Golkonda nuclear volcano
The Golkonda nuclear volcano ( Russian Страна багровых туч ; scientific transliteration Strana bagrovych tuč , Duden transcription Strana bagrowych tutsch (literally "The land of the purple clouds ")) is the first science fiction novel by the brothers Arkadi and Boris Strugazkiadi . It was published in the Soviet Union in 1959.
The novel is connected to the novel The Way to Amalthea (1960) and the episode novel Praktikanten (1962) through the main character Alexej Bykow . The authors had to revise their original text for publication.
content
Six cosmonauts prepare for a trip to the planet Venus in the communist Soviet Union at the end of the 20th century . The new spacecraft Chius of the Venus mission is propelled with photons . Venus is a still unexplored planet covered by clouds. Scientific interest is sparked when the Golkonda atomic volcano forms uranium copper ore and other heavy metals after a meteorite impact. The cosmonauts find themselves in increasingly dangerous situations, which also lead to deaths. The original Russian title The Land of the Purple Clouds alludes to the warning "Be afraid of the red ring" by the geologist Tachmasib Mechti. What this is all about is revealed at the end of the novel.
The nature of Venus, as it is described in the novel in the late 1950s, differs greatly from today's knowledge. Water pressure and temperature are significantly lower than on the real planet, there are plants and a low-level animal world and the period of rotation around its own axis is only 57 hours instead of 243 days.
interpretation
Two problems are dealt with in the novel: the interrelationship between common good and individual interests on the one hand and general technical progress and the conquest of space on the other.
Publication history
Even before the first publication of the novel, the authors were forced to make numerous changes to the text; they criticized the high number of deaths, demanded that almost all the names of the characters appearing be changed, and insisted that any mention of military and military ranks be deleted from the manuscript. The GDR edition, which was often reprinted later, was again deleted and shortened; the epilogue of the novel was also omitted. The first complete German edition is the version published by Golkonda-Verlag in 2012.
literature
- Karsten Kruschel : Golkonda nuclear volcano / work edition - fourth volume. In: The Science Fiction Year 2013. Edited by Sascha Mamczak , Sebastian Pirling and Wolfgang Jeschke , Wilhelm Heyne Verlag, Munich 2013, pp. 443–449, ISBN 978-3-453-53444-5 .
Individual evidence
- ↑ See Boris Strugazki: Commentary , in: Atomvulkan Golkonda. The land of purple clouds , Golkonda Verlag 2012, p. 354f.
- ↑ Cf. Erik Simon: Departure into the world of noon. The forgotten debut of the Strugatzkis . in: Golkonda nuclear volcano. The land of purple clouds , Golkonda Verlag 2012, p. 367
German editions
- Arkadi N. Strugazki, Boris N. Strugazki: Strana bagrovych tuč . 1959 (Russian original edition).
- Arkadi Strugazki, Boris Strugazki: Golkonda nuclear volcano . Verlag Kultur und Progress, Berlin 1961 (German first edition, translated from the Russian by Willi Berger).
- Arkadi Strugazki, Boris Strugazki: Golkonda nuclear volcano . Heyne, Munich 1980, ISBN 3-453-30254-0 . (text identical to the edition from 1961)
- Arkadi Strugatzki, Boris Strugatzki: Golkonda nuclear volcano . Golkonda, Berlin 2012, ISBN 978-3-942396-22-6 (first complete German edition; uncensored and unedited version reconstructed based on the manuscripts, completed by a chapter from an early working version of the novel; comments by Boris Strugatzki, afterword and notes by Erik Simon).
Web links
- Maxim Moschkow's library: Strana bagrovych tuč ( txt file; 744 kB ) (Russian romantic text, version of the original edition, edited by the editor)
- Library of Maxim Moschkow: Strana bagrovych tuč ( txt file; 812 kB ) (Russian novel text; original version by the authors)