Review of His Master's Voice Stanisław Lem

Fyodor Dostoyevsky's Notes from the Underground is one of those portrayals of humanity so disturbingly subtle as to set the psychological skin crawling. Spotlighting what might jokingly be called an anti-hero, it features a man who, with all spleen possible, goes about making his life miserable, and if that isn't enough, the lives of those around him as well. No murder, no torture, it's a tough read that compels for its commentary on the human condition. Dostoyevsky scholars will undoubtedly roll their eyes, but I can't help but think Stanisław Lem's His Master's Voice (1968) is a science fiction cousin—cousin—to Notes from the Underground.

His Master's Voice is the memoirs of a fictional American mathematician, Peter Hogarth. Top of his class with Nobel potential, he is one of a handful of experts, natural to hard to social sciences, who are called in to examine, analyze, and hypothesize on an extraterrestrial signal intercepted from space. The group of experts come up with all manner of interpretations of the message, absurd to logical, in coming up with humanity's answer to the stars. But is it enough?

The nature of the interpretations is just fuel for the novel, however. The fire is Hogarth's curmudgeonly dismissal of everything, anyone, and anything he comes in contact with that is not hard mathematics. He mercilessly denigrates his peers, their methods, and ideas. He is perpetuates cynicism towards anything outside his sphere. His IQ stomps on his EQ. But his jaded nature wouldn't be so offputting if it weren't so on point.

His Master's Voice is that ilk of scientifiction which is heavy on idea and light on plot. Thankfully, it is also heavy on character—but not a John, Sally, or Suzy, rather the human character, and what makes it so peculiar. Where so much of hard sf focuses on ideation with empiric roots, Lem focuses the novel on the people and collective human knowledge, rather than a cheap mystery or an outward spiral which leads nowhere. Another way of putting this is: Hogarth is as disagreeable as the unnamed man from Notes from the Underground, but it is the manner of his characters and their environment which substance is found.

For those curious, His Master's Voice is Solaris-adjacent. Otherness is front and center in both. In the case of His Master's Voice it is the fragment of what is ostensibly an extra-terrestrial communication but what figuratively could be called anything between the origins of the cosmos and the source of consciousness—the unknowable. Lem approaches each novel from very different angle: Solaris, with its sub-plot involving an ex-lover, has a more relatable, “normal” feel, whereas His Master's Voice puts readers in the shoes of a disagreeable yet highly intelligent protagonist—less relatable to most people. His intelligence wins the reader over, but only just. The difference maker is that Hogarth is proactive; he believes science can convert the unknown to known. And to wrap up the opening line, he is something different than Solaris' main character, a man who is reactive; things more often happen to him rather than him being the agent of his fate.

Before closing this review, an important note on author philosophizing. Unlike the nattering of Polish “contemporary” Andrzej Sapkowski (author of the Witcher books), Lem demonstrates intelligence. Where Sapkowski goes off on tangents, thinking himself the wielder of perennial wisdom, Lem synergizes his intelligence with the story and character. And he does this between the lines and at a couple levels. By playing with his food, he demonstrates his knowledge of it, making for interest-building, thought-provoking, and occasionally subtly humorous exposition.

In the end, Stanislaw Lem's name will go down as one of the greatest science fiction writers of all time—top ten in my book. Most people will likely cite Solaris and Cyberiad, and possibly The Futurological Congress as reasons why, but the real reason is that those master works are buttressed by superb novels like His Master's Voice. It's highly unlikely the novel will ever catch retro fire in mainstream sf, but for the portion of sf readers who know a Rolls Royce when they see one, this is gloss black and mirror chrome. Like Olaf Stapledon, George Orwell, and others, Lem's ability to synergize the human condition with an intelligent angle to a conception is, as stated, among the best.