Stanisław Lem, filmed
Two constructors, Trurl and Klapaucius, build machines for kings and for each other. Every machine does exactly what it was built to do, and that is where each story begins.
These are Lem’s stories in the order his book prints them, drawn in ink and played one after another. At the end come two of his books about imaginary books: Non Serviam, and five films from A History of Bitic Literature. Then a story by Italo Calvino about a book that survives only as its index, and a sequel to it from Watson Hartsoe’s screenplay The House Is Occupied, in which the same programmer is sent a fire before it happens, and By What Light, which rebuilds the copybook machine with room, light and witness and counts every film exactly. An afterword reads them through an essay on the theory of possibilities.
After Stanisław Lem, The Cyberiad, translated by Michael Kandel, with Non Serviam from A Perfect Vacuum and A History of Bitic Literature from Imaginary Magnitude, translated by Marc E. Heine. With Italo Calvino, The Burning of the Abominable House, in Numbers in the Dark, translated by Tim Parks. The afterword follows Ewelina Woźniak-Czech, The Possibilities of Theory – the Theory of Possibilities (2024).
Narration and dialogue paraphrase their sources. Drawn in ink in the browser, voiced with Kokoro, the sound made in code. Also: The House That Language Built, four fables of Edifiction.
Three Early Stories
The Seven Sallies
Tales
From A Perfect Vacuum
From Imaginary Magnitude
After Calvino
Afterword
SPACE PLAY OR PAUSE · LEFT AND RIGHT 10 SECONDS · SHIFT 60 SECONDS · [ AND ] PREVIOUS AND NEXT FILM · 0 TO 9 JUMP WITHIN THE FILM · F FULL SCREEN · C CONTENTS