A READERS THEATRE PRODUCTION OF THREE STORIES FROM STANISLAW LEM'S THE CYBERIAD; FABLES FOR THE CYBERNETIC AGE by CONNIE TAPP BANDY, B.S. in Ed. A THESIS IN SPEECH COMMUNICATION Submitted to the Graduate Faculty of Texas Tech University in -Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of MASTER OF ARTS Approved Accepted December, 1982 7:- : I P"— ^ ACKNOWLEDGMENTS I am deeply indebted to Dr. Vera L. Simpson for her direction of this thesis, and for her help and encouragement throughout the years. I would also like to thank Dr. William J. Jordan and Dr. Keith V. Erickson for their helpful criticism and advice. I would like to express my gratitude to Mrs. Linda Milam Vancil and to Mr. Julian "Kip" Hyde, who also read the role of Klapaucius, for their invaluable help in staging this readers theatre production, as well as to the rest of my cast for their hard work: Mr. Ernest Barton, Ms. Joyce Elliot, and Ms. Linda Thompson. Mr. Stephen Tolle designed the backdrop for the set. 11 CONTENTS ACKNOWLEDGMENTS 11 I. INTRODUCTION 1 Review of Previous Studies in Science Fiction 2 Oral Interpretation and Readers Theatre as Modes of Literary Study 5 Justification of the Study 7 Statement of Problem 10 Methodology 11 Summary of Chapters 11 II. LEM'S LIFE AND LITERATURE 15 Difficulties in Working with Translations 15 Brief Biography of Lem 18 Lem's Works 19 Lem's Major Themes and Techniques 26 Reasons for Choosing The Cyberiad Selections 27 Summary 29 III. CONFRONTATION, MEDITATION, CONTROL AND RECOGNITION OF THE STRUCTURAL DYNAMICS OF THE LITERATURE 32 Director's Role: Confrontation 32 Director's Role: Meditation 34 Director's Role: Determination of Control and Structural Dynamics 35 Director's Role: Assembling the Cast 38 Group Process: Confrontation 41 Group Process: Meditation and Control 43 Group Process: Recognition of Structural Dynamics 44 Summary 45 IV. EXPLORATION OF THE LITERATURE 47 Group Evolution of the Set 47 Group Evolution of Characters 49 Group Evolution of Blocking 52 Development of Costuming 54 111 Rationale for Lighting 54 Summary 55 V. COMPLETION 57 Public Performances 57 Audience Reactions to the Metaworld 57 Summary 68 VI. SUMMARY, CONCLUSIONS, AND RECOMMENDATIONS FOR FUTURE STUDY 70 Summary 70 Conclusions 71 Recommendations for Future Study 71 SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY 73 APPENDICES A. Correspondence 83 B. Script 86 C. Figures 131 1. Ground Plan 132 2. Elevation of Center Arrangement 133 D. Audience Questionnaire 134 iv CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION Our concern here ... is with certain writers of real excellence whose major achievements have come after the remarkable decade of the fifties but who for one reason or another, have not been a part of the "New Wave." Their work is among the very best science fiction we have, and its high literary quality has had much to do with the grow­ ing attention science fiction has received from literary critics and the growing respectability of science fiction courses in schools and colleges. These writers are Philip K. Dick and Ursula K. Le Guin in America, John Brunner and D. G. Compton in England, and Stanislaw Lem in Poland. This thesis has as its subject the works of one of the "writers of real excellence," Stanislaw Lem, which had been translated into English as of April, 1978. Although each of his works of fiction which had been translated will be discussed at least briefly, major attention will be directed to his cycle of robotic tales. The Cyberiad: Fables for the Cybernetic Age, translated by Michael Kandel The means of literary study employed will be literary analysis cul­ minating in performance through readers theatre. This chapter will set forth introductory material relevant to this study, discuss the compatibility of science fiction and readers theatre, state the par­ ticular problem to be examined, introduce the method to be followed in solving that problem, and outline the chapters to follow. Review of Previous Studies in Science Fiction And what are some of the things which the tradi­ tional literary critic knows about SF? He knows that works of SF use the language clumsily, with neither grace nor wit. He knows that these works lack interesting characters, being populated by robots, some of whom are supposed to be men and women. He knows that the plotting in these fic­ tions is either hackneyed, episodic, or both. And he knows that their subject matter is unreal, 2 escapist, and ultimately trivial. This description of the field of science fiction is, perhaps, the most pervasive one for many people. Why, then, should the number of courses offered in the study of science fiction rise from one in 1962 at Colgate University, to approximately five hundred by 1974 at various colleges throughout the United States and Canada, as Lahna F. 3 Diskin reported in her doctoral research? The answer may simply be: ... a certain amount of what people "know" about SF without reading it is true—and simply reveals a prejudice against the genre and against other con­ temporary forms of fiction as well. But much of this "knowledge" is totally unfounded, the result of misinformation and ignorance of the texts them­ selves. Ursula K. Le Guin, herself one of the "certain writers of real excellence" mentioned earlier, also discusses this "image" problem in one of her essays: It's a pity that this trivial image is perpetuated, when the work of people from Zamyatin to Lem has shown that when science fiction uses its limitless range of symbol and metaphor novelistically, with the subject at the centre [sic], it can show us who we are, and where we are, and what choices face us, with unsurpassed clarity, and with a great and troubling beauty. In research at the University of Iowa, Sam J. Siciliano concluded that science fiction works were both creative and mimetic, drawing on reality to create something new. After working with "Science, Fiction, and Film: A Study of the Interaction of Science, Science Fiction Literature, and the Growth of Cinema," Bruce R. Cook con­ cluded that science fiction serves a threefold purpose in modern society: as a feedback system to science; as a barometer of societal concerns, hopes, and fears; and as a modern mythology. Norman Spinrad agrees that science fiction holds a unique sphere of influ­ ence: Speculative fiction is the only fiction that deals with modern reality in the only way that it can be comprehended—as the interface between a rapidly evolving and fissioning environment and the result­ ant continuously mutating human consciousness. Speculative fiction is surfacing into popular cul­ ture from every direction because it reflects the condition of the modern mind. It is the only fic­ tion that confronts and explores the modern Zeit­ geist and is therefore inherently the literature of 8 our times. Although science/speculative fiction may serve as a type of modem mythology, it explores Mythos within certain new knowledge. Robert Scholes writes in his book. Structural Fabulation: ^ Essay on Fiction of the Future: In works of structural fabulation the tradition of speculative fiction is modified by an awareness of the nature of the universe as a system of systems, a structure of structures, and the insights of the past century of science are accepted as fictional points of departure. Yet structural fabulation is neither scientific in its methods nor a substitute for actual science. It is a fictional exploration of human situation made perceptible by the impli­ cations of recent science. Its favorite themes involve the impact of developments or revelations derived from the human or the physical sciences upon the people who must live with those revela- 9 tions or developments. Some research has been conducted from this viewpoint of scien­ tific developments. Nancy Whyte Lewis examined the Alexandria Quartet group of novels by Lawrence Durrell in terms of the author's rendering of space in the post-Einsteinian era, to determine the degree Durrell approached reality as either wholistic or atomistic. Samuel H. Vasbinder reached further into the past to look at elements of Newtonian monism as a basis of scientific thought in Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, while T. H. Kirlin delved into the "geometric imagination" of H. G. Wells in early classic science fiction: The Time 12 Machine, The Sleeper Wakes, and "A Story of Days to Come." Not all research has taken the scientific tack, however. D. G. Jackson chose to perform a historical analysis of the Frankenstein 13 story, based on mythos, technological advances, and social changes. Jennie Dailey designed a course on science fiction, including such diverse works as Robert Heinlein's Stranger in a^ Strange Land, Frank Herbert's Dune, Roger Zelazny's "A Rose for Ecclesiastes," and Samuel Delaney's "Time Considered as a Helix of Semi-Precious Stones," as 14 well as others. Science fiction themes in mainstream novels. William Golding's The Inheritors and Walker Percy's Love in the Ruins, drew the attention of Peter S. Alterman for his research. The possibilities for work in the area of science fiction are wide-ranging. One dissertation looked at science fiction as a para- religious experience in the works of Roger Zelazny, whil^hi; e another 17 examined the cult phenomenon of science fiction fandom. In terms of the varying societies presented, one writer has chosen to view anti-utopian elements of science fiction in the mid- 18 Twentieth Century, i.e. the "Golden Age." One woman elected to do a content analysis of paperback science fiction appearing in the 19 United States from 1945-70, in terms of projected societies. Obviously, neither of these mentioned Lem or his work, since his books were not translated until the 1970s.