Arkady and Boris Strugatsky
The brothers Arkady Natanovich Strugatsky (1925 –1991) and Boris Natanovich Strugatsky (1933 – 2012) were Soviet Russian writers who are inextricably linked as collaborators in some of the best and most provocative science fiction beyond US and British shores and beyond — and influenced by — Stanislaw Lem of Poland. Despite the Cold War, their books crawled to some recognition in the West in the Sixties and Seventies, often in garish DAW paperback editions. I hazard a guess that the 1979 film “Stalker,” directed by Andrei Tarkovsky with a screenplay by the brothers based loosely on Roadside Picnic, ignited a re-reading of the original brilliant novel. This naturally led to an interest in all their other writings. Their complete works in Russian run to 33 volumes. Meanwhile, here in the US, Chicago Review Press is doing a splendid job as their publisher.
The Inhabited Island
The Inhabited Island
A masterly and frightening tale of space exploration, newly translated from the uncensored edition
When Maxim Kammerer, a young space explorer from twenty-second-century Earth, crash-lands on an uncharted world, he thinks of himself as a latter-day Robinson Crusoe. Eager to establish first contact with the planet's humanlike inhabitants, he finds himself increasingly entangled in their primitive way of life. After his experiences in their nightmarish military, criminal justice, and mental health systems, Maxim begins to realize that his sojourn on this radioactive and war-scarred world will not be a walk in the park. The Inhabited Island is one of the Strugatsky brothers' most popular and acclaimed novels, yet the only previous English-language edition (Prisoners of Power) was based on a version heavily censored by Soviet authorities. Now, in a sparkling new edition by award-winning translator Andrew Bromfield, this land-mark novel can be newly appreciated by both longtime Strugatsky fans and new explorers of the Russian science fiction masters' astonishingly rich body of work.