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As far as I know Stanisław Lem was not allowed to like anything from US. These days the soviet propaganda in Poland disallowed people to like anything that came

As far as I know Stanisław Lem was not allowed to like anything from US. These days the soviet propaganda in Poland disallowed people to like anything that came from "the rotten west"

SideburnsOfDoom 2y ago
Yes, and as far as I know Stanisław Lem was also genuinely contemptuous of the 1950s default style of US sci-fi: square-jawed heroes who triumph over every puzzle, right every wrong; Cowboys and Indians on a frontier planet, manifest destiny, etc. A lot of his work emphasises how this tendency fails in the face of the sheer unknowable alienness of the outer universe. e.g. Solaris, The Invincible, Fiasco. Lem liked Phil Dick though, because Dick's work was more sceptical and mind-bending: more like his own work than it was like the spaceship heroics.
- stonogo 2y ago
  I'm sure you know this, but for those who might not, US sci-fi was just as varied as anywhere else... except in the domain of John W. Campbell, for decades the editor of the biggest-circulation sci-fi magazine in the country, where he very much explicitly selected for that kind of story. Lots of famous authors active in the era have tales of how they edited their work to meet Campbells demands -- I recall one where the author switched the 'human' and 'alien' species because Campbell wouldn't print a story where humanity 'lost.' Truly a fascinating character, and an author in his own right, responsible for the story that John Carpenter would adapt for his film The Thing. I don't share his taste in science fiction, but he had a massive impact on the genre.
  - SideburnsOfDoom 2y ago
    Yes, indeed. I was thinking of the pulp magazines, and also to an extent the Original Series of Star Trek. See Jeannette Ng's "2019 John W. Campbell Award" acceptance speech on the topic, and commentary that followed.
    - andybak 2y ago
      You're doing a genre with a complex timeline somewhat of a disservice here. Dick's career spanned two or three of the broad "waves" of SF. He was embraced by the New Wave authors probably more than any other writer not of their generation.
- bawolff 2y ago
  Im not super well read in that era, but i feel like that sort of square-jawed americanism was already kind of being deconstructed at that point. E.g. asimov books were all about how brain beat brawn, and violence is the last refuge of the incompetent.
trwired 2y ago
> As far as I know Stanisław Lem was not allowed to like anything from US. These days the soviet propaganda in Poland disallowed people to like anything that came from "the rotten west" Such statement would hold somewhat true for the Soviet Union until the 80s, but not for Poland, whose society never stopped seeing itself as a part of wider European community, and because of significant migration in the XIX and XX century, also felt a connection with the US. Poland took advantage of Stalin's death to wrangle itself somewhat free of Soviet hegemony and starting with Gomułka's Thaw [1], adopted a more liberal model. It was still a dictatorship, but in comparison with the Soviet Union itself and also a few of the more repressive regimes in other satellite states, it was significantly more open. Edward Gierek's [2] rule only reinforced that course. Don't get me wrong, it wasn't all roses. The inflow of Western culture faced many obstacles still, but those were often more of economical nature — in general books were translated, movies were shown in cinemas, the TV was filled with (somewhat dated) American and Western European TV shows, and Polish artists followed world trends in music (although with significant delay). The „rotten west” mindset never took root in Polish society and the authorities didn't enforce it with much zeal once the most repressive era ended in the mid-50s. [1] — https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polish_October https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polish_October [2] — https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_Gierek https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_Gierek
- BrandoElFollito 2y ago
  Not to mention that people were traveling to the west quite a bit (especially to France and the US), VCR tapes were broadly shared and they had this dichotomy of communism and the church reigning each one on everyone.
- p0w3n3d 2y ago
  What I'm saying that writers were clearly forbidden by the communist powers to look towards west. Those were cancelled subjects, and cancel would be the least punishment there available. That's why everything that was written against the censorship bureau, would be covered by an allegory blanket, and writers were often asked to remove parts of they could be deciphered by the censor officials. Of course later on the iron hand of authorities was loosening and more and more forbidden words were tolerated, up to the 1989 Round Table event when Poland was freed (not before strong military repression happening in 1981)
ajuc 2y ago
Lem wrote in his journal: "Na początku 48 roku wyjechałem na miesiąc do Pragi, gdzie zostałem zatrudniony w rządowej klinice im. Klimenta Woroszyłowa (wyobraźcie sobie u nas szpital imieniem Hermanna Goeringa). I ledwo wytrzymałem ten miesiąc. Codziennie jak nie masówka na stołówce, to agitka w szpitalnych garażach. W moim rodzimym krakowskim szpitalu na Montelupich byłoby to nie do pomyślenia. My byliśmy jednak najweselszym barakiem w obozie..." "In the beginning of 1948 I went to Praga for a month, where I worked in government health clinic named after Kliment Woroshylov (imagine a hospital named after Goering in Poland). I barely managed to survive that month. Every day either a general meeting in the dining hall or political agitation in the hospital's garages. In Kraków Montelupi's hospital where I usually worked it would be unimaginable. We indeed are the merriest barrack in the [socialist] camp..." Poles often called themselves that because censorship was the least strict there and we had some contact with the western culture (mainly through the "Kultura Paryska" - a Polish emigrants in Paris printed a newspaper that was very influential in Poland despite being theoretically banned - it was smuggled in en masse - it was so influential that to this day the political program developed by Giedroyć and Mieroszewski in that newspaper is serving as the core for Polish foreign policy - and it's working very well so far). It changed depending on the period (50s were the worst) - but western culture was usually pretty well known and admired in communist Poland. We had very lively jazz scene, Beatles and other rock bands were played in radio (for example in Polish Radio 3 there were whole auditions based on showcasing western music - it was considered a "safety valve for Polish youth" by the communists). We even had yearly indie punk/rock festival in Jarocin where all the anti-mainstream western-inspired kids went to drink and sing punk songs against the system. Don't get me wrong - communism was obviously evil. But it wasn't competent/diligent enough to be 100% totalitarian in Poland. That would take too much effort and for what? You'd get paid the same either way. If you were unlucky you could definitely go to prison for a wrong joke or song. But most people didn't. Anyway. Lem definitely would have written that he liked American sci-fi if he did liked it.
- int_19h 2y ago
  The "happiest barrack" in the Soviet Bloc was traditionally considered to be Hungary, though: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goulash_Communism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goulash_Communism Although that was after the Hungarian Revolution.

As far as I know Stanisław Lem was not allowed to like anything from US. These days the soviet propaganda in Poland disallowed people to like anything that came from "the rotten west"

SideburnsOfDoom 2y ago

Yes, and as far as I know Stanisław Lem was also genuinely contemptuous of the 1950s default style of US sci-fi: square-jawed heroes who triumph over every puzzle, right every wrong; Cowboys and Indians on a frontier planet, manifest destiny, etc. A lot of his work emphasises how this tendency fails in the face of the sheer unknowable alienness of the outer universe. e.g. Solaris, The Invincible, Fiasco. Lem liked Phil Dick though, because Dick's work was more sceptical and mind-bending: more like his own work than it was like the spaceship heroics.

stonogo 2y ago
I'm sure you know this, but for those who might not, US sci-fi was just as varied as anywhere else... except in the domain of John W. Campbell, for decades the editor of the biggest-circulation sci-fi magazine in the country, where he very much explicitly selected for that kind of story. Lots of famous authors active in the era have tales of how they edited their work to meet Campbells demands -- I recall one where the author switched the 'human' and 'alien' species because Campbell wouldn't print a story where humanity 'lost.' Truly a fascinating character, and an author in his own right, responsible for the story that John Carpenter would adapt for his film The Thing. I don't share his taste in science fiction, but he had a massive impact on the genre.
- SideburnsOfDoom 2y ago
  Yes, indeed. I was thinking of the pulp magazines, and also to an extent the Original Series of Star Trek. See Jeannette Ng's "2019 John W. Campbell Award" acceptance speech on the topic, and commentary that followed.
  - andybak 2y ago
    You're doing a genre with a complex timeline somewhat of a disservice here. Dick's career spanned two or three of the broad "waves" of SF. He was embraced by the New Wave authors probably more than any other writer not of their generation.
bawolff 2y ago
Im not super well read in that era, but i feel like that sort of square-jawed americanism was already kind of being deconstructed at that point. E.g. asimov books were all about how brain beat brawn, and violence is the last refuge of the incompetent.

trwired 2y ago

> As far as I know Stanisław Lem was not allowed to like anything from US. These days the soviet propaganda in Poland disallowed people to like anything that came from "the rotten west" Such statement would hold somewhat true for the Soviet Union until the 80s, but not for Poland, whose society never stopped seeing itself as a part of wider European community, and because of significant migration in the XIX and XX century, also felt a connection with the US. Poland took advantage of Stalin's death to wrangle itself somewhat free of Soviet hegemony and starting with Gomułka's Thaw [1], adopted a more liberal model. It was still a dictatorship, but in comparison with the Soviet Union itself and also a few of the more repressive regimes in other satellite states, it was significantly more open. Edward Gierek's [2] rule only reinforced that course. Don't get me wrong, it wasn't all roses. The inflow of Western culture faced many obstacles still, but those were often more of economical nature — in general books were translated, movies were shown in cinemas, the TV was filled with (somewhat dated) American and Western European TV shows, and Polish artists followed world trends in music (although with significant delay). The „rotten west” mindset never took root in Polish society and the authorities didn't enforce it with much zeal once the most repressive era ended in the mid-50s. [1] — https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polish_October https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polish_October [2] — https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_Gierek https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_Gierek

BrandoElFollito 2y ago
Not to mention that people were traveling to the west quite a bit (especially to France and the US), VCR tapes were broadly shared and they had this dichotomy of communism and the church reigning each one on everyone.
p0w3n3d 2y ago
What I'm saying that writers were clearly forbidden by the communist powers to look towards west. Those were cancelled subjects, and cancel would be the least punishment there available. That's why everything that was written against the censorship bureau, would be covered by an allegory blanket, and writers were often asked to remove parts of they could be deciphered by the censor officials. Of course later on the iron hand of authorities was loosening and more and more forbidden words were tolerated, up to the 1989 Round Table event when Poland was freed (not before strong military repression happening in 1981)

ajuc 2y ago

Lem wrote in his journal: "Na początku 48 roku wyjechałem na miesiąc do Pragi, gdzie zostałem zatrudniony w rządowej klinice im. Klimenta Woroszyłowa (wyobraźcie sobie u nas szpital imieniem Hermanna Goeringa). I ledwo wytrzymałem ten miesiąc. Codziennie jak nie masówka na stołówce, to agitka w szpitalnych garażach. W moim rodzimym krakowskim szpitalu na Montelupich byłoby to nie do pomyślenia. My byliśmy jednak najweselszym barakiem w obozie..." "In the beginning of 1948 I went to Praga for a month, where I worked in government health clinic named after Kliment Woroshylov (imagine a hospital named after Goering in Poland). I barely managed to survive that month. Every day either a general meeting in the dining hall or political agitation in the hospital's garages. In Kraków Montelupi's hospital where I usually worked it would be unimaginable. We indeed are the merriest barrack in the [socialist] camp..." Poles often called themselves that because censorship was the least strict there and we had some contact with the western culture (mainly through the "Kultura Paryska" - a Polish emigrants in Paris printed a newspaper that was very influential in Poland despite being theoretically banned - it was smuggled in en masse - it was so influential that to this day the political program developed by Giedroyć and Mieroszewski in that newspaper is serving as the core for Polish foreign policy - and it's working very well so far). It changed depending on the period (50s were the worst) - but western culture was usually pretty well known and admired in communist Poland. We had very lively jazz scene, Beatles and other rock bands were played in radio (for example in Polish Radio 3 there were whole auditions based on showcasing western music - it was considered a "safety valve for Polish youth" by the communists). We even had yearly indie punk/rock festival in Jarocin where all the anti-mainstream western-inspired kids went to drink and sing punk songs against the system. Don't get me wrong - communism was obviously evil. But it wasn't competent/diligent enough to be 100% totalitarian in Poland. That would take too much effort and for what? You'd get paid the same either way. If you were unlucky you could definitely go to prison for a wrong joke or song. But most people didn't. Anyway. Lem definitely would have written that he liked American sci-fi if he did liked it.

int_19h 2y ago
The "happiest barrack" in the Soviet Bloc was traditionally considered to be Hungary, though: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goulash_Communism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goulash_Communism Although that was after the Hungarian Revolution.