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December 23, 2004
His Master's Voice
37 years ago, Stanislaw Lem finished His Master's Voice. Many years later the title for a book explaining the human condition from the point of view of an idealist occurred to me, Autobiography of a Loser, but the outline remained hazy.
Lem's book contains, as a sideline, a better version than I'd ever write. Lem recounts the tale from the point of view of a mathematician engaged in a massive project to crack what was understood as a complex encoded message emanating many light years from earth. The action in Lem's story strikes me as hilariously formulaic for an author with so many new ideas he can in every few paragraphs expose, review, and discard an imaginary insight on which a lesser author might base an entire novel.
The core question: What the human mind can do with something truly new and different? Lem's answers make HMV richer than carrot cake.
Posted by Mark at December 23, 2004 10:44 AM