Transfer (Stanisław Lem)

In his novel Transfer (also published under the title Return from the Stars , the literal translation of the original title) from 1961, Stanisław Lem describes a futuristic society in which all people have given up their aggressive instincts through treatment at birth.

people

The narrative perspective is that of the pilot Hal Bregg, who is returning from a 10-year space flight during which time the earth has moved 127 years into the future through time dilation . He meets the actress Aen Aenis, who embodies the luxurious, superficial way of life of society, and the girl Eri, with whom Bregg falls in love.

action

After returning from their space flight, the crew experiences a dramatically changed humanity. In addition to technological advancement, the change is primarily of a social nature. People live non-violently and without aggression due to the so-called betrayal . Distribution struggles and conflicts no longer take place; instead, social pleasures, virtual experiences , clothing, consumption and superficial interactions make up life. Money no longer plays a major role in society, as a large number of intelligent robots do almost all services and production. Everything dangerous has been removed from life, an anti-gravity mechanism has even made injuries in accidents with means of transport impossible. Society is complex to incomprehensible and full of strange customs and manners, but at the same time energetic and boring, without tension and curiosity. Nobody cares anymore about the years of their lives that the space travelers sacrificed for their dangerous and lonely action. Even love relationships are terrifyingly lifeless and devoid of any intensity.

Bregg makes the acquaintance of three women who are attracted to him because of his unique aggressiveness (which, from a contemporary perspective, ought to be called meekness). The third encounter creates a love relationship that prompts him to come to terms with life on earth.

The members of his team, who besides him are the only ones in this society still possessing their natural human savagery, cannot integrate and they decide, repulsed by this kind of future, to plan a space flight that will take them away from earth to the stars .

Interpretation and evaluation

Lem's novel asks about the meaning of research (not only of space travel, but of scientific and civilizational “progress” as a whole) that alienates people from their own world. The technology as such does not play the main role. The parallel world of robots in the novel only reflects the expected future effects of the automation of the world of work. The discarded robots lament their condition and whine like old and frail workers; they can end up in the robot graveyard or become insane.

But in the foreground comes the description of the alienation phenomena of a mankind who has been deprived of aggression with drugs, but also of many emotional expressions. While the heroic deeds of exploring the world of stars fade, the smoothing of affects through consumption and medication is a symbol of the achievements of Western civilization that few people can escape and that were also felt in Poland after the Polish October . The earth is thus to a certain extent largely feminized. The "new" men are small, inconspicuous and weak. The longing for romance has not died: The new “soft”, feminine side of civilization remains tempting for men who have retained their aggressiveness, just as their archaic behaviors are, conversely, attractive to women. The gender picture is drawn very conventionally here; Women are responsible for emotions; It is precisely this emotionality that men perceive as threatening.

With this novel, Lem begins to take an increasingly critical view of technology and the progress of civilization. The parallels to Aldous Huxley's novel “ Brave New World ” (1922) and to Gajda's novel The People in the Atomic Era (1948, published only 1957) are obvious.

In an interview, Lem later commented negatively about his work: “The sentimentality of this book bothers me; the heroes are muscled, and the heroine is made of cardboard. "

expenditure

• Stanisław Lem: Powrót z gwiazd . Czytelnik, Warszawa 1961
• Stanisław Lem: Transfer . (German translation by Maria Kurecka) Marion-von-Schröder-Verlag, Düsseldorf 1974
• the same translation also appeared as: Return from the Stars . Insel-Verlag, Frankfurt am Main 1984
• as a radio play entitled Return to Earth (Director: Andreas Weber-Schäfer ). SDR 1974.

literature

• Bartholomäus Figatowski: Between utopian idea and reality: Kurd Laßwitz and Stanislaw Lem as representatives of Central European science fiction. Wetzlar 2004 [1]

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Cf. Antonina Dyjas: Paradisien on the Vistula. Polish Science Fiction 1945-1989 in the context of literary utopia. Dissertation, Bonn 2013. Online (pdf)
2. ↑ https://german.lem.pl/index.php?option=com_content&view=category&layout=blog&id=20&Itemid=30