Stanisław Lem

"Originally published in 1961, Return from the Stars recounts the experiences of Hal Bregg, an astronaut who returns from an exploratory mission of ten years. Due to time dilation 127 years have passed on Earth. Bregg returns to a society that he hardly recognizes, one where danger has been eradicated. Children are 'betrizated' to remove all aggression and violence, but this also removes all impluse to take risks and explore. Bregg has serious difficulty...

World-renowned cosmonaut Ijon Tichy, persuaded to attend the Eighth World Futurological Congress, is severely injured when the Congress is routed by Costa Rican revolutionaries, is refrigerated in liquid nitrogen, and awakens in the year 2039.

"In this charming memoir of his childhood between world wars, Lem investigates the nature of memory and the impossibility of a 'pure' remembrance. Witty, playful and self-deprecating, Lem recalls his 'monstrous' younger self, his early passion for pointless destruction, and his fascination with his father's medical books and instruments. Born into a comfortable upper-middle class Jewish household in provincial Lvov (at that time in Poland, now a part...

"When psychologist Kris Kelvin arrives at the planet Solaris to study the ocean that covers its surface, he finds himself confronting a painful memory embodied in the physical likeness of a past lover. Kelvin learns that hs is not alone in this, and that other crews examining the planet are plagued with their own repressed and newly real memories. Could it be, as Solaris scientists speculate, that the ocean may be a massive neural center creating...