Breadcrumbs(yum!):
Breadcrumbs(yum!):
The Cyberiad
EXCELLENT ! READ IT. whimsical, but insightful. a collection of stories, centered around two rival robot inventors, based in a universe where robots are the "humans". all told in a wonderfully playful fairy-tale format. F%CK, it's good. it's has necrophilia(well, not really. hehehe), violent slap-stick, reality bending PKD-ish tales, tales within tales with tales, Gnostics, an absurd/existential archtype(MyMosh the Self-Begotten), bloody(oily actually) wars, a cautionary tale about bureacracy, wild probabilty theories, and THAT ROBOT POET IS THE BEST!!!
Return From The Stars
probably the most sentimental of his works(not counting his polish works that never got translated). it's about an astronaunt who travels out to the edge of the universe , aging about a decade ,while 2 generations have passed on the earth he returns to. vividly describes a society most alien to the middle-aged astronaunt. a world where the pioneering spirit/aggression of mankind has been tranqualised. a colourful but bored utopia. all the problems of survival solved and all challenges gone... this book was blasted by female readers who thought lem described a man who possesses the values of the 50's sexist male. most sci-fiction is written by men who (in lem's generation) are certainly not new-age sensitive types or those so called "metrosexuals", so i don't see what the fuss is about.
Peace On Earth
a man's brain was split into two when he was sent to investigate the arms race on the moon. Pretty much reminded me of "Dr. Strangelove", with comical moments of the man's right hemisphere(of his brain) fighting with his conscious and more practical left hemisphere, to uncover the truth.
The Futurological Congress
comparable to PKD's "Ubik" but probably with more socio-political satire in mind. And his wicked sense of humour certainly isn't unintentional. drugs drugs drugs ...ah the rats are walking!!!!!
DISCLAIMER: All of the images used on this page is copyrighted by ... whoever the heck published those books with that ugly covers... you get the idea. i don't own those images. bla bla bla. i'm a bloody fan , n i'm just 'borrowing' those images from some public domain.
BTW, find out more about Stanislaw Lem's book @ Amazon.com & Stanislaw Lem on the Web