Solaris (1961)

Thematically I loved this book. If the pulpy and Star-Trek-y science fiction franchises are the popcorn films of science fiction literature, this is the intellectual, beautifully directed, spectacularly cinematic, film that a few people love so intensely that they share it with everyone they know.

It read like a horror film, the good kind where you never see the monster and you're not even sure the monster is monstrous. It is full of tension and hits so closely to home, for the reader and the characters, that one can't help but imagine how they might react in such a hopeless and gut-wrenching situation. How one clings to the object of one's torture because it is also the object of one's most-guarded fantasy. ( )

Very, very interesting story. I didn't know what to think of this story at times, so I will describe, as well as I can, the different impressions I had at different times while reading. If this makes no sense, please accept my apologies. I'm gonna try to keep it clean, but be warned, there may be spoilers ahead. :)

Starting the book, it felt like your standard science fiction, pop into a space-suit and into your pod/shuttle/ship/whatever (please SF fans, no throwing stones!) and take off for parts unknown. Once on Solaris though, oh man... What to think? Kelvin's exploration and conversations with Snow struck me as something really creepy, mysterious and "Clue"-like.

I mean, here Kelvin is, finding hints with his name on them, leading him to find other books, which lead back around to where they began and then he finds another clue... All this, strange as it may seem, reminded me of the game Myst. And I'm terrible at that game. Not that that has anything to do with anything.

Then the visitors make their appearances, and its scary even though it's familiar. The part where Kelvin manages to lock Rheya in the shuttle and she is screaming for him and battering the shuttle gave me chills. His disgust with her, and desire to be rid of her in any way possible made me think of Victor Frankenstein. OK yes, there are MAJOR differences there, the major one being that Kelvin didn't willingly create Rheya 2, but there she is, nonetheless. She is just as innocent of any crime as Frankenstein's monster was at first, yet just as abhorred.

Anyway, I'm rambling. I'll try to make the rest quick.

There were some very dry, science text-like sections, which really are what made this book a 3 star earner rather than a 4 star earner. Not too difficult to understand, but a little too much like work. But this book is smart, too. Perceptive. Take a look at this quote:

"...We take off into the cosmos, ready for anything: for solitude, for hardship, for exhaustion, death. Modesty forbids us to say so, but there are times when we think pretty well of ourselves. And yet, if we examine it more closely, our enthusiasm turns out to be all sham. We don't want to conquer the cosmos, we simply want to extend the boundaries of Earth to the frontiers of the cosmos. For us, such and such a planet is as arid as the Sahara, another as frozen as the North Pole, yet another as lush as the Amazon basin. We are humanitarian and chivalrous; we don't want to enslave other races, we simply want to bequeath them our values and take over their heritage in exchange. We think of ourselves as the Knights of the Holy Contact. This is another lie. We are only seeking Man. We have no need of other worlds. We need mirrors. We don't know what to do with other worlds. [...:] We arrive here as we are in reality, and when the page is turned and that reality is revealed to us--that part of our reality which we would prefer to pass over in silence--then we don't like it anymore."

Enjoyable read, if dry in certain spots. But, don't let that stop you from reading this one. The rest of the story more than makes up for any slow parts. ( )

This is really good.

I can't speak for the movies, which shows how little I know about film - but this is a really good novel, good scifi, good philosophy.

I'm too tired to think of any descriptive adjectives to say apart from good. Somebody else has said it better. What's the use. I need to lie down. ( )

Another book I should revisit -- with an eye toward a good translation. I've enjoyed a few other of Lem's works, and even though I know this to be a somewhat difficult (very Russian/Slavic?) book, I'd like to get a better grasp on it. As it is, I finished it feeling like I'd been reading oatmeal with raisins -- just as I thought I understood something, it would sink under the surface again. Also, no brown sugar or butter. ( )

Solaris is a planet that orbits two suns, able only to maintain it's orbit by the fluctuations maintained by the living ocean that inhabits the entire surface of the world. This strange ocean, alien in every sense of the word, defies every theory or definition scientists attempt to use to explain it. Every answer springs forth more questions, more debate, more theories, building into a flurry of activity on and about the world. As time goes on, scientists remain so confounded by this world and its living ocean that the fire of investigation has died down and only three scientist remain on the station.

Enter Kelvin, who upon his arrival discovers that the scientist who hired him is dead under apparently mysterious circumstances. He finds the station disheveled and the two remaining scientist in varying states of paranoia to the extent that they won't even explain what's happened. At first he thinks they may have gone insane, until he has a strange visitor and discovers the truth for himself.

Solaris grabs the reader's attention fairly quickly with the mystery of what's happening at the station, which is a good thing. The intrigue and psychological threat of the visitor is interspersed with the massive amounts of techno/bio babble, which comes up as Kelvin looks into past theories and explorations on the ocean. All of which is vital to the story, because it contributes to the incomprehensibility of an alien that has no comparison to earth or human standards.

This book was deeply fascinating on many levels, from the truly alien alien to the philosophical and psychological concerns brought up by the visitors to they mystery and discovery of what happened and how these three men try to resolve the situation, each perceiving the problem through their unique human lens.

Solaris is not casual reading, but it's a wonderful book and one I highly recommend. ( )