Solaris" (Le Livre Est L'extraterrestre: Àpropos De Lectures Certaines Et Incertaines Du "Solaris" De Lem) Author(S): Istvan Csicsery-Ronay, Jr

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The Book Is the Alien: On Certain and Uncertain Readings of Lem's "Solaris" (Le livre est l'extraterrestre: àpropos de lectures certaines et incertaines du "Solaris" de Lem) Author(s): Istvan Csicsery-Ronay, Jr. Source: Science Fiction Studies, Vol. 12, No. 1 (Mar., 1985), pp. 6-21 Published by: SF-TH Inc Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/4239658 . Accessed: 31/12/2014 11:16

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This content downloaded from 163.120.1.91 on Wed, 31 Dec 2014 11:16:47 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions 6 SCIENCE-FICTIONSTUDIES, VOLUME 12 (1985)

Istvan Csicsery-Ronay,Jr The Book is the Alien: On Certain and UncertainReadings of Lem's Solais

1. Contemporaryscience describes a world thatis neithera rationalcosmos, nora roilingcosmos, but something in between:a sourceof paradox,allowing for complementary,but contradictory,interpretations of humanity'srelation- shipwith non-human reality. The "classical"myth of the rationalcosmos had sharedwith the prescientificmyths underlying humanistic culture the concep- tion thatthe humanand natural realms were in some ways co-ordinated.Both worked accordingto intelligible, self-consistent,determining laws. In the systemof modematomic physics, however, scientists have succeeded, accordingto Planck,in purgingscience of determinismand "all anthropomorphicele- ments"(Arendt: 269). Butas Heisenbergobserved, in sucha deanthropomor- phized universehuman beings always "confrontthemselves alone" (ibid., p. 277). Since every answerthey attainin theirinvestigations into natureis a specificanswer to a specificquestion, the sum of theseanswers allows the appli- cationof otherwisequite incompatible types of naturallaws to one andthe same physicalevent. Science'sanswers reflect the questionsscientists are impelled to ask of nature;and thus anthropomorphismis reintroducedat the level of hypothesisformation that preselectsthe data to be studied.Beyond this, it remainsextremely problematic whether the seeminglyunbridgeable gulf betweenthe languages of humanculture and quantum physics' purely probabilis- tic andmathematical expressions of the universewill produce"an appropriate wideningof the conceptualframework" to resolve all the presentparadoxes anddisharmonies in a new "logicalframe," as Niels Bohrhoped (see Arendt: 277)-and as radicalholistic physicists like FritjofCapra have proposed-or whetherthe gulf is inherentin the new physics. The conclusionsof the 20th century'sscience have thus introduced an alienation from the cosmos more radical thanany previouslyconceived in humanculture. Whether this alienation is thebeginning of a dialecticalprocess of conceptualsynthesis or an enormous stalemate,we cannot know. We cannot summarilyreject either historical hypothesis. SF characteristicallytransforms scientific and technologicalideas into metaphors,by which those ideas are given culturalrelevance. It worksvery muchlike historicalfiction in thisrespect. It takesa bodyof extratextualpropo- sitionsbelieved to be true, with no inherentethical-cultural significance, and endowsit withmeaning by incorporatingit in fictionalstories about characters representingtypical values of theauthor's culture. Although the historical facts limitwhat can happenin historicalfiction (in the realisticmode, at least),these factsare embedded among purely fictional facts to implya metaphoricalmean- ing beyond historiography'scustomary function of describing"what really happened."In historicalfiction, history is no longertrue history, even if it is

This content downloaded from 163.120.1.91 on Wed, 31 Dec 2014 11:16:47 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions THEBOOK IS THEALIEN: LEM'S SOLARIS 7 in fact true. It is metaphorical,and hence "more thantrue"; it is culturally significant. The same can be said, mutatis mutandis, about SF. Furthermore,in works of artisticinterest, we also expectthe fictionalaction and the processof reading to correspondanalogically to the fiction'smetaphorized scientific ideas. Read- ing the fictionshould act as a metaphorfor the processof cognitionimplied by thescience. In general, it is futileto lookfor this sortof harmonyof scientific ideas and aestheticdesign in contemporarySF. Severalcommentators have notedthat SF writersusually adhere to the paradigmsof romance(cf. Rose: 7; Frye:49). The paradigmaticforms of SF are usuallymore archaic, indeed prescientific,than much of so-calledmainstream fiction. One book is an exception,however: Stanislaw Lem's Solaris,one of the philosophicallymost sophisticatedworks of SF. Lem has oftendismissed the suggestionthat SF shouldbe judged by criteriadifferent from the restof literature.1 Yet mostof Solaris'commentators have discussedthe novel as a work of "meta-SF,"a virtuosoexample of genericcriticism and the explorationof the possibilitiesinherent in the genre.2In thesepages, I will considerSolaris somewhatdifferently, as an elaboratemetaphor for the cultural and philosophi- cal implicationsof scientificuncertainty for Westernculture.

2. Solaris invites several parallel, andeven contradictory,interpretations. It can be readas a Swiftiansatire, a tragiclove story,a Kafkaesqueexistentialist parable,a metafictionalparody of hermeneutics,a Cervanteanironic romance, anda Kantianmeditation on the natureof humanconsciousness. But none of these readingsis completelysatisfactory, and Lem intendedit to be so. The simultaneouslyincompatible and mutually reinforcing readings make the pro- cess of interpretingthe text a metaphorfor the scientificproblem of articulating a manifestlyparadoxical natural universe. This inbuiltindeterminancy notwithstanding, most of Solaris' commentators agreeon a commonreading of the novel's actionand point. Accordingto this reading,Solaris is aboutthe problemof whetherhuman beings will ever be able to makecontact with a trulyalien intelligence, and thus transcend the anthropomorphismand anthropocentrism apparently inherent in humancognition. In thenovel, a centuryof attemptsby the mostadvanced human scientists to understandthe mysterious, sentient ocean-planet, Solaris, has produced only a chain-reactionof paradoxes.The instrumentsthat the earlySolarists take to theplanet to measurecertain phenomena return to themphysically transformed by Solaris;the researchersthus cannotknow what it is they have measured (Solaris,2:27). The methodologicalparadoxes produced by the explorationof Solaris,which are extrapolations of classicalscientific method, come to occupy most of the Solarists'time. The inscrutableand opaqueplanet gradually becomesa macrocosmicmirror of thehuman image. The Solarists' obsession with themysteries of Solarisdissolves into the broader struggle to understandhuman reflectionand identity.When it appearsimpossible that human scientists will everbreak out of theenclosure of humanconsciousness, their space exploration appearsto be a religiousquest for "Contact,"mystical union with a godlike intelligencethat might reveal the purposeof the "missionof Mankind"in the universe,and redeemit from cosmic alienation.

This content downloaded from 163.120.1.91 on Wed, 31 Dec 2014 11:16:47 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions 8 SCIENCE-FICTIONSTUDIES, VOLUME 12 (1985) By the timethe narrator,the Solaristpsychologist Kris Kelvin, arrives on SolarisStation, hovering a mileabove the planet's surface, the theoretical paradoxes of Solaristicshave taken on an unnervingsolidity. The Solaristpro- tagonistsare "visited" by humansimulacra, which appear to be incarnations of the scientists'repressed erotic and guilt fixations. We cannotknow the purpose of these Visitors,as the Solaristseuphemistically call them, or how they arrivedon the spacestation. They merely appear when their hosts awaken after a dream-filledsleep. They maybe gifts fromthe planet,or instrumentsof exploration,or merelyaugmentations of thescientists' unconscious thoughts. The Visitorsdisorient the scientistscompletely by displayingthe quintessenceof eachman's subjectivity in theform of an inscrutableobject. Each Solarist deals with his confusionin a differentway. Kelvin'sfriend and teacher,Gibarian, unableto contemplate"murdering" the quasi-humanbeings, kills himselfin- stead;the pedantic physicist Sartorius locks himself in his laboratory,emerging only afterhe has inventeda deviceto annihilatethe Visitors;the cyberneticist Snow3takes to drink,irony, and self-pity-in fearand trembling. Only Kelvin provesopen and "innocent"enough to attemptto accommodatethe presence of his Visitor,a replicaof his youngwife Rheya,for whose suicideten years earlierhe has carrieda deep sense of guilt. At first, the Visitorsare indestructible,and appearto be materialcopies of an ideal template.When they are ejectedinto space, new versionsof them reappearon the stationlater. They know only whattheir hosts remember, and forobscure reasons they must stay within sight of thosehosts. In time, however, theybecome increasingly autonomous, and seem to develophuman consciousness. In the centrallove story betweenKelvin and Rheya, Rheyaappears to becomeeven morehuman than the truehuman Solarists-by willinglyaccept- ing her deathin orderto free her lover fromhis grotesqueattachment to her. The transformationin the novel occurswith Kelvin'sdisillusionment: his recognitionthat Rheya is not a humanbeing, andthat his inappropriateloyalty to her, which was motivatedby earthlyguilt and love, has kepthim fromthe workto whichhe haddevoted his life: encounteringthe Other-the planetSola- ris. Kelvinis compelledto recognizethat in a worlddefined by the encounter of thehuman with a non-humanintelligence, the most noble human values may be only quixoticillusions. His awarenessof his diminutioncomes in stages, withgreat suffering. First, he mustrenounce his romanticfaith. At the end of the novel, still mourningRheya, he preparesto returnto Earth"a sadderand wiser man"; "I shall neveragain give myself completelyto anythingor any- body... and this Kelvin will be no less worthya man thanthe Kelvinof the past,who was preparedfor anything in thename of theambitious project called Contact.Nor will any man have the rightto judge me" (14:206). Likeall the positiveassertions made by the protagonistsof the novel, this self-diminutionquickly turns ambiguous. In order not to returnto Earthwithout havingever physically touched-down on theplanet, Kelvin descends to the surface before he leaves. Therehe plays the game of extendinghis handto the ocean,which responds by envelopingit, withoutactually touching it. Although no physicalcontact is made, Kelvinis deeply affected,and feels "somehow changed."

This content downloaded from 163.120.1.91 on Wed, 31 Dec 2014 11:16:47 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions THE BOOK IS THE ALIEN: LEM'S SOLARIS 9

I hadnever felt the gigantic presence so strongly,or its powerfulchangeless silence, or the secretforces that gave the wavestheir regular rise andfall. I sat unseeing and sankinto a universeof inertia,glided down an invisibleslope, andidentified myself with the dumb,fluid colossus;it was as if I had forgivenit everything, withoutthe slightesteffort or thought.(14:210)

Kelvindoes not leave afterall. He allowshimself to believein "a chance, perhapsan infinitesimal one, perhapsonly imaginary" (14:21 1), thatsome new manifestationof contactor sharedcreation will occur.We surmisehis egoistic projectionsare spent:"I hopedfor nothing,and yet lived in expectation.I did not knowwhat achievements, what mockery, even whattortures awaited me. I knew nothingand persistedin the faiththat the time of cruel miracleswas not past" (14:211). Mostcritics agree that in his concludingwords Kelvin has attaineda new stateof alertnessand awareness. His formerlyaggressive drive for Contacthas given way to a more serenereceptivity. Stephen J. Potts(p. 51) believesthat atthis point Kelvin "has become ... anempty slate ready to receivethe universe on its own terms." For MarkRose, Kelvin finallycomes to the recognition thatthe Otherdoes in fact exist separatelyfrom himself:"he knowsthat the oceanis real and he is willing to commithimself to whateverthe futuremay bring"(p. 95). For DarkoSuvin, "Kelvinwins throughto a painfullygained, provisionaland relative faith in an 'imperfectgod' " (p. 220). EvenDavid Ket- terer,who arguespersuasively for the hermeticclosure of Solaris, writesthat "Kelvindoes learnsomething of man'slimits: they are circumscribedby the realityof Solaris" (p. 197). The gist of Solarisin this readingis thathuman consciousness could not proceedto a newcognition as long as it was trappedin its ownhuman-centered, egocentricconception of reason.Only a catharticencounter with an alien reality insistentand intrusive enough to violatethe membraneof self-sufficienthuman self-awarenesscould dissolve the scientists'repressed emotional fixations and initiatea new receptivityto the universeoutside the self-a knowledgethat somethingOther not only exists, but can transform the self. Thisreading (which I haveadmittedly fleshed out a bit) involvesnot so mucha paradoxas a hidden contradiction.If we are to believe thatKelvin is actuallypurged of illusions at the end of the tale, we mustaccept the realityof Solarisas a determinate Other,whose "not-humanness"defines Kelvin for himself, and the reader. But how did Kelvincome by this new abilityto see himselfobjectively, if human cognitionis a priori anthropomorphic?To see himselfdeterminately-that is, "to learnsomething of man's limits," as Kettererwrites-Kelvin musthave been able to see himselfas a "not-human,"an abilitythat he couldonly have learnedfrom contact with Solaris.The criticswho hold thatKelvin arrives at a new stateof humbledand purifiedcognition consequently also approvethe questfor "Holy Contact,"since only the acquisitionof the Other'spoint of view couldhave both dispelled Kelvin's illusions and given him knowledgeof himself.If thisis true,then Kelvin has redeemed the romantic impulses of Solar- istics by provingtheir truths. His identificationwith the alien mightbe read as the necessaryinversion that concludes the successfulreligious quest, just as the discoveryof the Grailwas to end in translationand absorptioninto God.

This content downloaded from 163.120.1.91 on Wed, 31 Dec 2014 11:16:47 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions 10 SCIENCE-FICTIONSTUDIES, VOLUME 12 (1985) Beforecoming to SolarisStation, Kelvin's contribution to Solaristicshad beenthe discoveryof possiblecorrelations between encephalographic patterns indicativeof certainhuman emotions with formally similar patterns taken from Solaris(11:182-83). To putit anotherway, Kelvinhad discovered what could be construedas "personal"and emotional activity in the planet.At the conclusionof thenovel, the situationis reversed.He substitutesfor the personification of the alienhis own self-identificationwith the alien-i.e., alienationfrom the human.The quasi-religiousquest for Contact,rather than being an illusionto keep humanityfrom despair,apparently paid off afterall: miracleshave oc- curred,even if they are cruel ones, and Man has placedone foot beyondhis humanlimits, albeitinto a mysteriousand undefined dimension. It is an apo- calypse,of sorts.Therefore, man's knowledge is notlimited to himselfand his creations. But is this readingvalid? Is Kelvinreally as emptyat the end of the novel as Potts claims, "readyto acceptthe universeon its own terms"?Does not the universeinclude Kelvin, and the humanspecies, among its terms?Doesn't Kelvin'sidentification with the alienleave us once againwith no way of deter- miningwhere the humanends and the Otherbegins? Only PatrickParrinder has, to my knowledge,challenged the prevailing ideathat Kelvin ultimately succeeds in breakingout of the anthropocentrichall of mirrorsto the doorwayof new cognition.For Parrinder,Kelvin's decision to stayby thealien planet parallels Gulliver's infatuation with the rational horses in his last journey. The novel's ending, Parrinderwrites, shows the fate of a manwho has abandonedhumanity for the alien, andso is tragicbut also absurd,a symbolicgesture holding at bay the recognitionof despair.Kelvin hasfollowed through the logic of thescientist-explorer in theliberal-humanist tradi- tion, until he is finallya victim of an isolatingromantic obsession. (p. 54) To carryParrinder's reading a step further:Kelvin desertshumanity in ordernot to face the despairof knowingthat his speciesis a singularityin the cosmos, and that reason,desire, love, and truth-even the ideas of self and other-are merely tautologiesin the isolated, self-reinforcingsystem of the "human." If, as Kelvintells us, he is completelycommitted to awaitingnew interac- tions with Solaris,are we to admirehis renewedspirit of sacrificeand dedica- tion in the cause of Contact,or to suspectit? How are we to judge whatwe read?To choose eitherinterpretation, Kelvin as GrailKnight or as Gulliver, we must have a standardagainst which to compareeach interpretation-and thatis preciselywhat we cannothave in Solaris,just as the Solaristshave no realityagainst which to comparehumanity and the ocean-planet. Solaris'salienness is so threateningto the Solarists'scientific egoism that none of their conscioushypotheses regarding the planetcan be takenat face value. Still, thereis evidencein the novelto supportthe ideathat some mysterious andsignificant contact has been achievedbetween Kelvin and the planet. Thereare moments in theaction not interpreted by theprotagonists (particularly havingto do with Rheya,and with Kelvin'sdreams), and these bearhints of a special,non-rational relationship between Solaris and Kelvin that could easily go by the name of Contact.In the first place, Rheya appearsto be the co-

This content downloaded from 163.120.1.91 on Wed, 31 Dec 2014 11:16:47 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions THE BOOK IS THE ALIEN: LEM'S SOL4RIS 11 operativecreation of Kelvinand Solaris: if sheis a projection,she is a projection of both, since her formis producedby Kelvin'sunconscious memory and her substanceis producedby theplanet. We cannotknow exactly what the Visitors' purposeis, but Rheyabelieves she may be "an instrument"(4:51) of some sort(perhaps analogous to the Solarists'instruments transformed by Solarisin theearly stages of exploration).On the assumption that Solaris may have "read off' theVisitors from the dreamsof thesleeping scientists after they had begun bombardingthe planetwith x-raysat night(6:82), the Solaristsencode some of Kelvin'swaking thoughts and broadcast these by day, to "inform"Solaris of how muchsuffering the Visitorsare causing.The idea is farfetched,and it seemsto be a way of distractingKelvin's attention from Sartorius and Snow's attemptto inventa neutrino-annihilatorto be usedagainst the Visitors-a device Kelvin would like to sabotage,to preventRheya's destruction. As Kelvin's encephalographicpatterns are broadcast,however, he becomesincreasingly sensitiveto directintuitions of "an invisiblepresence which has takenposses- sion of the Station"(12:186). Moreover,the annihilatedVisitors do not reap- pearafter the emissionshave been completed, implying that the messagemust have "gone through." Most suggestiveof all is Kelvin'sweird "dream"in Chapter12 ("The Dreams"). Thelanguage of thedream passage is worthclose attention,but here I can only note thatthe entiredream can be readas if it were being narrated by eitherKelvin or Solaris,which is for a while humanly"informed" by Kel- vin'sthoughts. To makesense of thisdream, for which Kelvin provides no com- mentary,we areinvited to concludethat Kelvin and Solaris penetrate each other to createa being- "a woman?"(12:187), doubtless Rheya-and thento exper- iencethe excruciating suffering of a mysteriousdissection. At thedream's con- clusion,the narratorobserves his/its sufferingas "a mountainof grief visible in thedazzling light of anotherworld" (ibid.). Whoever the observer here might be, this indeterminateprocess of incarnationimplicates both Kelvin and Solaris-as if each were perceivingit throughthe otherin some inarticulable way. If theseare moments of directcontact bypassing the mediations of egocen- tric rationality,then we can concludethat some exchangeactually does occur betweenthe humanand the alien, the self andthe Other.Snow speculatesthat throughthe Visitors Solaris may be learningabout mortality, and the increasing humanautonomy of the Visitorsmay servejust this purpose.("It imploresus to help it die withevery one of its creations"[12:192], he tells Kelvin.)Since Solaris'spower to stabilizematter extends from massless neutrinos to its own orbitaround two suns, it is possiblethat the planet experiences the pain of death for the firsttime throughthe annihilationof the Visitors. (Thisspeculation is justifiedalso by the "piercingscream which came from no humanthroat" [12:190],probably the death-agony of Sartorius'sVisitor, that awakens Kelvin one night.)Through Rheya specifically, Solaris may have learnedthe ethical and affectiveessence of the human,the abilityto transformnecessary death intoliberating self-sacrifice for the sakeof lovedones. Kelvin,in turn,appears to loosen his clutchon his narcissisticself-projections, and comes to identify himselfwith the planetand to "forgive" it, attainingan almostsuper-human patience.

This content downloaded from 163.120.1.91 on Wed, 31 Dec 2014 11:16:47 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions 12 SCIENCE-FICTIONSTUDIES, VOLUME 12 (1985) 3. These are suggestivepassages, and they resist interpretationas anything otherthan moments of non-rational,non-conscious exchange-true moments of contactso surpassingthe commonrun of humancommunication that they couldwell be mistakenfor religiousinspiration. Still, the fundamentalindeter- minacyof Solariswill not let us acceptany interpretationbased only on what Kelvin, our sole informant,tells us. Once the questionis raisedwhether we can" see" somethingthat is nota projectionof humanconsciousness, we cannot makea purelyrational or objectivedetermination one way or theother. Readers of Solaris are Solarists,too-the phenomenaof the novel's actionreach us in thelanguage of a Solaristand psychologist whose own reflections on howhypo- thesesare generatedanticipate and subsume most of the hypothesesthe reader mightcome up withindependently. Just as theindeterminacy of Solarisdeflects its explorersback into doubtabout their methods of interpretingphenomena, the indeterminacyof the evidencein Solarisdeflects us backinto doubtabout our own methodsof reading. Lemhas constructed Solaris in sucha waythat every apparently significant elementin the text correspondsto othersignificant elements, creating a hall of mirrorswith no windows from which to observe some privilegednon- correspondingstructure of things.Rose and Ketterer have demonstrated in their readingsof the novel thatsymbolic images reflect one anotherto a suffocating degree;in Solaris,Ketterer writes (evoking Heisenberg), "man confronts only analoguesof his own image" (p. 201). Allusionsto the literatureof illusion extendthis doubling from the internalaction of the taleto the statusof thebook andreader in theworld outside the text. Forexample, Lem requires us to accept Romanticism'sfavorite devices of doublingand self-reflection simply to follow the manifestlyrealistic plot. Ghosts,mirrors, dreams, unconscious memories andimpulses, a web of symboliccorrespondences, eerily enclosed spaces and sublimevoids all functionas empiricallyconcrete "objects" in a scientific mystery.Names appearto be allusive, and perhapseven allegorical:Kelvin, Rheya,4Sartorius, Snaut, Andre Berton, Fechner, the designations of thespace- ships (Prometheus,Ulysses, Laocoon, Alaric), even Solarisitself. But since we cannotbe sureexactly how these allusionswork or whetherthey all work the same way, or even whetherthey are arbitraryred-herrings just imitating allusions,5the extratextualthings to whichthey refer also lose their solidity, and are absorbedinto the book's worldof indeterminateelements. We know only thatthey correspond. We do not knowwhat these correspondences mean. To createeven broaderironies, Lem invokesa wholelibrary of romance, satire, and myth: Don Quixote, Gulliver, Poe's phantomlovers, the Grail Quest, the tale of Eros and Psyche, Echo and Narcissus,the Passionand the Creation.Since the manifestproblem of the Solaristsand readersis how to determinewhether human consciousness can know anythingother than itself, each of the mythsand storiesinvoked in the book becomesa versionof the sameproblem-and thuseach is transformedinto a versionof Solaris.Again, we areshown Western culture's problems and the creations responding to them reflectingone another.But what do thesereflections signify? The infiniteplay of mutuallyreflecting projections,or the appropriationof transcendental knowledge? The problemis raisedvividly, neverto be dispelled,when Kelvincomes

This content downloaded from 163.120.1.91 on Wed, 31 Dec 2014 11:16:47 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions THEBOOK IS THEALIEN: LEM'S SOLARIS 13 uponthe deadGibarian's Visitor, a giganticAfrican woman, who reclinessoft and warmand alive next to Gibarian'scorpse in the space station'sfreezer. Throwninto a panic, Kelvinwonders whether what he is seeing is realityor a hallucination.He tries to concocta controlledexperiment to test his sanity, buthe knowsthat his conclusionscan provenothing. A derangedmind's illusions of certaintyare indistinguishablefrom a sane mind'sknowledge. Con- sciousnesscan never make an object out of itselffor objective observation. Kel- vin landson an apparentsolution: he sets up a complicatedproblem of calcula- tion, whichhe thenmatches with the precalculatedconclusions of an indepen- dentlyorbiting satellite-computer, on the assumptionthat he wouldnot be able to matchthe computer's speed even in a hallucination.When the numbers mesh, he believeshe has demonstratedthe realityof the Visitors.It is a persuasive tactic,but once the seed of doubthas takenroot it cannotbe pulledup. Could not Kelvinhave dreamed the satellite'sresults as well?Who can determine the limitsof themind's power of projection?Never in readingSolaris can we estab- lish a hierarchyof phenomenaor significationsstable enough for us to interpret eventsunambiguously. We cannever tell whatis the "real"structure of events andwhat are the deviations.None of the protagonists'conscious assertions is abovesuspicion. The Solaristsare desperate men. Theyare faced not only with analien reality resistant to theirreason, but also, in theVisitors, with their most familiarand unattractiveselves out in the light of day. In the final analysis,we have no way of determiningwhether Solaris is notthe collectivehallucination of thewhole human species, like the "monsters of the id" in the film ForbiddenPlanet. Or, inversely,whether the humanspecies is not the hallucinationof the dreaming"ocean-yogi" Solaris, corres- pondingto the Hindunotion of maya.We cannottell whatis the referentand what is the referringterm. Our inabilityto determineKelvin's fate one way or anotheris partof the necessaryirony of theepistemological problem created by Lem'salien. No definitionof theOther (and, of course,of theself) is possible withoutreference to a standardthat transcends both the self andthe Other.But how can sucha thingbe conceived"scientifically"? In Solaris'smaze of correspondences,enclosures, and reflections,what we and the Solaristslack is somethingthat would be non-corresponding,a "meta-alien"structure that wouldnot mean anything: something as determinatelydifferent from the dialec- ticalunity of self andOther as self andOther are from each other. But, of course, that is what neitherscience nor the readercan have. 4. In the conclusionof his book Fantastykai futurologia (ScienceFiction and Futurology)6Lem discussesthe techniqueshe believes are appropriate methods for expressingauthentically the semanticproblems of scientific- technologicalculture in contemporaryfiction. For Lem, modem literature evolves throughthe conflictbetween the rulingcultural codes of empiricism andthe writer's need to havea coherentset of normativerules of socialconduct uponwhich, or againstwhich, to baseartistic norms. Western culture's domi- nantempiricism is in facta set of anti-codes."For empiricism,"Lem writes, "theonly inviolablebarrier is the totalityof attributesof natureit callsthe body of naturallaws. Thus,observing the human world from an empirical standpoint necessarilyleads to the completerelativization of culturalnorms everywhere wherethey impose 'unfounded' imperatives and restraints" ("Metafantasia": 62).

This content downloaded from 163.120.1.91 on Wed, 31 Dec 2014 11:16:47 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions 14 SCIENCE-FICTIONSTUDIES, VOLUME 12 (1985) Traditionally,art worked with structuresderived from mythical-religious conceptsthat antedated scientific rationalism. These concepts reinforced certain socialcodes by presentingthe cultureand its axiomsas sacredand unquestion- able. The realmof humandecisions was viewedas partof a cosmicorder and was given value becauseof its cosmic resonances.Empiricism, according to Lem, was Westernculture's "Trojan horse," because of its successin dissolv- ing fromwithin those culturalnorms not basedon utilityand comfort. Artists in the modernage havebeen unable to findnew axiogenicstructures to replace the sacred-mythologicalones thatsecular science eroded. Hybridization tech- niquesabound but original, self-consistent ethical and aesthetic structures can notdevelop where norms are constantly subject to rationalcriticism and techno- logical innovation. Parodyof myth is one obviousand alreadytraditional solution; but it is purelycritical, and entirely dependent on the mythsit parodies.Lem believes thattwo radicalmethods of "cunningstructuration" ("Metafantasia": 64) are particularlyappropriate for 20th-centurywriters in the age of indeterminacy. Thefirst is to give "thetotal structure of a worka multidimensional'indeterminacy,"' a techniqueLem associateswith Kafka's Ihe Castle.The writerseals up differentmodes of significationin the work'sstructure in such a way that the readeris given all the clues necessaryto acceptthat the work signifiesin a unifiedway, butnot how to determinethe significanceof thatunity, i.e., what the work means. "Kafka's7he Castle," accordingto Lem, can be readas a caricatureof transcendence,a Heavenmaliciously dragged down to Earthand mocked, or in preciselythe oppositeway, as the only imageof tran- scendenceavailable to a fallenhumanity.... Works like this do not exposethose mainjunctures that could reveal their unambiguous ontological meanings; and the constantuncertainty this producesis the structuralequivalent of the existential secret. ("Metafantasia":64) The other approachLem singles out is the manifestinterpenetration of incongruousstructures and paradigmatic forms-some harmonious,some dis- sonant,and some changing their relations in thecourse of the fiction'sdevelop- ment. Like Kafka'stechnique, such writingdenies the readeran absolute systemof relationsby whichto interpretrelative systems. Some of the structures mightbe so divergentthat they distortand "damage"the information producedby theother structures; at othertimes, convergences might occur for- tuitously.The most radicalmodel of this technique,in Lem's view, is the Frenchnouveau roman, and especially the workof Robbe-Grillet,where even chanceenters as a constitutivestructure to createa clashbetween the paradigmatic forms of orderand chaos ("Metafantasia":65). Both of these techniquesof "cunningstructuration" are adequateto the philosophicalproblems raised by indeterminacy.For the writerwho weakens the reader'ssense of certaintyby weakeningthe culturallyprivileged conven- tions of fiction also weakensthe reader'ssense of certaintyabout the world to which the fiction's languageis believedto refer. Becauseof this systematicrefusal to speakplainly, the readerbegins to feel unsure whetherhe or she reallyunderstands what the descriptionis concretelyabout, and this gives rise to the semanticwavering that characterizes the receptionof modem

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poetry.... Theseapproaches have a commonorigin: as thelevel of the reception's indeterminacyrises, the reader'sown personaldeterminations begin to waver.In practice,it is oftenimpossible to determinewhether a given narrativestructure is only very indirectand elliptical, but essentially homogeneous, or one deliberately damagedby 'chancenoise,' or evenperforated, softened and bent by another,dis- cordantstructure. Furthermore, since one can also createmultilayered structures, even the concretequality of the describedobject or situationcan be transformed beyondrecognition and reshaped from one level of articulationto another.Thus, it is oftenimpossible to determinecategorically whether the basicstructure of descriptionis an imageof orderor of chaos. ("Metafantasia":67). Manyof theproblems of interpretingSolaris evaporatein thelight of Lem's meditationson modernism,for Lem conflatesthese two ways of creating semanticindeterminacy in the designof his novel. The similarityof Solaristo The Castleis readilyapparent: the planetis Kelvin'sCastle. Whether it will yield its secretor not, Kelvininsists that it has a secretto yield, and thathe has been "called"to plot its dimensions,like the land-surveyorK. Insteadof openingthe transcendentalsignificance of the cosmosto him, Solarisremains opaque,"communicating" with him through inscrutable messengers, the Visi- tors. Oncethese obstructive messengers are clearedaway, Kelvinbelieves he is, justas Pottsputs it, an emptyslate ready to be inscribedupon by thedemiur- gic Other.The alien intelligence provides humankind with a glimpseof its long- soughtArchimedean point in the universeonly to show how inaccessibleit is. Solarismight be profitablyread as a gloss on Kafka'sremark that Man "found theArchimedean point, but he usedit againsthimself; it seemshe waspermitted to find it only underthis condition"(Arendt: 278). At the same time, since the Otheris (by definition?)totally inscrutable, Kelvin, like K., acceptsthat his humancognition and his knowledgeof his placein the universeare corrupt in theiressence. Both Kelvinand K. follow the lead of Gulliver,who would ratherbe a horse. Lem punctuatesand deformsthis Kafka-likeambiguity with a versionof the other "systemof indeterminacy"he associateswith literarymodernism, the mutualinterference of narrativestructures which outsidethe text appear as clear and distinct,even mutuallycontradictory. This methodcreates the inverseeffect to the impenetrablemystery of "the structuralequivalent of the existentialsecret." The readeris madeto feel thatthe elementsof narrative are all familiar,"taken from the repertoireof culturallyknown situations" invoking"the repertoire of possibleissues appropriate for [them]" ("Metafan- tasia": 66); yet in theirincongruous conflation, they seem "perforated,soft- enedand bent" by one another(ibid., p. 67). Thehard opacity of theunyielding secretis complementedby the nauseatingfluidity of the familiarwhen facing that opacity.

5. This sense of distortionthrough "softening" of ordercomes aboutspon- taneouslyin the actionof Solaris.The variousself-consistent models that the protagonists-andreaders-of the novel use to interpretthe mysteriousaction lose theirdistinctions. These putatively sharply-defined systems for articulating realityare transformedinto a single fluid processwhose only articulationis its differencefrom the sentientplanet.

This content downloaded from 163.120.1.91 on Wed, 31 Dec 2014 11:16:47 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions 16 SCIENCE-FICTIONSTUDIES, VOLUME 12 (1985) In a worldruled by positiverationality (the implied epistemology of West- ern consciousnessin Solaris), certainculturally privileged structures of cognition throughwhich writersmake sense of the naturaland social worlds(such as physics,biology, psychoanalysis, psychochemistry, romantic love, religious faith, mythology, "fantomology,"7 to mentionthe most prominentones in Solaris)appear to be all-explainingand mutually exclusive from within those structures.From the standpoint of contemporaryculture as a whole,they appear to be partsthat, when ideallycombined, come closer to articulatingthe truth aboutreality than any singleone of them.This view impliesthat human cognition operatesby maintaininga greatvariety of possibletechniques for world- describing(and the possibilityof synthesesamong these), some of whichare certainlyexpected to assimilatewhatever reality has in store. All such privi- legedmodels of explanationare based on thepositive faith that truth exists "outside" consciousnessand must be appropriatedby it. When confrontedby a concreteexisting thing that resists all strategiesof appropriation,the common characterof these strategiescomes out in relief: all are projectionsof human qualities,as if they could exist outsidehuman limits. Of course,Lem cannot create a trulyalien creature to makeus see thispara- dox fromoutside human consciousness. Though he takesgreat pains to evoke the senseof Solaris'sstrangeness through vividly detailed, and yet barelyintel- ligible,descriptions of theplanet and its excrescences,we alwayssee theplanet througha humanobserver's language as it strivesto assimilatean a priorinon- assimilableobject. Our only evidencethat there is a trulyalien intelligenceis thatall the intrahumandistinctions between modes of thoughtand types of dis- courseeither disappear (as in Kelvin'sstrange love story)or, whenthey retain their distinctiveness,they becomeabsurd anachronisms, personified by Sar- torius'spedantic devotion to his positivisticideals and personaldiscipline. In the faceof that-which-does-not-correspond,the most diverse and contradictory ways of makingsense becomea single self-reflectingset of correspondences, an amorphousmythoscience thrashing in its inabilityto articulatethe alien. Lem constructsthis ironic "alienation"of cognitionby at every turn denyingthe Solaristsand readersthe opportunityto completethe structureof significationthat they were invitedto expectby the text's allusions.Lem, and Solaris, evoke certainstructures particularly privileged in Westernculture, only to distortthem through other structures alien, andeven inimical,to them. In other words, hypothesesare made possible and projectedby modes of thoughtthat contradict those hypotheses. In thisway, the failureof thepositive scienceof Solaristics(which already encompasses all the existingbranches of scienceand has produced a multitudeof newbranches by thetime Kelvin arrives on the station)to appropriateSolaris gradually leads the scientiststo act as if the "Solarisproject" were the projection of somethingmore archaic (i.e., both olderand more generative) than science. At one momentit is religiouslonging andmessianism. Kelvin discovers this view fully elaboratedin the writingsof theSolarist Muntius, who had written that "Solaristics is thespace era's equiva- lent of religion;faith disguised as science.... Explorationis a liturgyusing the languageof methodology;the drudgeryof the Solaristsis carriedout only in the expectationof fulfillment,of an Annunciation,for thereare not andcannot be any bridgesbetween Solaris and the Earth"(11:180).

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Solaristicsas messianismand as sciencemay, however,be only a projectionof eroticrepression and narcissism, which founders when the Solaristshave to confronttheir Freudian ghosts, the repressed"others" inside themselves. Snow tells Kelvin: We thinkof ourselvesas Knightsof the Holy Contact.This is anotherlie. We are only seekingMan. We have no need for otherworlds. We need mirrors....We are searchingfor an idealimage of our world.... At the sametime there is something insideus which we don't like to face up to, from which we try to protect ourselves,but which nevertheless remains, since we don'tleave the Earth in primal innocence.(6:81) Like the Solaristcommentators, we can go further.All these ideological andpsychological projections may be the inevitableprojection of the physical definitionof the humanbody onto the universe.So the eccentricSolarist Gras- tromspeculates in discerningthe anthropomorphisms"in the equationsof the theoryof relativity,the theorem of magneticfields, andthe various unified field theories"(11:178). The idealsystems of reasoncome graduallyto be seen as versionsof humanlimitation disguised as transcendence.Lem's Solarists,all menof scienceand hard common sense, arecompelled to entertainan ideathat necessarilycasts grave doubts on thebasis of theirlives as scientists:that there is no clear line betweenreason and unreason,reality and illusion.

6. Becausereaders of Solaris approachit as fiction, andexpect the science to be metaphorical,an educated reader cannot be as upsetby theidea of science as a systematizedform of despairas the Solaristsare. The literaryform offers a kindof comfort,deriving from the sensethat the story'sorder is distinctfrom thatof the ideas it "uses." And since these ideas are transformedby fiction into metaphorsat the outset, the readeralready starts out expectingsome of thecollapse of quasi-rationalisticsystems into one anotherthat the professional scientistsof the tale experiencein the action. As the possibilityof a realistic interpretationof Solaris dissolvesfor the reader,and the scientiststhemselves seemto turnto religiousand psychoanalytic explanations, the readerlooks for cluesof moretraditional mythic structures. Lem provides such clues abundantly in variouskinds of allusions:in names,situations, and explicitspeculations. Butthese mythic structures, too, are subjectto the novel's underlyingindeter- minacy.They also sufferthe samemutual deformation and incongruous moti- vationas the quasi-rationalisticexplanatory models. Thewhole Solarist enterprise seems trapped in a Mythof theWill-a myth designedto explainand supporthumanity's appropriation of the materialuni- verse. This mythappears gross and absurdwhen confrontedby a manifestly morepowerful alien being. Intothis stalematecome the Visitors,whom Lem clearlyidentifies with Mythsof Love. Althoughwe neverlearn who Snow's andSartorius's Visitors are, we caninfer from Gibarian's African woman and from Rheya,as well as from some of Snow's guardedcomments, that all the Visitorsare incarnationsof repressedobjects of erotic desire. The situation impliesthat the Solaristshave drawntheir power to exploreand their love of adventurefrom this repression, and that the shockof seeingtheir shadow-selves so concretelyin frontof themsaps their egoistic resolve. The ironicexception

This content downloaded from 163.120.1.91 on Wed, 31 Dec 2014 11:16:47 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions 18 SCIENCE-FICTIONSTUDIES, VOLUME 12 (1985) is Sartorius.His sadistichatred of the Visitors, and the unbendingscientific egoismassociated with it, is sufficientto sustainhim until he succeedsin invent- ing the neutrino-annihilatorthat "kills" the simulacra.While Kelvin, and to a lesserdegree Snow, come to acceptthe Visitors' and Solaris's right to be real, Sartorius'swhole existenceis predicatedon the destructionof everythingthat interfereswith his positiveego-science. Rheya in particularseems to carrythe values of non-scientificmythic- religiousmediation, albeit in a way thatdeforms distinct mythic structures of mediationby conflatingthem. Rheya gradually takes on the role for Kelvinof a personalmediator sent to him for inscrutablereasons by a deific intelligence. She offers him the opportunityto redeemthe guilt and shameof his life with the originalRheya, an absolutionof the OldKelvin, a vitanuova. But the exact valueof Rheya'smythic-religious character in Solarisdepends on howwe interpret Kelvin's decisionto stay by the planetat the end of the novel. Rheyabegins as a mereembodiment of Kelvin'serotic desire. She seems like an indestructiblegoddess attached to a mortallover. Herphysical structure appearsto be so stablethat she mightnever grow old. Heranomalous neutrino- basedbody, however, makes it doubtfulthat she could remain stable away from herheavenly abode near Solaris. These associations are not lost on Snow, who refersto Rheyaonce as a "fair Aphrodite,child of Ocean" (12:192), much to Kelvin'sannoyance-although he himselfhad earlier called Gibarian's Visi- tor "a monstrousAphrodite" (3:37). As Rheyabecomes increasingly human in herfeelings and quandaries, the character of herlove appearsto changealso. It graduallybecomes less arbitrary,clinging, and childlike,and increasingly faithfuland altruistic.She becomesa doubly-inverted,paradoxical image of Christ,a materialisticversion of the transcendentalmediator. She is a human formof Solaris,and a Solarianform of thehuman. As she mysteriouslyevolves into a conscious,free agent,again and again acting against her physicallimits (by drinkingthe liquidoxygen, keepingher distancefrom Kelvin, and lying about listeningto Gibarian'scassette [9:1431),she fulfills-Lem implies- essentialcognitive, axiological, and ontological conditions of beinghuman. She is consciousof her ignoranceof her origins;she is willingto sacrificeher life for a loved one; andshe is, in the end, ableto die. The goddessfreely chooses to acceptdeath to liberateKelvin from his guilt. SinceSartorius and Snow will not be swayedfrom their determinationto annihilatethe Visitors, they have the force of fate for Rheya.Her acceptanceof deathre-enacts the tragicgrace of Christ'spassion on SolarisStation. However, Rheya can only recapitulatethe myth of Christif the whole mythicstructure of Christ'smediation is completein Kelvin'slife. Her death makessense as a quasi-religiousmediation only if Kelvinat the end has been emancipatedfrom his egoism andthe burdenof his past sins into a condition of new hope. Rheya'sact wouldthen imply a versionof transcendentalgrace, validatingthe religion of Contactand affirming the "personal"relationship between the godlike Solarisand the humanKelvin. But if, with Parrinder,we view Kelvinas a manstuck in the hallof mirrorsof narcissisticself-reflection, thenthe characterof Rheya'smediation changes from emancipatory to ironic. Insteadof Christ,she becomes Echo, the loveliest and most concrete of Kelvin's fated self-reflections.Although she is the only one of his echoes capableof

This content downloaded from 163.120.1.91 on Wed, 31 Dec 2014 11:16:47 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions THE BOOK IS THE ALIEN: LEM'S SOLARIS 19 loving Narcissus,her love can do nothingto save him from drowningin the unfathomableocean-pool whose surfacereflects his face throughoutthe cosmos. These two mythicstructures are inimicalto each other. A mythcannot simultaneouslyvalidate transcendental grace and transcendental fatedness. And yet we cannotdiscard either structure in readingSolaris. Theparadoxes of interpretationstem not only from the way these incompatible mythsassociated with Rheyaare shadedinto one another.The readeris also deprivedof ways to determinethe ontologicalstatus of the mythsand mythicbeings. The realisticontology of the tale seems fixed. We are never led to entertainmagical or mythicalexplanations literally. The role of the mythicis never emphasizedin Solaris. Its presenceseems only to represent the naturaltendency of peopleto createstructures of explanationeven when empiricaland rationalisticconditions for one cannotbe met. Myththen is an explanationof somethingthat does not cease to be consideredmysterious as a resultof that explanation.Rheya's physical existence can be explainedin materialisticterms: as a "form" takenfrom a "psychictumor" in Kelvin's cerebrosides,as a neutrino-basedanthropomimetic structure, as an "instrument"of Solaris.In a sense, then, her supernaturalcharacter is merelya par- ticularlyobjective projection of unconscioushuman (and Solarian?) needs. The mythologyshe evokesis closerto Freud'sand Feuerbach's than to Golgotha's andAttica's. But, as usualin Solanrs,the materialisticexplanation leads only to its own limitsand to the necessityof inferringa forminconceivable in materialisticterms. The familiarform of the Visitors,Kelvin tells his colleagues, is only a camouflage:"the real structure,which determinesthe functionsof the Visitors,remains concealed" (7:111). Solaristscan determine that the planet is composedof atoms. How it can producea humanbeing formedfrom neutrinosis beyondthe comprehensionof Solaristics.

7. In Solaris, Lem built into his designboth of the literary"systems of indeterminacy"he discusses in his "Metafantasia"-hermeticambiguity and mutualdistortion of structures-to representthe culturalimplications of the contemporarycognitive paradoxes. Each "system" is an actual,culturally- sanctionedideological interpretation of thoseimplications. Hermetic ambiguity impliesthat there are possible resolutions; but, in Kafka'swords, they are "not forus. " Opposedto thisinverted transcendentalist model, the mutual deformation of narrativestructures attempts to reflectthe view thathuman consciousness andnature are immanently"impure," indefinite processes. Lem does not opt for one or the otherof these radicalsolutions. He is essentiallya realist. He adoptshis clashingparadigms from the actualhistorical evolution of West- ern culture,which has provento be a more exactprototype for his dramaof cognizancethan more subjective models might have been. It embodies,by definition,the strictest determinism (it has already happened) and the most complete openness(we can never be sure whathappened, because it is not over). Just as Solaristicsincludes idealistic hypotheses that the planetis an "imperfect god" or "ocean-yogi,"materialistic hypotheses that it is a "plasmicmecha- nism," and syntheses,like the "homeostaticocean" theory,a true imageof indeterminacyin readingincludes both the quasi-transcendentalistand quasi- immanentistparadigms of uncertainty-eachof which re-enactsprescientific

This content downloaded from 163.120.1.91 on Wed, 31 Dec 2014 11:16:47 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions 20 SCIENCE-FICTIONSTUDIES, VOLUME 12 (1985) ideologiesin the languageof science.Solaris cannot be madeintelligible from only one of thesemutually contradictory perspectives. Both Solaris and Solaris are the productof integratingcertain clues into structuresthat cannot remain stable and closed: since myth and science, metaphorand realisticmimesis, motivateone another,no privilegedway of readingemerges. Whether Kelvin, therepresentative of humanculture, is on theverge of "widening[a] conceptual framework"as Bohrhoped the science of the futurewould, or on the verge of an unbridgeablegulf betweenhuman culture and the universe,we cannot know.Lem leaves his readersat the station where he believesthe 20th century's quantum-Solaristsarrived just beforethem.

NOTES

1. Lem'scollected critical works available in Englishare scheduled to be published in 1985 by HarcourtBrace Jovanovich, under the title Microworlds,edited by Franz Rottensteiner. 2. English-languagecommentaries on Lem includeRose (pp. 82-95), Suvin(in Solaris, pp. 212-23), Ketterer(pp. 182-202), and Potts. 3. To avoid confusion,I will use the Englishtranslators' versions, Snow and Rheya, for Lem's Polish originals,Snaut and Harey. 4. Inthe originalPolish version, Lem names Kelvin's wife andVisitors "Harey." The Englishtranslators' decision to renameher "Rheya" strikesme as an inspired improvementover the original.The linkingof this ambiguousmediator with the Earth goddessreinforces and intensifiesthe irony of Kelvin'sdecision not to returnto the Earth. 5. The readerwho triesto piece Solaristogether from apparent allusions is in for a hardtime. Does the novel's Fechner, the first explorer to die on Solarisand the possible sourceof thegigantic child witnessed by his colleagueBerton, hint at the greatGerman psychophysicist,Gustav Theodor Fechner, who wasequally well knownfor his "hard" work in psychologicalquantification and his theosophicalspeculations on the angelic natureof planets?Is AndreBerton a distortedallusion to the manifesterof Surrealism? ShouldKelvin be associatedwith Lord Kelvin and the only absolutecurrently available to science?Is theresignificance in the namesof the spaceshipsmentioned by Kelvin, andin theirorder of appearance:the glorious ascetic resolve of thePrometheus followed by the Ulysses'connotations of cunningand homesickness, which is thenfollowed by theLaocoon's passive suffering for misreadingthe gods, andfinally the Alaric's purely destructivepower of conquest?These and many other names seem to call out for interpretation,but we cannotbe surethat they are not arbitrary.(In correspondence,Lem claimsthat all the namesin the novel cameto him unconsciously,with the exception of Sartorius,who is namedfor a tiny nmuscle.) 6. The concludingchapter of the bookhas appearedin Englishas "Metafantasia: The Possibilitiesof Science Fiction" (see "WorksCited"). 7. In his SummaTechnologiae, Lem gives thisname to the studyof artificialreali- ties "thatare in no way distinguishablefrom normalreality by the intelligentbeings thatlive in them,but which nonetheless obey rulesdeviating from that normal reality" (Summa,4:171).

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WORKS CITED

Arendt,Hannah. Between Past and Future(NY, 1968). Frye, Northrop.Anatomy of Criticism(Princeton, 1971). Ketterer,David. New Worldsfor Old (Bloomington,IN: 1974). Lem, Stanislaw."Metafantasia: The Possibilitiesof ScienceFiction," SFS, 8 (1981): 54-70. . Solaris, trans. Joanna Kilmartin& Steve Cox (NY: Berkley, 1970). . Summa Technologiae (Budapest, 1976). Parrinder,Patrick. "The BlackWave: Scienceand Social Consciousnessin Modem ScienceFiction" Radical Science Journal, no. 4 (1977), pp. 37-61. Potts,Stephen J. "DialoguesConcerning Human Understanding: Empirical Views of Godfrom Locke to Lem," in Bridgesto ScienceFiction, ed. GeorgeSlusser (Car- bondale,IL.: 1979). Rose, Mark.Alien Encounters.(Cambridge, MA: 1981). Suvin, Darko. "The Open-EndedParables of StanislawLem andSolaris," in Lem's Solaris, ed. cit., pp. 212-23.

RESUME

IstvanCsicsery-Ronay. Le livre est l'extraterrestre:A propos de lectures certaines et incertainesdu Solarisde Len. -Solaris invitea' deux lectures au moins,contradic- toiresmais complementaires: le recitdu contact realise avec la plantte-ocian et la satire de l'illusionque l 'Autrepuisse jamais &trevraiment connu. Toutetentative du lecteur de chercherune lecture unifiee est homologuea la qute donquichottesqueexposee dans le recitlui-mtene, qui espere que la oSolaristiqueparviendra a uneconnaissance scien- tifiqueunifiee de Solaris.Lem inscrit cette contradiction compl6mentaire dans son recit par la techniquede l'POinditerminationsemantique' qu'il d6critdans les conclusions de son ouvrageFantastyka i futurologia: I'ambiguite hermetique qu 'on associe du Cha- teaude Kafkaet l'interferencedes structuresnarratives propre au ..nouveauroman>> francais. (IC-R)

Abstract.-StanislawLem 's Solarisinvites at least twocontradictory, but conplemen- taryreadings: as a romanceof achievedContact with the alienplanet, and as a satire on the illusionthat the Alien-Othercan trulybe known.The reader's attempt to find a unifiedinterpretation ofthe novel corresponds to theSolarists ' quixoticefforts to arrive at a unifiedscientific understanding of Solaris.Lem inscribes this complementary con- tradictorinessin thenovel through the literary techniques of "semanicindeterminacy " he describesin the conclusionof his Fantastykai futurologia:the hermeticambiguity associatedwith Kafka's The Castleand the mutualinterference of narrativestructures associatedwith the Frenchnouveau roman. (IC-R)

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