The Futurological CongressWritten in Polish by Stanislaw Lem, 1971. Translated to English by Michael Kandel, 1974. 149 pages
The story is told from the viewpoint of Ijon Tichy, a young man asked to join the annual Futurological Congress, a convention designed to predict and prevent the ills of the future by a large gathering of intellectuals from around the world.
Within the space of just a few pages we see that this is no ordinary book, and Lem no ordinary writer. In Tichy's hotel room lies a camouflage cape, a spool of alpine rope, and a large sack of hardtack beneath the bed. In the hotel's bar Tichy meets a devout Catholic planning to assassinate the pope. Nothing is as you might expect, even in the relatively "normal" world that the story begins in.
The convention begins but is quickly interrupted by rebels. The government reacts quickly, dropping LTN bombs and other benignimizers over the city (LTN - Love Thy Neighbor, an experimental drug that brings overwhelming feelings of love and friendship). Chaos ensues, artillery is brought in, other drugs are applied, and Tichy finds himself hallucinating in the sewers. Tichy becomes unable to tell hallucination from reality and becomes convinced that everything he sees is illusion. His doctors freeze him cryogenically and leave him for others to worry about.
Tichy is thawed in 2039 and introduced to a new world. The science of producing drugs to bring about a certain mental state has been perfected, and drugs have become the answer to every question. At first glance the world seems a utopia, but one with little sanity, because the over-reliance on drugs has completely unbalanced society.
Drugs are used to simulate "...furniture, furnishings, food, drink, obedience from one's children, courtesy from officials, scientific discoveries, ownership of Rembrandt's and scissors, ocean voyages, space flights, and a million other things." Many of these uses in the story are both funny and frighteningly realistic.
In order to heighten the feeling of stepping into a new world and to describe the new things that Tichy encounters, Lem constructs new words from old roots. The Futurological Congress has more than 100 original words such as lubricrat (one who gives bribes), cretinoid (an artificial idiot), and concuballoon (I'll leave that one for your imagination.) Lem is equally adept at using old words in interesting ways, and the book is riddled with memorable quotes, such as:
By the way, La Scarletina del Mutango isn't about a mustang that comes down with a fever, but a midget prostitute who falls in love with a man who was born (thanks to some genetically engineered mutation) with the uncanny ability to perform Spanish-American dances.
'It is not enough that we are happy--others must be miserable!'
The Futurological Congress makes for a quick and interesting read. Like Brave New World and 1984 it is social satire, but unlike these two books, the story is frequently punctuated by tongue in cheek humor which tends to heighten rather than diminish the message.
