indigoabstract 8 days ago

Seems pretty silly in hindsight and probably was back then as well. If communist committees could write like Lem, the world would be a much richer place today.

What stuck with me after reading many of his works was this underlying theme in several of his novels, of the futility of trying to make contact or reason with alien entities which are so vastly different from us, no bridge of understanding is possible.

On a lighter note, his electronic bard from The Cyberiad is pretty spot on, quite similar to the LLMs we have now.

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kranke155 7 days ago

What blew me away from the Cyberiad was how funny it was.

m-hodges 7 days ago

I know the title is meant to be a play on The Iliad but the stories remind me more of Don Quixote.

troupo 7 days ago

I used to know the Russian translation by heart (and all of Ijon Tichy)

apelapan 7 days ago

I loved how is was mentioned in passing (as I recall it, 30 years later), that Ijon Tichy was followed by an entourage of Tichiologists.

stevenwoo 7 days ago

When I was reading it, it seemed a lot of bits reappeared as Futurama jokes but then got to the story with the robot named Calculon and that made it obvious.