The Cyberiad : Fables for the Cybernetic Age

The Cyberiad : Fables for the Cybernetic Age
ISBN: 9780141394596
Publication Date: 23 July 2014

'Most cosmic civilizations long for things, in the depths of their souls, they would never openly admit to . . . '

In the strange, surreal world of The Cyberiad, outlandish events abound: two ingenious 'constructors' travel through a medieval universe offering their technical expertise; a machine capable of creating anything that starts with the letter 'N' meets an untimely end; kings oppress their people with parlour games; and PhD pirates demand ransom in knowledge rather than gold. It is a world where UFOs land silently on lawns at dawn, and where even the stars can be re-arranged for advertising purposes. In these fantastical short stories, Stanislaw Lem rewrites the laws of reality, space and language itself to take us on an anarchic and darkly comic journey through a newly imagined universe.

About the Author

Stanislaw Lem (1921-2006) was born in Lviv, then part of Poland. He is probably the most original and influential European science-fiction writer since H.G. Wells. Best known in the West for Tarkovsky's film of his novel Solaris, Lem wrote novels and stories that have been published all over the world. He is credited with anticipating in his writing artificial reality, e-books and nano-technology. His most famous works include Solaris, Tales of Pirx the Pilot, the Summa Technologiae and The Futurological Congress.