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Fables of Desire Author(S): Daniel Kluger Source: Science Fiction Studies, Vol SF-TH Inc Fables of Desire Author(s): Daniel Kluger Source: Science Fiction Studies, Vol. 31, No. 3, Soviet Science Fiction: The Thaw and After (Nov., 2004), pp. 415-417 Published by: SF-TH Inc Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/4241286 . Accessed: 22/10/2014 05:26 Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at . http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp . JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected]. SF-TH Inc is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to Science Fiction Studies. http://www.jstor.org This content downloaded from 131.111.184.22 on Wed, 22 Oct 2014 05:26:19 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions FABLESOF DESIRE 415 Daniel Kluger Fables of Desire The Strugatsky brothers are rightly considered to be the best and the most popular Soviet sf writers. Nor has their popularity dimmed in post-Soviet Russia. Despite the plethoraof new names enteringthe genre in the last ten to fifteen years, the Strugatskys'books sell as briskly today as they used to under the Soviet regime, even thoughwith the deathof the elder brother,Arkady, has broughtthe collaborationto a naturalend. Boris Strugatskycontinues to publish under the pen-name "S. Vititsky," but his solo novels have failed to elicit any great interest among readers. The Strugatskys'contemporary popularity seemingly defies common sense: after all, their last joint novel, Burdenedby Evil, was publishedin 1988. Their masterpieces, Hard to Be a God (1964), Roadside Picnic (1972) and Monday Begins on Saturday(1965), were written in the remote 1960s and 1970s in a country that no longer exists. Nevertheless, the last years have seen no fewer thanthree editions of the brothers'collected works, as well as countlessreprints of separatenovels. There are serious groundsfor consideringthe Strugatskys' oeuvre as central to both Soviet and post-Soviet Russian sf. The phenomenonof the Strugatskys'enduring popularity deserves a deeper analysis than can be given in the frameworkof a short essay. Nevertheless, I hope that I can suggest an approachthrough a comparisonof Roadside Picnic with its "film version," Stalker(1979), made by Andrei Tarkovsky. The term "film version" is in quotation marks because the novel and the film have surprisinglylittle in common. Tarkovky's (and Soderbergh's)films based on StanislawLem's Solaris stay closer to their literarysource than does Stalkerto Roadside Picnic. Roadside Picnic develops one of the Strugatskys'central themes: contact with an extraterrestrialcivilization. Yet it is also unique in not fitting into the authors'coherent future history. Neither its charactersnor its location (perhaps not even its time of action) can be linked to any of the Strugatskys'other novels. The only link is the enigmatic, incomprehensiblenature of the novel's aliens, a motif that echoes the Wandererswho figure in many of their other novels. The Wanderersare a Galactic super-civilizationthat is never confronteddirectly but whose mysterious traces are found on many planets. These traces are often as incomprehensibleas those left by the aliens in the Zone of Roadside Picnic. RoadsidePicnic depicts the aftermathof a Visitation:mysterious aliens land in several places on Earthone night and departin the morning, leaving behind many strangeobjects scatteredaround the landingsites. The action of the novel takes place in one such locale, the Zone. The protagonist, Redrick ("Red") Shuchart,is a professional scavenger who illegally penetratesthe Zone to hunt for alien artifacts. Such people are called "stalkers."There are also legitimate scientific institutionsset up to harvest alien artifacts. Among these mysterious This content downloaded from 131.111.184.22 on Wed, 22 Oct 2014 05:26:19 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions 416 SCIENCE FICTION STUDIES, VOLUME 31 (2004) objects, some are useful, sparkingoff a technological revolution. Others are neutral or extremely dangerous, for example, the "death-lamp"and "witch's jelly. " The artifacts'most importantcharacteristic is thateven those objects that can be copied and utilized cannot be scientifically explained. Stalkers who regularly enter the Zone court danger. They are not left unscathedeven if they manageto survive: their childrenare bornwith a mixture of humanand non-humanfeatures, and the lattereventually predominate. Their homes are hauntedby the walking dead, partiallyresurrected deceased friends and relatives. There is a strange connection between the stalkers' non-human children and the walking dead. There are, in short, numerous mysteries intertwined with the novel's depiction of the adventuresof the stalker Red Shuchart, who gambles with his life to reach the enigmatic Golden Ball, a machine that reputedlycan grant any wish. But the main mystery concerns the meaningof the Visitation itself. Whatwas the aliens' intentionin leaving behind these strange and deadly gifts? One of the novel's characters,the scientist ValentinePilman, offers several explanations, the most extravagantof which is the source of the novel's title: Imagine a clearing in the woods. A car rumbles up the unpavedtrack into the clearing. A group of young people tumble out, boys, girls, bottles, hampers, portableradios, cameras .... They make a fire, put up tents, crankup music. In the morning they're gone. Beasts, birds and insects that have been watchingthe goings-on from their hiding places, emerging timidly. And what do they see? The grass is spotted with oil; used spark-plugsand filters lie scattered. Here is some litter, there-a burnt-outlight bulb, somebody has droppeda screwdriver .... The tires have brought smears of dirt from some unknown swamp; and of course there are ashes of the fire, apple cores, candy wrappers, empty tins and bottles, somebody's handkerchief, a pen-knife, old newspapers, a couple of coins, withered flowers broughtfrom anotherclearing .... A roadsidepicnic in the backwoods of space." (?3.) The existence of several explanations,none of which is ultimatelyendorsed, is an ironic meta-genericcommentary directed at those readerswho expect science fiction to clarify all mysteries out of existence by tying up all loose ends. The novel itself deviates from sf and develops into somethingcloser to allegorical fantasy or fairy tale when it uses the traditionalmotif of an object capable of fulfilling every wish, the Golden Ball. This artifact, the most enigmatic in the Zone, can only be reachedby overcoming deadly obstacles and sacrificing one of the seekers in the process. Much has been written about the connection between sf and the fairy tale. This connection is more evident in Roadside Picnic than in any other of the Strugatskys' novels. The Zone is reminiscent of the underworld, and the stalkers' dangerousexcursions there are the traditionalfairy-tale journeys to the Kingdom of the Dead. After such a journey, the fairy-tale hero is characteristicallygiven magic gifts whose natureis ambivalentin thatthey can, like the artifacts found in the Zone, be used for both good and evil purposes. Anotherfairy-tale element is the story of Red's non-humandaughter, nicknamed Monkey, a subplotthat parallels the famous fairy tales of P. Bazhov, which are This content downloaded from 131.111.184.22 on Wed, 22 Oct 2014 05:26:19 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions FABLESOF DESIRE 417 based on the folklore of the miners in the Ural mountains.The protagonistof three of these fairy tales ("The Stone Flower," "The Masterof the Mountain," and "The MalachiteBox") is a miner named Danila who visits the underworld ruledover by the Queen of the CopperMountain. Afterwards, he has a daughter who is different from other childrenand mysteriouslylinked to the underworld. The rich folkloric and mythologicalsubtext of theirwork may be one reasonfor the Strugatskys' unabated popularity in contemporaryRussia. Folklore and mythology are immune to fashion and easily survive historicalupheavals. The first version of the Stalker script was written by the Strugatskys themselves and titled TheMachine of Desire. Had the film followed this script, it would have been closely based on the novel. The Strugatskys'protagonist, despite a differentname, is indistinguishablefrom Red Shuchart.His character and goals differ only slightly from those of the novel's protagonist.The Zone is the same as in the novel: dangerous,mysterious, and yet with a distinctfairy- tale flavor. The script displays a full range of fantasticphenomena, including a time loop, a gravitationalanomaly, and a terrifying "meat-chopper." But Tarkovsky's film ultimately used a different script, written by the Strugatskysin collaborationwith the directorhimself. In this final script, there is no adventurerand gambler named Shuchartwho risks everythingto save his daughter, and the Zone is not a fantastic space. The Stalker of the film is a saintlydreamer who guides a groupof people to a Room of wish fulfillment. His motives for doing so, while not entirely clear, are selfless and pure. The film's Zone resembles nothing so much as a desertedand derelict industrialarea. The viewer eventually begins to doubtwhether the Zone even exists or whetherit is merely a fantasy of the Stalker and his
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