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SF-LIT  May 1998

SF-LIT May 1998

Subject:

Various ramblings May 13th - 25th: Lem, Bulychev, robot, etc.

From:

Malgorzata Wilk <[log in to unmask]>

Reply-To:

Malgorzata Wilk <[log in to unmask]>

Date:

Thu, 28 May 1998 09:17:52 0100

Content-Type:

text/plain

Parts/Attachments:

Parts/Attachments

text/plain (256 lines)

Hi all,

I get my list mail as digest and it's late when I get it. And when I'm
on vacation, then it's getting even more late. So I'll try to put all
together and answer all the questions in one lengthy commentary:

1) Lem
I. Khan asked about Lem and wether he is >still alive and writing< and
that he wrote the book that Tarkovsky has based his "Stalker" upon.
There were also some other questions (and comments) concerning Lem.
I'm no Lem expert, I haven't even read all his novels or newer
articles. One is sure; he's still alive (might have dropped dead this
very moment, in that case they'll tell us today evening on the tv
news). He is still writing but as I've written in my reply to Dennis
Fischer that he resend to the list, Lem isn't writing fiction anymore,
and that for a long time already. Actually there is not much more to
tell after so many have commented on this subject.

Oh yes, of course Lem didn't write "stalker" or rather "Roadside Picnic",
he wrote "Solaris" and it was probably again Tarkovsky, who's made his
movie upon it.

Unfortunately I have no idea which of his books have been translated
into English. Funny story about translating his books though is, that
when Lem lived in Vienna during the 80'ties, he still wrote his books
in Polish, but the German translations were published sometimes even a
one or two years earlier than the actual Polish original. Yes, it took
us sometimes 3 years to finish printing a book...

2) Richard Brookes questions; Lem and Bulychev
(well, I'll still have something to tell about "robota" in the Polish
language, but that will come later.

> Now that we have the straight scoop on Capek and R.U.R., perhaps
> Malgorzata can tell us some facts about Stanislaw Lem.  It seems that
> eastern Europe has a strong SF legacy.

> Also, I am not familiar with Kir Bulychev.  This does not sound like a
> Polish name so I am assuming that Bulychev is Russian...?  Please tell
> us something about his fiction and if any of it has been translated into
> English.  I am not as accomplished with languages as you are,
> Malgorzata, so I am unfortunately limited to reading SF in English.

About Lem I can add only a nice story about his American translator
(again, I think it was Michael Kandel) who was talking sadly to one of
his Polish fans that unfortunately Poland doesn't have good SF writers
(at that time he probably hasn't known about Janusz Zajdel). Well, and
what about Lem? asked his friend. Lem? Oh, yes, I forgot that Lem was
a Pole.

This probably shows that Lem has become a common wealth/worth/good.
Unfortunately the English language is so popular everywhere that
nobody ever cares to learn any other language nor to bother if there
are any good books written in other languages that could be
translated. Problem is I know only German, English and Dutch (apart
from my native Polish) and what about any other languages? I shall try
to read some Czech. In Russia they publish now only Trek and detective
novels.

Re: Bulychev. He is Russian, his real name is Igor Mozejko and his
profession is orientalist (he's written under his own name the book
"Seven by Seven wonders of Asia" about Asian architectural monuments).
He chose his pseudonym as Kir Bulychev (but it was changed by his
publishers into a proper russian Kiryl) because it was his mothers
name, Kira. He thought that such unprofessional deeds as writing SF is
improper to a scientist and so he writes under pseudonym. Until the
end of the 80'ties all of his works were published in POland
(sometimes even earlier than in the USSR) but unfortunately now we get
only American translations and occasionally a story by Bulychev in a
convention booklet.
Bulychev's fiction can be divided more or less in 3 topics;

a) juvenile stories and novels about Alisa, the daughter of the
director of the Moscow Cosmic Zoo of the 24th (or something like
that). There are some 4 or so novels and a few collections. Alisa, the
girl to which nothing can happen, was originally written for his
daughter (I think she even was Alisa, too), who when she grew up,
didn't like her anymore. Lovely novels, lovely stories.

b) The stories about Wielki (Big) Guslar, a typical Russian town where
marvels and miracles are happening - aliens landing, mad inventors,
gold fishes who fulfill your wishes. Guslar was originally conceived
when Bulychev found an old phone book from before the war and liked
the names of the people so he used them in his stories. A collection
of his Guslar stories was published in English as "Guslar Wonders"
don't ask me when or by whom, I only have it in the exchange list of
the LoC.

c) all the rest.

Bulychev is still writing, still a few stories apear in convention
booklets .They are about the new reality in which we are forced to
live now.

3) ahem, "robota" or robot
 > From:    Matthew Winslow <[log in to unmask]>
> Subject: Re: Robot in Slavic languages

> Actually, most all of the Slavic languages have the "robot-" stem for a
> verb meaning work. Russian has _robotat'_ meaning "to work" much along
> the same semantic lines as the Polish word.
and Jitka:
> In the Czech language,
> in contrast to the Polish language, is the main word "prace" a "pracovat"
> (work and to work). It isn't the words describing whta kind of the work
> (physical or mental, hard or light). It is very general. If I say in my
> language: "Musis pracovat!" Nobody knows if I meant that this person
> must work hardly like a mason or if must just help with the houseworks.
> "Robota" was the words from middle age. In this century, it isn't used
> at all in our language. Even Capek had the sence or good taste to use
> this one for to create ROBOT. He could have taken DRINA (it is the
> words for heavy work that we hate). Imagine, instead of robot it could
> have been DRIN, DRINAK...
Actually, we use the word "praca" as well, it's work in general,
wether it's physical labor or brain work. And to traverse Jitka: >If I
say in my language: "Musisz pracowac!" nobody knows if I urge the
person to build a house or wash the dishes. In English you say that a
worker works, in Polish you say "robotnik pracuje". But there is the
word "pracownik" meaning generally an employee, so it is possible to
say: "pracownik pracuje".
And that should be the end of the discussion about robots and
language.

4) I accidentally started a discussion about Heinlein and "Podkayne of
Mars", thank you very much for an interesting discussion. And thank you
Kristen for the additional posting about computers in movies.

5) Jitka on SF as totally materialistic and touching our outside world.
I disagree, good SF (and I like to divide literature in the good one
and the bad one. Just as when Ted Sturgeon was told that 90% of all SF
is shit and what he thinks of it, he simply said, it's true, but that
90% of all that's written is shit. Good SF deals primarily with
people, not the outside world as such. The outside world is insofar
important as as trigger to peoples reactions. People react to other
people and to the outside world.

I think it would be nice now to introduce the most beloved word from
the last few years (yeah, I know, we live behind the moon in Poland,
you're already past it all) - postmodernism? It's a truism, but
somehow there's still some truth in it. Life changes, our likings
change, we see the world differently and seek for new ways of
expression. Intertextuality is the key. But as always, that's my own
private point of view.

6. language barrier
> From:    Hyuck Chung <[log in to unmask]>
> I am a Korean living in New Zealand. I have been a Sci-fi fan for about
> seven years. Before I came to New Zealand, I had read translated
> versions of sci-fi books. And rereading the same books written in
> English has made me realize how much I was missing by reading the
> translated versions.
> I wonder if anyone has this experience.

Boy oh boy, everybody who reads SF in the original language and in
translation stumbles upon it. Sometimes it's the feeling of a
language, sometimes it's the problem with untranslatable language
jokes; like in Anthony's Xanth series. Already in the first one you
stumble upon centipedes, nicklepedes and dollarpedes. You can't do
that in Polish (nor I suspect in German). We use the word "stonoga"
that is a "hundredfeeter" and the Germans even a "thousandfeeter".
Centipedes comes from latin but Anthony had the connotation with
cents. From here it's no long way to invent nicklepedes and
dollarpedes. Or a tree that grows cherry bombs, literary little
cherries that explode.

I had a different sort of experience when I read Donaldson's Mordants
Need dylogy. The first one I read in a German translation, the second
in the original English version. And I like the translation better!
The German language has various forms of addressing people whereas
English doesn't. (I mean you can address people with "your majesty" or
"your highness" or the likes.) But in this case the German translator
(a writer himself) used the modern German "Sie" (Terisa) and "Euch"
semi-medieval form used by everybody in Mordant.

On the other side I hated the German translation of Le Guin's Earthsea
trylogy. How can a sorcerer in a magical environment address somebody
with "Sie"?!

Jitka, Gibson IS difficult, I read him in the German translation (now
I got the Polish one, and if somebody provides me with the American
original I can start comparing the three of them, :-), one of my
favourite occupations). I think our Polish translator, Piotr Cholewa
has done a marvellous job, but what else can you expect of him? He's a
genius.
> Hi!
> Not long time ago, I've heard that sci-fi readers and fantasy readers
> can dislike the opposite literature. I don't know as I like very much
> both of them. It seems to me... well, a little absurd, but I would like
> to know your opinion. A sci-fi reader can like a fantasy book, and on the
> contrary?
> Now I have in my mind the "pure" literature, not the mix one.
Well, I like both, and there's actually (in my belief) nothing like
"pure" genres. And why the hell shouldn't one like good books?

7. Magic realism
Again I started a discussion here, for which I thank you all, lack of
time prevents me to comment upon here. I'm a firm believer that almost
everything can be counted to "fantastyka". In Poland we use this term
as opposed to smaller terms as "Science Fiction" or "Fantasy".
"Fantastyka" is everything, even myths, magic realism etc. Magic
realism, as Ephraim Mallery correctly states, isn't a combination of
SF and fantasy. But the combination of magic and fiction and the
science of our world is something in itself. Remember "Gun with
occasional music" by Latham? Still haven't read it, but from what I
know about it, it must be magical, scientifical, etc.

BTW magic (realism); re: best book discussion a few weeks ago -
anybody read here Peter Hoeg's "Miss Smilla's Sense of Snow"? There
was a nice movie with Julia Ormond based on this novel. One of the
best books I ever read in the last few months.

8) Shatner and ghost writers;
We had something totally different here in Poland (though probably
we had ghost writers as well, or maybe not). End 80'ties, beginning
90'ties we had writers writing under foreign sounding names/pseudonyms
because readers wouldn't at that time read any SF by Polish writers.


9) language
> From:    [log in to unmask]
> Subject: Re: Dick

> Hi, Joe -- long time, no write!  I know English isn't your first language,
> so you may not be aware -- but your subject line cracked me up - made me
> laugh -- "dick" is a slang term for a penis -- I know you're a Philip K.
> fan, so I knew what you were referring to, but it still made me laugh --
Ehem, everybody knows that, but what can Philip K. Dick do, if he's
got such a name? Accidentally, what can my friend Dick Lynch do, if
"Dick" is the official short for "Richard"? Shall we start calling a
"cock" something else only because someone stupid uses it as a slang
term for describing a certain part of the man's anatomy?

10) serials
Kamikasee wrote:
> For instance, I immensely enjoyed Ender's Game (Orson
> Scott Card) but I was not too thrilled about Xenocide...the third book (whose
> name escapes me) was enjoyable, as was the fourth.
The second novel was "Speaker for the Dead", the third "Xenocide", the
fourth "Children of the Mind" (just published in Poland)

And now it looks like I'm finished, and everybody who survived long
enough to read my ramblings should be finished as well.

Hugs and kisses,

Malgorzata

             mailto: [log in to unmask]
                     [log in to unmask]

             try both, one will always work

=====================================================================
|                  He who laughs last, thinks slowest               |
=====================================================================

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