Solaris (novel)

Name	Solaris
Image
Caption	Cover of the first edition
Author	Stanisław Lem
Cover Artist	K.M. Sopoćko
Country	Polish People's Republic
Language	Polish
Genre	Science fiction
Publisher	MON, Walker (US)
Release Date	1961
English Pub Date	1970
Media Type	Print (hardcover and paperback) Audio
Pages	204
Isbn	0156027607
Dewey	891.8/537 19
Congress	PG7158.L392 Z53 1985
Oclc	10072735

Plot summary

Solaris chronicles the ultimate futility of attempted communications with the extraterrestrial life inhabiting a distant alien planet named Solaris. The planet is almost completely covered with an ocean of gelatinous material that turns out to be a single, planet-encompassing entity. Terran scientists conjecture it is a living and sentient being, and attempt to communicate with it.

Kris Kelvin, a psychologist, arrives aboard Solaris Station, a scientific research station hovering near the oceanic surface of Solaris. The scientists there have studied the planet and its ocean for many decades, mostly in vain. A scientific discipline known as Solaristics has degenerated over the years to simply observing, recording and categorizing the complex phenomena that occur on the surface of the ocean. Thus far, the scientists have only compiled an elaborate nomenclature of the phenomena, and do not yet understand what they really mean. Shortly before Kelvin's arrival, the crew exposed the ocean to a more aggressive and unauthorized experimentation with a high-energy X-ray bombardment. Their experimentation gives unexpected results and becomes psychologically traumatic for them as individually flawed humans.

The ocean's response to this intrusion exposes the deeper, hidden aspects of the personalities of the human scientists, while revealing nothing of the ocean's nature itself. It does this by materializing physical simulacra (including human ones) based on the unpleasant repressed memories of the researchers, who visit the corresponding researchers. Kelvin confronts memories of his dead lover and guilt about her suicide, which constitutes a significant part of the plot. The "visitors" of the other persons are only alluded to.

All efforts to make sense of Solaris's activities prove futile.

Characters

• Dr. Kris Kelvin, is a psychologist recently arrived from Earth to the space station studying the planet Solaris. He had previously been cohabiting with Harey ("Rheya" in the Kilmartin–Cox translation), who died by suicide.
• Snaut ("Snow" in the Kilmartin–Cox translation) is the first person Kelvin meets aboard the station.
• Gibarian, who had been an instructor of Kelvin's at university, killed himself just hours before Kelvin arrives at the station.
• Sartorius is the last inhabitant Kelvin meets.
• Harey ("Rheya" in the Kilmartin–Cox translation, an anagram of "Harey"), who kills herself with a lethal injection after quarreling with Kelvin and later her copy reappears at the space station, apparently produced by the Ocean of Solaris.

Commentary

The novel is the best known elaboration of Lem's trope of the impossibility of communication with extraterrestrial intelligence, present in many of Lem's novels, including his first, The Man from Mars, and his last, Fiasco.

As Lem wrote, "the peculiarity of those phenomena seems to suggest that we observe a kind of rational activity, but the meaning of this seemingly rational activity of the Solarian Ocean is beyond the reach of human beings." Lem also wrote that he deliberately chose to make the sentient alien an ocean to avoid any personification and the pitfalls of anthropomorphism in depicting first contact.

In an interview, Lem said that the novel "has always been a juicy prey for critics", with interpretations ranging from that of Freudianism, critique of contact and colonialism, to anticommunism, proponents of the latter view holding that the Ocean represents the Soviet Union and the people on the space station represent the satellite countries of Central and Eastern Europe. He also commented on the absurdity of the book cover blurb for the 1976 edition, which said the novel "expressed the humanistic beliefs of the author about high moral qualities of the human". Lem noted that the critic who promulgated the Freudian idea actually blundered by basing his psychoanalysis on dialogue from the English translation, whereas his diagnosis would fail on the idioms in the original Polish text.

English translations

Cultural influence of the novel

Film

Solaris has been filmed three times:

• Solaris (1968), a Soviet TV play directed by Boris Nirenburg, follows the plot quite closely and keeps the emphasis on the planet rather than the human relationships.
• Solaris (1972), a Soviet feature-length film directed by Andrei Tarkovsky. The film loosely follows the novel's plot, emphasizing the human relationships instead of Lem's astrobiology theories — especially Kelvin's life on Earth prior to his space travel to the planet. The film won the Grand Prix at the 1972 Cannes Film Festival.
• Solaris (2002), an American film directed by Steven Soderbergh, starring George Clooney and produced by James Cameron. This film also emphasizes the human relationships and again excludes Lem's scientific and philosophical themes.

Audio

• 1963: by the Teatre of Polskie Radio; director: Józef Grotowski, Kelvin: Stanisław Zaczyk
• 1975: by the Teatre of Polskie Radio; director: Józef Grotowski, Kelvin: Marek Walczewski
• 2007: BBC Radio 4 broadcast a two-hour dramatized version of the novel.
• 2007: an audio play was released in Russia on a CD-MP3 disc (226 minutes, 14 tracks).

Audiobooks

• 2010: Polskie Radio, narrated by Piotr Fronczewski
• 2011: Audible.com released the first direct Polish-to-English translation as an audiobook download narrated by Alessandro Juliani. The original Polish text was translated into English by Bill Johnston, with the approval of Lem's estate. An e-book edition (isbn 978-1-937624-66-8) of the Johnston translation followed.

Theatre

• The 2009 Polish stage production Solaris: The Report (Polish: Solaris. Raport), TR Warszawa, Poland.
• The British stage production Solaris by Dimitry Devdariani (London, England, 2012).
• La velocidad del zoom del horizonte, a 2014 play written by David Gaitán and directed by Martín Acosta, premiered in Mexico City, was loosely based on the novel.
• In 2018 the Theater Magdeburg, Germany, staged an adaptation by Tim Staffel directed by Lucie Berelowitsch
• Solaris (2019 play), premiered in Malthouse Theatre, production of an adaptation by David Greig, in association with Royal Lyceum Theatre, Edinburgh, that ran in Edinburgh in September–October 2019 and at London's Lyric Hammersmith in October–November 2019. Its protagonist was a woman, and the spaceship crew was gender-balanced.

Opera

• The German opera Solaris by Michael Obst (Munich Biennale, Germany, 1996).
• The Italian opera Solaris by Enrico Correggia (Turin, Italy, 2011).
• The Austrian opera Solaris by Detlev Glanert (Bregenzer Festspiele, Austria, 2012).
• The Japanese opera Solaris by Dai Fujikura and Saburo Teshigawara (Opéra de Lille, and travelling to other venues, 2015).

Other

• Musician Isao Tomita's 1977 album Kosmos, specifically the track "The Sea Named 'Solaris'", is based on music by Bach featured in Tarkovsky's film. Tomita was inspired by the film and even sent his recording to Tarkovsky.
• Hungarian rock band Solaris named themselves after the novel.
• The 1990 Russian ballet Solaris by Sergey Zhukov (composer) (Dnipro Opera and Ballet Theatre).
• The song "Solaris", composed by Ken Andrews, from space rock band Failure's 1996 album Fantastic Planet, summarizes the novel.
• The song "Solaris" from musician Photek's 2000 album Solaris.
• The 2011 album Sólaris by Daníel Bjarnason and Ben Frost was inspired by Tarkovsky's film.
• The plot of the 2021 Icelandic TV series Katla uses elements from Solaris, inspired by the novel.
• The Solaris is the only synchrotron in Central Europe and takes its name from the novel.
• Elements of the plot of the 2019 Chinese video game Arknights are inspired by the novel.

See also

• Ocean world

References

• Solaris, Solaris, 17 November 2010
• Lem, Stanisław, Stanisław Lem, The Solaris Station, 8 December 2002, Stanislaw Lem, 13 July 2013
• Resisting Monsters: Notes on "Solaris", Ann Weinstone, Science Fiction Studies, July 1994, 21, 2, 173–190, SF-TH Inc, 10.1525/sfs.21.2.0173, 4240332, 4 February 2021
• 8 April 2006, Obituary: Stanislaw Lem, 22 May 2021, The Guardian, en
• Stanisław Lem's "Solaris", 17 November 2024, Conversation Tree Press, en-US
• Flood, Alison, First ever direct English translation of Solaris published, 15 June 2011, The Guardian, 13 July 2013
• Lem, Stanislaw, Stanislaw Lem, Solaris , Edition, - Bill Johnston (translator), 22 November 2014, 8 February 2016
• Devdariani, Dimitry, Solaris Play, 2012, Dimitry Devdariani, 13 July 2013
• Solaris - Royal Lyceum Theatre, 12 September 2019, 15 September 2019
• Solaris - Malthouse Theatre, 5 July 2019
• 7 November 2011, Sólaris, usurped, 14 September 2018, 13 July 2020, Daníel Bjarnason, en-US
• Katla (TV Series 2021– ), 25 June 2021, IMDb, en-US
• Arknights, Hypergryph, Cutscenes, CW-ST-3, 14-19, 1 May 2024, zh

External links

• Solaris - Book Page on Stanisław Lem's Official Site.
• Solaris - Essay by Stanisław Lem.
• Solaris - Review/GioiaT.
• Solaris - Study Guide/BriansS.
• Solaris - Study Guide/HughesC.
• Video - Solaris Opera (Turin, Italy, 2011) (Trailer, 00:53). + (Clip, 07:10).
• Video - Solaris Opera (Bregenz Festival, Austria, 2012) (Preview, 03:28).