Solaris is a 1961 science fiction novel by Polish writer Stanisław Lem . It follows a crew of scientists on a research station as they attempt to understand an extraterrestrial intelligence , which takes the form of a vast ocean on the titular alien planet. The novel is one of Lem's best-known works. [2]
The book has been adapted numerous times for film, radio, and theater. Prominent film adaptations include Andrei Tarkovsky 's 1972 version and Steven Soderbergh 's 2002 version , although Lem later remarked that none of these films reflected the book's thematic emphasis on the limitations of human rationality. [3]
Solaris chronicles the ultimate futility of attempted communications with the extraterrestrial life inhabiting a distant alien planet named Solaris. The planet is almost completely covered with an ocean of gel that is revealed to be a single, planet-encompassing entity. Terran scientists conjecture it is a living and a sentient being, and attempt to communicate with it.