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Solaris cover art

Solaris

By: Stanislaw Lem,Bill Johnston - translator
Narrated by: Alessandro Juliani
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Editor reviews

This fine, new, direct-to-English translation of Solaris allows listeners a new opportunity to marvel at the way Stanisław Lem managed to pack so much into such a compact story. As well as being a gripping sci-fi mystery, his novel stands as a profound meditation on the limitations of knowledge and the impossibility of love, of truly knowing another: how a vast, cold galaxy can exist between two people. In how many relationships does the other turn out to be a projected hologram? At the book's heart is the dark and mysterious planet of Solaris: working out what it means is half the fun of the book. One thing is clear: the possibility it offers of alien contact represents "the hope for redemption", a Schopenhauerian longing to be rid of the endless cycle of want, need, and loss. In one passage, the main character notes with a touch of envy that, "automats that do not share mankind's original sin, and are so innocent that they carry out any command, to the point of destroying themselves". The motivating forces that have traditionally sustained mankind - love, relationships, belonging - are exposed as so much space debris. In a book that contains one of the most tragic love stories in modern literature, the idea of a love more powerful than death is "a lie, not ridiculous but futile".

Alessandro Juliani is a veteran of television's Battlestar Galactica, though here it's a young, pre-parody William Shatner-as-Captain Kirk that his performance sometimes evokes: the same cool, clipped delivery and occasional eccentric choice of emphasis. If he occasionally under-serves the book's dread-filled poetry, his character studies clearly carry the wounds of their earlier lives: at first, his Kris is an opaque tough guy, coolly removed from the unfolding, terrible events, until he touchingly gives way in the end to an overwhelming sense of loss. His performance as Snout is a mini-masterpiece in feral intensity, an intelligence crushed by the immense weight of limbo. As Harey, caught in "apathetic, mindless suspension", he manages to make his voice unfocussed and passive, as if distilling the bottomless sadness of her self-awareness of her own unreality. It's also a strong tribute to his performance that he can carry the pages and pages of philosophising, argumentative theology, and semi-parodic scientific reports without coming across as didactic. What could easily drag the story to a standstill is, in this recording, compellingly conveyed as an essential part of Lem's heartfelt investigation into the painful limitations of human knowledge. — Dafydd Phillips

Summary

At last, one of the world’s greatest works of science fiction is available - just as author Stanislaw Lem intended it.

To mark the 50th anniversary of the publication of Solaris, Audible, in cooperation with the Lem Estate, has commissioned a brand-new translation, unabridged for the first time, and the first ever direct translation from the original Polish to English. Beautifully narrated by Alessandro Juliani (Battlestar Galactica), Lem’s provocative novel comes alive for a new generation.

In Solaris, Kris Kelvin arrives on an orbiting research station to study the remarkable ocean that covers the planet’s surface. But his fellow scientists appear to be losing their grip on reality, plagued by physical manifestations of their repressed memories. When Kelvin’s long-dead wife suddenly reappears, he is forced to confront the pain of his past - while living a future that never was. Can Kelvin unlock the mystery of Solaris? Does he even want to?

©1961 Stanislaw Lem. Translation © 2011 by Barbara and Tomasz Lem (P)2011 Audible, Inc.

Critic reviews

"A fantastic book." (Steven Soderbergh)
"[Lem] is one of the most intelligent, erudite, and comic writers working today." (Anthony Burgess)
"Few are [Lem's] peers in poetic expression, in word play, and in imaginative and sophisticated sympathy." (Kurt Vonnegut)
"Juliani transmits Kelvin’s awe at Solaris’s red and blue dawns and makes his confusion palpable when he awakens one morning to find his long-dead wife seated across the room. Juliani’s performance is top-notch." ( AudioFile)

What listeners say about Solaris

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  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars
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    4 out of 5 stars

Seminal SF suffering from patchy narration

Solaris is - as its reputation indicates - an introspective work. It's first and foremost a contemplation of the futility of any human attempt to communicate with a truly alien being. Most of the meat of the narrative is protagonist Dr Kris Kelvin's relationship with his own desires and personal history, set against the backdrop of a research station on an impossibly alien world.

Narrator Alessandro Juliani does a good job of portraying Kelvin and his fellow scientists, but the book is seriously let down by his depiction of Harey, a woman from Kelvin's past who appears on the research station without explanation, and whose presence only leads to deeper mysteries.

The very quiet and unbearably whining voice Juliani gives her was something I found increasingly annoying as the book went on, and it had a negative impact on my enjoyment of the novel, detracting from Harey's complex characterisation.

Translator Bill Johnston has done an outstanding job. He's avoided the problems and changes to the Polish original found in older English editions of the text, which Lem was very critical of. Johnston has in the process also avoided an instance of unnecessarily racist language which appears in the mediocre Kilmartin/Cox translation, but has done so without compromising Lem's harsh characterisation of Kelvin and his fellow scientists, their prejudices and the pettiness of their desires.

Solaris is one of the pillars of the SF canon, and this translation makes for an excellent edition, if you can just get past Harey's voice.

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41 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars

Blown away!

Sorry folks. I must be going through a 'purple patch' in terms of my fortunate choice of audio novels. I've not seen the films but no need because this novel paints a vivid and vast techo(colour) canvas. Where have I been all these years not knowing this exceptional writer? Had to listen to some excerpts 4 or more times to get the full meaning, but so much the better (value)! If there is just 1 sci-fi book - GET THIS!!!

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36 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars

stunning book and great performance

I was curious about the book after seeing Tarkovsky's adaptation and reading about Stanislav Lem. I thought I might give it a try even though I was not a big fan of science fiction at the time. This book has certainly changed my view of the genre. It is beautiful and strange, the performance really brings it alive and I found myself taking detours on my walk home from work to finish whole chapters.I look forward to enjoying it again later and hopefully other works of Stanislav Lem as well.

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15 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    2 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    4 out of 5 stars
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    1 out of 5 stars

Bored

Waited and waited and waited for action. No action. Awful depiction of women, but then it was written in 1961.

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10 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars

A pleasnt surprise

I struggled with reading this for my book club (even though I was familiar with the excellent film adaptation from a few years ago). So despite already owning an earlier edition as a book, I wanted to see if it worked any better on the new audible version. It does. It is still a flawed and dated book, but the new translation is exremely well rendered by Alessandro Juliani and may well deserve it's claim to be the definitive edition.

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10 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars
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    4 out of 5 stars

Superb, thought provoking

I have often wondered at science fiction worlds in which all the alien species have differences but manage to easily communicate and find meaningful common ground and language.
This is one of those truly great science fiction novels who's purpose is to ask real, interesting questions about alien life. From the first step of determining if the alien is living, through to determining it's sentience to attempting contact, the book poses thought provoking questions while simultaneously maintaining a quite gripping plot.
The narration is perfectly suited to the tale and drives the story forward with excellent characterisation.
A sci - fi classic.

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9 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars
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    3 out of 5 stars

Phenomenal voice acting - very scientific story

Solaris. What to say?

It is heavy going but rewarding. Despite what synopsis and internet reviews may say this is not a story about humans and their interrelationships. It is a story about a group of scientisits observing an alien planet that defies time and human understanding.

There is a lot of exposition tracing the history of Solaris which is, honestly, brilliantly imagined. The characters are portrayed magnificently by the narrator which is some of the best voice acting on Audible to date.

This is not a book to put on and switch off to, it required concentration to fully appreciate and understand the plot.

Hard work but rewarding if you focus.

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8 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

Love this book

I have listen to it a lot of times now and it seems to get better every time.

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8 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
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    4 out of 5 stars

Fascinating sci fi Classic on the 1001 books to read before you die lists

Not my usual genre, this book is a brilliant story about a strange planet with red and blue moons where mysterious things happen. There is much science detail within but this audible version allowed me to gloss somewhat over these bits and focus on the main story. This is truly a fantastic production and brilliant narration of what I understood to be a pretty difficult read. I would thoroughly recommend the audible version of this novel.

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6 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    2 out of 5 stars

ok but is a bit self indulgent

I know this is an icon, but I found it a bit too self indulgent with some of the histories of made up theories. The end was a so what! I doesn't so much finish as fade away.

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6 people found this helpful