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Solaris ::
I usually read Science Fiction for the story line. I don’t expect much in the way of poetry or complex writing style, nor to I expect the themes to be all that compelling. So I was pretty amazed after I read the first twenty pages of Solaris and found all of those elements involved in the book. I soon felt comfortable making the assertion that it was the most textured, captivating novel I’d read since, well, maybe The Spectator Bird. (Not that the two had anything else in common, of course.)
Solaris is also interesting because for all the complexity and artistry in its discourse, there really wasn’t much in the way of plot. Basically, you have this guy who travels across the galaxy to a space station that is in orbit around a planet where it is determined that the sea is a living, sentient being. Soon after he gets there, it turns out that the ocean may be manipulating the minds of everyone on the station, because everyone there is experiencing physical manifestations of their own memories; for the hero, Kris Kelvin, he is visited by a lover who died ten years earlier. That introduces a significant amount of confusion and emotional intensity for him, but once it starts happening, most of the events and ensuing struggles are internal and emotional, so not all that much happens that advances a plot. But that was OK with me -- there was more than enough going on to keep me interested. At least for a time.
For all its surprises and its complexities, I did find in the end that it was a difficult book to read. There was a lot of words spent describing the speculations and internal searchings that Kris went through when his long-lost love was reintroduced into his life. And it seemed like he was mostly barking up the wrong tree -- he spent all of his time trying to understand scientifically the manifestation of his dead lover, rather than wondering why she had showed up rather than someone else. In the end, I found it hard to believe that anyone could have such an intense internal stuggle without having emotional issues arise in any meaningful way.
But then, maybe that was the point that Stanislaw Lem was trying to make. Maybe that weakness on the part of the hero was intended to reveal some strength in the reader they might not know existed. Not that I want to spend much time speculating -- I’d rather just read the book and enjoy it for what it was.
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