Christmas is an annual festival commemorating the birth of Jesus Christ, observed primarily on December 25 as a religious and cultural celebration among billions of people around the world. A liturgical feast central to Christianity, preparation for Christmas begins on the First Sunday of Advent and it is followed by Christmastide, which historically in the West lasts twelve days and culminates on Twelfth Night. Christmas Day is a public holiday in many countries, is celebrated religiously by a majority of Christians, as well as culturally by many non-Christians, and forms an integral part of the holiday season surrounding it.
Stanisław Herman Lem was a Polish writer. He was the author of many novels, short stories, and essays on various subjects, including philosophy, futurology, and literary criticism. Many of his science fiction stories are of satirical and humorous character. Lem's books have been translated into more than 50 languages and have sold more than 45 million copies. Worldwide, he is best known as the author of the 1961 novel Solaris. In 1976 Theodore Sturgeon wrote that Lem was the most widely read science fiction writer in the world.
The Futurological Congress is a 1971 black humour science fiction novel by Polish author Stanisław Lem. It details the exploits of the hero of a number of his stories, Ijon Tichy, as he visits the Eighth World Futurological Congress at a Hilton Hotel in Costa Rica. The book is Lem's take on the science fictional trope of an apparently Utopian future that turns out to be an illusion.
Observation on the Spot is a social science fiction novel by Stanisław Lem. The novel is a report of Ijon Tichy's travel to a faraway planet Entia to study their civilization. This report was supposed to fix a misunderstanding arisen from Tichy's Fourteenth Voyage to supposedly Entia, which turned out to be a satellite of Entia, masqueraded by Entians to misguide explorers. The travel was also to verify the results of the "Institute of Historiographical Computers", which use predictive modeling to overcome the speed of light limitation and get information about the state of the affairs on remote planets based on information obtained from previous expeditions.
Ijon Tichy is a fictional character who appears in several works of the Polish science fiction writer Stanisław Lem: initially in The Star Diaries, later in The Futurological Congress, Peace on Earth, Observation on the Spot, and Memoirs of a Space Traveller. Tichy is also the narrator in a 1973 novel Professor A. Dońda, being the professor's sidekick.
The Star Diaries is a series of short stories of the adventures of space traveller Ijon Tichy, of satirical nature, by Polish writer Stanisław Lem. The first ones were published in a 1954 collection Sezam i inne opowiadania and first published as a separate book in 1957 titled Dzienniki gwiazdowe, expanded in 1971. Closely related to this series is the series Ze wspomnień Ijona Tichego [From the Memoirs of Ijon Tichy]. Usually these stories, and several others, are considered to be the same cycle of the adventures of Ijon Tichy.
Science fiction and fantasy in Poland dates to the late 18th century. However, science fiction as a genre in Polish literature truly began to emerge at the end of the 19th century under the influence of Jules Verne's work. During the latter years of the People's Republic of Poland, a very popular genre of science fiction was social science fiction. Later, many other genres gained prominence.
Joseph René Vilatte, also known as Mar Timotheus I, was a French–American Catholic active in France and the United States. He was associated with several Christian denominations before his ordination as a Christian Catholic Church of Switzerland (CKS) bishop for service in an Episcopal diocese. Eventually, he was reconciled with the Catholic Church and voluntarily entered a solemn vow of abjuration.
Physician writers are physicians who write creatively in fields outside their practice of medicine.
Elements of fantastical or supernatural fiction have been part of mainstream Russian literature since the 18th century. Russian fantasy developed from the centuries-old traditions of Slavic mythology and folklore. Russian science fiction emerged in the mid-19th century and rose to its golden age during the Soviet era, both in cinema and literature, with writers like the Strugatsky brothers, Kir Bulychov, and Mikhail Bulgakov, among others. Soviet filmmakers produced a number science fiction and fantasy films. With the fall of the Iron Curtain, modern Russia experienced a renaissance of fantasy. Outside modern Russian borders, there are a significant number of Russophone writers and filmmakers from Ukraine, Belarus and Kazakhstan, who have made a notable contribution to the genres.
Ijon Tichy: Space Pilot is a satiric German television series loosely based on the series of science fiction stories The Star Diaries by Stanisław Lem. The television series was created by Randa Chahoud, Dennis Jacobsen, and Oliver Jahn with Jahn playing the protagonist, space traveller Ijon Tichy. The major female role, the female robot hologramme, is played by Nora Tschirner.
Stanisław Lem's fictitious criticism of nonexistent books may be found in his following works: in three collections of faux reviews of fictional books: A Perfect Vacuum, Provocation, and Library of 21st Century translated as One Human Minute, and in Imaginary Magnitude, a collection of introductions to nonexistent books.
Sepulkas are fictional objects found in works The Star Diaries and Observation on the Spot by Stanisław Lem. The nature of the objects, their physical properties, and applications were kept by the author from the protagonist and the readers, creating a mystery. In-universe they were described as "objects used for sepuling".
Mad scientists and inventors appear in the fiction of Stanisław Lem in the memoirs of Lem's starfaring vagabond Ijon Tichy, collected in The Star Diaries and Memoirs of a Space Traveller, as well as in The Cyberiad. Most of Lem's mad scientist stories fit into the format of stories about unusual inventions, known since the 19th century, most of them are devoid of ironic tone characteristic of most of Ijon Tichy's stories and robots' fables, and they are literary frames for various Lem's theories.
"Koniec świata o ósmej" is an early (1947) science fiction novelette by Polish writer Stanisław Lem. Professor Farragus claims that he discovered a "matter detonator" substance, which, when heated, starts a chain reaction causing the destruction of all matter. Irritated by a non-recognition of his fundamental discovery, and mockery, he decides to prove he is right by destroying the Universe.
