Thinking Outside the Perceptual Box: Adam Wiśniewski-Snerg’s Robot, by Rachel Cordasco

Book Reviews Photo by Aideal Hwa / Unsplash If reading Adam Wiśniewski-Snerg’s Robot (Penguin Classics, 2021), translated by Tomasz Mirkowicz, makes you think about Stanislaw Lem’s work, you’re not alone. Indeed, both Robot and Lem’s His Master’s Voice (published in Polish just a few years apart) take up the fascinating but insoluble problem of whether or not we’re alone in the universe. One might even call Robot surrealist science fiction and liken it to Kafka’s work, or even Lem’s Memoirs Found in a Bathtub, since the main character spends most of his time wandering around the halls of an underground shelter, unsure of his own identity and his place in the community that has formed following an apocalyptic event on the surface. His identity confusion derives from his “birth” on an assembly line under a kind of bell jar. Given instructions by a mysterious Mechanism to study the people living in the shelter, the protagonist proceeds as if he is a living machine given a modicum of free will (as explained by the Mechanism). Much of the novel focuses on the protagonist figuring out why those around him are living underground and why many of them believe that he is a physicist named Poreyra. Encountering strange “statues” that weigh several tons in one of the shelter’s rooms, he eventually moves through a mirror there into a replica of the stricken city, where time moves at a fraction of the speed experienced in the shelter.... Continue reading at 'World Literature Today'

[ World Literature Today | 2021-11-10 20:14:00 UTC ]
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Rachel Conway made director at Georgina Capel Associates

Literary agent Rachel Conway has been made a director at Georgina Capel Associates Ltd. Continue reading at The Bookseller

[ The Bookseller | 2016-11-09 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Helena Kelly | 'Almost everything we think we know about Jane Austen is wrong'

Think you know everything about Jane Austen? Helena Kelly invites you to think again about one of the nation’s favourite authors in Jane Austen, The Secret Radical.   Continue reading at The Bookseller

[ The Bookseller | 2016-11-08 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Ladybird Book of Boxing Day coming for Christmas

Penguin Random House is to release the 20th title in the Ladybird Books for Grown Ups series: The Ladybird Book of Boxing Day. Continue reading at The Bookseller

[ The Bookseller | 2016-11-05 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Table for Three: Rachel Maddow and Doris Kearns Goodwin on a Presidential Race for the History Books

Doris Kearns Goodwin, left, and Rachel Maddow talked about presidents past and future over lunch in the Gotham Lounge at the Peninsula Hotel in Manhattan. Continue reading at The New York Times

[ The New York Times | 2016-10-29 00:00:00 UTC ]
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To Think That It Happened at Bank Street: Bank Street Book Fest 2016

On a blustery fall day, members of the children's book community gathered for BookFest at Bank Street on Manhattan's Upper West Side. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly

[ Publishers Weekly | 2016-10-27 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Adam Bellow to Launch New Politics Imprint at SMP

St. Martin's Press has announced the imminent launch of a new, as-yet-untitled imprint, which will publish books focusing on political and current affairs. Adam Bellow will lead the line as editorial director, effective October 24. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly

[ Publishers Weekly | 2016-10-19 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Think Creepy Clowns Are Scary? Check Out This Bloomberg Businessweek (Middle East) Cover

Think creepy clowns are scary? Check out the nightmare-inducing new cover of the Middle East edition of Bloomberg Businessweek, titled "President Whoever" and subtitled "For the Middle East, does the result of the US presidential election even matter?"The cover mashup of Donald Trump and Hillary... Continue reading at Advertising Age

[ Advertising Age | 2016-10-18 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Adam Hargreaves signs with Pavilion Children’s

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[ The Bookseller | 2016-10-07 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Kate Adams joins Octopus to spearhead new imprint 'Aster'

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[ The Bookseller | 2016-10-07 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Rachel Faulkner-Willcocks to join Avon

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[ The Bookseller | 2016-09-30 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Dow: Children's publishers must think 'beyond the book'

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[ The Bookseller | 2016-09-28 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Viking to publish Olympic boxer Nicola Adams' memoir

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[ The Bookseller | 2016-09-15 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Here's What Top Industry Execs Think About the Future of Video

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[ AdWeek | 2016-09-01 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Global Publishing Leaders 2016: Woongjin Think Big

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[ Publishers Weekly | 2016-08-26 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Four Questions with... Rachel Hecht

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[ Publishers Weekly | 2016-08-25 00:00:00 UTC ]
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'Mr Robot' companion book to Abrams

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[ The Bookseller | 2016-08-20 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Amazon is to open a new fulfilment centre in Essex next spring to meet increasing customer demand and support the growing number of third party Amazon Marketplace sellers. Continue reading at The Bookseller

[ The Bookseller | 2016-08-19 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Critical re-thinking

The haemorrhaging of full-time literary editors raises questions about their future, unless publishers step in, says Katy Guest.   Continue reading at The Bookseller

[ The Bookseller | 2016-07-27 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Rachel Mills to join Furniss Lawton

Rachel Mills, formerly head of Peters, Fraser + Dunlop's international rights department, will be joining Furniss Lawton in the newly created role of agent and international rights director in late August. Continue reading at The Bookseller

[ The Bookseller | 2016-07-06 00:00:00 UTC ]
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