35][36][37] His criticism of most science fiction surfaced in literary and philosophical essaysScience Fiction and Futurology and interviews.[38] In the 1990s, Lem forswore science fiction[39] and returned to futurological prognostications, most notably those expressed inOkamgnienie [pl] [Blink of an Eye]. He had a deep appreciation for the works of Polish writerCzesław Miłosz and respectedJózef Piłsudski as a national leader.[35]
Lem was awarded an honorary membership in theScience Fiction Writers of America (SFWA) in 1973. SFWA honorary membership is given to people who do not meet the publishing criteria for joining the regular membership, but who would be welcomed as members had their work appeared in the qualifying English-language publications. Lem never had a high opinion of Americanscience fiction, describing it as ill-thought-out, poorly written, and interested more in making money than in ideas or new literary forms.[42] After his eventual American publication, when he became eligible for regular membership, his honorary membership was rescinded. This formal action was interpreted by some SFWA members as a rebuke for his stance,[43] and it seems that Lem interpreted it as such. Lem was invited to stay on with the organization with a regular membership, but he declined.[44] After many members (includingUrsula K. Le Guin, who quit her membership and then refused theNebula Award for Best Novelette forThe Diary of the Rose)[45][46] protested against Lem's treatment by the SFWA, a member offered to pay his dues. Lem never accepted the offer.[42][44]
Lem singled out only one[47] American science fiction writer for praise,Philip K. Dick, in a 1984 English-language anthology of his critical essays,Microworlds: Writings on Science Fiction and Fantasy. Lem had initially held a low opinion of Philip K. Dick (as he did for the bulk of American science fiction) and would later say that this was due to a limited familiarity with Dick's work, since Western literature was hard to come by in thePolish People's Republic.
Dick alleged that Stanisław Lem was probably a false name used by a composite committee operating on orders of theCommunist party to gain control over public opinion, and wrote a letter to theFBI to that effect.[48] There were several attempts to explain Dick's act. Lem was responsible for the Polish translation of Dick's workUbik in 1972, and when Dick felt monetarily short-changed by the publisher, he held Lem personally responsible (seeMicroworlds).[49][48] Also it was suggested that Dick was under the influence of strong medications, including opioids, and may have experienced a "slight disconnect from reality" some time before writing the letter.[48] A "defensive patriotism" of Dick againstLem's attacks on American science fiction may have played some role as well.[48] Lem would later mention Dick in his monographScience Fiction and Futurology.
Lem is one of the most highly acclaimed science fiction writers, hailed by critics as equal to such classic authors asH. G. Wells andOlaf Stapledon.[50] In 1976,Theodore Sturgeon wrote that Lem was the most widely read science fiction writer in the world.[5] In Poland, in the 1960s and 1970s, Lem remained under the radar of mainstream critics, who dismissed him as a "mass market", low-brow, youth-oriented writer; such dismissal might have given him a form of invisibility from censorship.[10]
In 1999,Franz Rottensteiner, Lem's former agent abroad, had this to say about Lem's reception on international markets:[51]
With [number of translations and copies sold], Lem is the most successful author in modern Polish fiction; nevertheless his commercial success in the world is limited, and the bulk of his large editions was due to the special publishing conditions in theCommunist countries: Poland, the Soviet Union, and theGerman Democratic Republic. Only inWest Germany was Lem really a critical and a commercial success [... and everywhere ...] in recent years interest in him has waned.Lem is the only writer of European [science fiction, most of whose] books have been translated into English, and [...] kept in print in the USA. Lem's critical success in English is due mostly to the excellent translations ofMichael Kandel.
Lem's works were widely translated abroad, appearing in over 40 languages[10] and have sold over 45 million copies.[2][3][4] As of 2020[update], about 1.5 million copies were sold in Poland after his death, with the annual numbers of 100,000 matching the new bestsellers.[52]
The video gameStellaris is highly inspired by his works, as its creators said at the start of 2021,[54] designated the "Year of Lem".
A major character in the filmPlanet 51, an alien Lem, was named by screenwriterJoe Stillman after Stanisław Lem. Since the film was intended to be a parody of Americanpulp science fiction shot in Eastern Europe, Stillman thought that it would be hilarious to hint at the writer whose works have nothing to do withlittle green men.[55]
György Pálfi directed a film adaptation ofHis Master's Voice with the same title, which was released in 2018.
In 2023,11 Bit Studios publishedThe Invincible, an adventure video game developed by Starward Industries. The game is an adaptation of Stanisław Lem's1964 novel.
1957 – City of Kraków's Prize in Literature (Nagroda Literacka miasta Krakowa)
1965 – Prize of the Minister of Culture and Art, 2nd Level (Nagroda Ministra Kultury i Sztuki II stopnia)
1973
Prize of the Minister of Foreign Affairs for popularization of Polish culture abroad (nagroda Ministra Spraw Zagranicznych za popularyzację polskiej kultury za granicą)
Literary Prize of the Minister of Culture and Art (nagroda literacka Ministra Kultury i Sztuki) and honorary member ofScience Fiction Writers of America
1976 – State Prize 1st Level in the area of literature (Nagroda Państwowa I stopnia w dziedzinie literatury)
2007 – A street in Kraków is to be named in his honour.[66]
2009 – A street inWieliczka was named in his honour[67]
2011 – An interactive Google logo inspired byThe Cyberiad was created and published in his honor for the 60th anniversary of his first published book:The Astronauts.[68][69]
2013 – twoplanetoids were named after Lem's literary characters:
The Museum of City Engineering, Kraków, has the Stanislaw Lem Experience Garden, an outdoor area with over 70 interactive locations where children can carry out various physical experiments in acoustics, mechanics, hydrostatics and optics.[71] Since 2011 the Garden has been organizing out the competition "Lemoniada", inspired by the creative output of Lem.[72]
2021 – Lem Prize has been established byWrocław University of Science and Technology to commemorate the 100th birthday Stanisław Lem. It is awarded annually to one young (under 40) European researcher whose creative work in science or engineering has potential for positive impact on the future of civilization increasingly filled with technology.[73]
Lem's early works weresocialist realist, possibly to satisfy state censorship,[74] and in his later years he was critical of this aspect of them.[75] In 1982, with the onset of themartial law in Poland, Lem moved to Berlin for studies, and the next year he moved for several years (1983–1988) to Vienna.[76] He never showed any wish to relocate permanently in the West. By the standards of theEastern Bloc, Lem was financially well off for most of his life.[77] Lem was a critic ofcapitalism,[78]totalitarianism, and of both Stalinist and Western ideologies.[79]
Lem believed there were no absolutes. He said: "I should wish, as do most men, that immutable truths existed, that not all would be eroded by the impact of historical time, that there were some essential propositions, be it only in the field of human values, the basic values, etc. In brief, I long for the absolute. But at the same time I am firmly convinced that there are no absolutes, that everything is historical, and that you cannot get away from history."[80] Lem was concerned that if the human race attained prosperity and comfort, this would lead it to passiveness and degeneration.[75]
Stanisław Lem's grave at the Salwator Cemetery, Kraków
Lem was apolyglot: he knew Polish, Latin (from medical school), German, French, English, Russian and Ukrainian.[81] Lem claimed that hisIQ was tested at high school as 180.[82]
In 1953, Lem metradiology student Barbara Leśniak, whom he married in acivil ceremony the same year.[83][84] The couple'schurch marriage ceremony was performed in February 1954.[10] Barbara died on 27 April 2016.[85] Their only child,Tomasz [pl] (born 1968), who graduated with a degree in physics fromPrinceton University, has writtenAwantury na tle powszechnego ciążenia (Tantrums on the Background of the Universal Gravitation), a memoir which contains numerous personal details about Lem. The book jacket says Tomasz works as a translator and has a daughter, Anna.[86]
As of 1984, Lem's writing pattern was to get up a short time before five in the morning and start writing soon after, for 5 or 6 hours before taking a break.[87]
Lem was an aggressive driver. He loved sweets (especiallyhalva and chocolate-coveredmarzipan), and did not give them up even when, toward the end of his life, he fell ill withdiabetes. In the mid-80s due to health problems he stopped smoking.[75] Coffee often featured in Lem's writing and interviews.[88][89][90][91][92]
In November 2021,Agnieszka Gajewska's biography of Lem,Holocaust and the Stars, was translated into English byKatarzyna Gucio and published byRoutledge.[95][96] It discussed aspects of Lem's life, such as being forced to wear theyellow badge and being struck for not removing his hat in the presence of Germans, as required of Jews at the time.
Lem loved movies and greatly enjoyedartistic cinema (especially the movies ofLuis Buñuel). He also likedKing Kong,James Bond,Star Wars, andStar Trek[97] movies but he remained mostly displeased by movies which were based upon his own stories.[98] The only notable exceptions areVoyage to the End of the Universe (1963) (which didn't credit Lem as writer of the original bookThe Magellanic Cloud) andPrzekładaniec (Layer Cake) (1968) (which was based upon his short story "Do You Exist, Mr Jones?").[99]
^Samuel Lem changed his last name fromLehm (meaning "loam", "clay" in German/Yiddish) to Lem in 1904.[8]
^Lech Keller suggests a slightly different reason why Lem did not pursue the diploma: since his father was a functionary of Sanitary Department of the infamous UB (Ministry of Public Security), he would have probably been assigned to the hospital subordinated to UB, probably to the same department his father served. Keller further remarks that it was well-known that UB doctors were used to "restore the conditions" of the interrogateddissidents. See Lech Keller,"Przyczynek do biografii Stanisława Lema" (retrieved 16 February 2020),Acta Polonica Monashiensis(Monash University, Melbourne, Victoria, Australia) Volume 3 Number 2, R&S Press, Melbourne, Victoria, 2019, pp. 94, 107
^E. Tuzow-Lubański, "Spotkanie ze Stanisławem Lemem",Przegląd Polski, 9 May 1996, pp. 1, 15. (fragmentArchived 27 November 2019 at theWayback Machine)Quote: "W 1948 r. zrobiłem absolutorium z medycyny. I wtedy okazało się, że jak się kończy medycynę i dostaje dyplom, to trzeba iść do wojska jako lekarz – i nie na rok czy dwa, ale na zawsze"
^"The Lem Affair (Continued)". Science Fiction Studies, # 14 = Volume 5, Part 1 = March 1978. 1978.Archived from the original on 17 October 2007. Retrieved10 May 2007.
^Thorsten Bothz-Bornstein "The Movie as a Thinking Machine", In:Inception and Philosophy: Ideas to Die for, 2011,ISBN0812697332,p.205Archived 2 February 2021 at theWayback Machine
^"Stanisław Lem: Jestem jak Robinson Crusoe", a Polish translation of the interview with Lem byFranz Rottensteiner,Fantastyka, 9/48, 1986 (originally inWochenpresse, no. 14, April 1986),
^"Lem may have been critical of the Soviet Union, but that didn't mean he had a positive view of the West. "Say, one country permits eating little children right before the eyes of crazed mothers", he wrote to Kandel in 1977, "and another permits eating absolutely anything, whereupon it turns out that the majority of people in that country eat shit. So what does the fact that most people eat shit demonstrate [...] ?" In other words, just because life behind the Iron Curtain was bad, that didn't make the United States good. For Lem the world wasn't divided between good and evil, but between bad and even worse." Ezra Glinter, The World According to Stanislaw Lem,https://lareviewofbooks.org/article/world-according-stanislaw-lem/Archived 7 July 2020 at theWayback Machine
^Wilson, John (10 April 2006)."Stanislaw Lem 1921-2006".The Weekly Standard.Archived from the original on 19 July 2020. Retrieved19 July 2020 – via Washington Examiner.
^Lem, Stanislaw (30 January 1984)."Chance and Order".The New Yorker. Vol. 59. pp. 88–98.Archived from the original on 19 July 2020. Retrieved19 July 2020.
^https://culture.pl/en/article/the-many-masks-faces-of-stanislaw-lem {{"As a viewer, Lem preferred artistic cinema, especially the films of Luis Buñuel. The writer’s favourite pop culture pictures included several King Kong movies, the James Bond series, Star Wars, as well as the TV series Star Trek. The latter, however, he did criticise for disregarding the basic laws of physics."}}
Jameson, Fredric. "The Unknowability Thesis." InArchaeologies of the Future: This Desire Called Utopia and Other Science Fictions. London and New York: Verso, 2005.
Suvin, Darko. "Three World Paradigms for SF: Asimov, Yefremov, Lem."Pacific Quarterly (Moana): An International Review of Arts and Ideas 4.(1979): 271–283.
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