Stanislaw Lem
Polish director
Born
12 September 1921
in LvivLvivUkraine
Died
27 March 2006
Polish writer of science fiction, philosophy and satire. His books have been translated into 41 languages and have sold over 45 million copies. From 1950s to 20000s he published many books, both science fiction and philosophical/futurological. He is best known as the author of the 1961 novel Solaris, which has been made into a feature film three times. In 1976 Theodore Sturgeon wrote that Lem was the most widely read science-fiction writer in the world. Lem was awarded an honorary membership in the Science Fiction Writers of America (SFWA) in 1973. He is the most internationally famous Polish writer. He has become one of the most highly acclaimed science-fiction writers, hailed by critics as equal to the like classics such as H. G. Wells or Olaf Stapledon. The total volume of his published works is over 28 million volumes. His best-known novels include Solaris (1961), His Master’s Voice (Głos pana, 1968), and the late Fiasco (Fiasko, 1987). Solaris was made into a film in 1972 by Russian director Andrei Tarkovsky and won a Special Jury Prize at the Cannes Film Festival in 1972; in 2002, Steven Soderbergh directed a Hollywood remake starring George Clooney.
