Snail On The Slope
''Snail on the Slope'' (Russian - "Улитка на склоне") is a science fiction novel by Soviet authors Boris and Arkady Strugatsky. The first version of the novel was written in 1965 (during March 6 and 20), but then it was significantly rewritten. The original draft was published in 1990 under the title ''Disquiet (Strugatsky novel), Disquiet''. In the spring of 1966 the so-called "Forest" part of the novel was separately published in the USSR. In 1968 the other part was published, in the journal "Baikal". A full version was published in 1972 in the Federal Republic of Germany and in the USSR in 1988. The brothers Strugatsky have described this novel as ''the most perfect and the most valuable of their works''. Комментарии к пройденному // Борис Стругацкий. Plot summary The novel consists of alternating chapters belonging to two loosely coupled parts: "Directorate" (or "Peretz", this part was published in 1968) and "Forest" (or "C ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Snail On The Slope
''Snail on the Slope'' (Russian - "Улитка на склоне") is a science fiction novel by Soviet authors Boris and Arkady Strugatsky. The first version of the novel was written in 1965 (during March 6 and 20), but then it was significantly rewritten. The original draft was published in 1990 under the title ''Disquiet (Strugatsky novel), Disquiet''. In the spring of 1966 the so-called "Forest" part of the novel was separately published in the USSR. In 1968 the other part was published, in the journal "Baikal". A full version was published in 1972 in the Federal Republic of Germany and in the USSR in 1988. The brothers Strugatsky have described this novel as ''the most perfect and the most valuable of their works''. Комментарии к пройденному // Борис Стругацкий. Plot summary The novel consists of alternating chapters belonging to two loosely coupled parts: "Directorate" (or "Peretz", this part was published in 1968) and "Forest" (or "C ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Science Fiction
Science fiction (sometimes shortened to Sci-Fi or SF) is a genre of speculative fiction which typically deals with imaginative and futuristic concepts such as advanced science and technology, space exploration, time travel, parallel universes, extraterrestrial life, sentient artificial intelligence, cybernetics, certain forms of immortality (like mind uploading), and the singularity. Science fiction predicted several existing inventions, such as the atomic bomb, robots, and borazon, whose names entirely match their fictional predecessors. In addition, science fiction might serve as an outlet to facilitate future scientific and technological innovations. Science fiction can trace its roots to ancient mythology. It is also related to fantasy, horror, and superhero fiction and contains many subgenres. Its exact definition has long been disputed among authors, critics, scholars, and readers. Science fiction, in literature, film, television, and other media, has beco ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Boris And Arkady Strugatsky
The brothers Arkady Natanovich Strugatsky (russian: Аркадий Натанович Стругацкий; 28 August 1925 – 12 October 1991) and Boris Natanovich Strugatsky ( ru , Борис Натанович Стругацкий; 14 April 1933 – 19 November 2012) were Soviet-Russian science-fiction authors who collaborated through most of their careers. Life and work The Strugatsky brothers ( or simply ) were born to Natan Strugatsky, an art critic, and his wife, a teacher. Their father was Jewish and their mother was Russian Orthodox. Their early work was influenced by Ivan Yefremov and Stanisław Lem. Later they went on to develop their own, unique style of science fiction writing that emerged from the period of Soviet rationalism in Soviet literature and evolved into novels interpreted as works of social criticism. Their best-known novel, ''Piknik na obochine'', has been translated into English as ''Roadside Picnic''. Andrei Tarkovsky adapted the novel ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Disquiet (Strugatsky Novel)
''Disquiet'' (russian: Беспокойство, translit=''Bespokoystvo'') is a 1965 science fiction novel by Soviet-Russian writers Boris and Arkady Strugatsky, set in the Noon Universe. It is the initial variant of the novel ''Snail on the Slope'' (''Улитка на склоне'') which has a different set of characters and is not set in the Noon Universe. After completing the first draft, the authors felt a need to take the novel in a different direction, which resulted in the creation of ''Snail on the Slope''. However, twenty-five years later, they examined the initial draft and concluded that it was a decent novel in its own right. In 1990, it was published in «Измерение-Ф» [Dimension F] magazine. In 1995, feeling the need to expose it to a wider readership, Boris Strugastky published it online (but it has been taken offline by his heirs). Plot summary The novel is set on the planet Minor Planets of Noon Universe#Pandora, Pandora which is famous for its anima ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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USSR
The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen national republics; in practice, both its government and its economy were highly centralized until its final years. It was a one-party state governed by the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, with the city of Moscow serving as its capital as well as that of its largest and most populous republic: the Russian SFSR. Other major cities included Leningrad (Russian SFSR), Kiev ( Ukrainian SSR), Minsk ( Byelorussian SSR), Tashkent (Uzbek SSR), Alma-Ata (Kazakh SSR), and Novosibirsk (Russian SFSR). It was the largest country in the world, covering over and spanning eleven time zones. The country's roots lay in the October Revolution of 1917, when the Bolsheviks, under the leadership of Vladimir Lenin, overthrew the Russian Provisional Gove ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Federal Republic Of Germany
Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, and the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany is situated between the Baltic and North seas to the north, and the Alps to the south; it covers an area of , with a population of almost 84 million within its 16 constituent states. Germany borders Denmark to the north, Poland and the Czech Republic to the east, Austria and Switzerland to the south, and France, Luxembourg, Belgium, and the Netherlands to the west. The nation's capital and most populous city is Berlin and its financial centre is Frankfurt; the largest urban area is the Ruhr. Various Germanic tribes have inhabited the northern parts of modern Germany since classical antiquity. A region named Germania was documented before AD 100. In 962, the Kingdom of Germany formed the bulk of the Holy Roman Empire. During the 16th century, north ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Kefir
Kefir ( ; also spelled as kephir or kefier; ; ; ) is a fermented milk drink similar to a thin yogurt or ayran that is made from kefir grains, a specific type of mesophilic symbiotic culture. The drink originated in the North Caucasus, in particular the Elbrus region along the upper mountainous sections of Circassia, Karachay and Balkaria, from where it came to Russia, and from there it spread to Europe and the United States, where it is prepared by inoculating the milk of cows, goats, or sheep with kefir grains. Kefir is a breakfast, lunch, and dinner drink popular across Russia, Belarus, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Romania, and Ukraine - where it is known as an affordable health drink. It is also known in Norway, Sweden, and Finland, where buttermilk-type fermented dairy drinks are common. Kefir is common particularly among Russian and Estonian minorities. In South Slavic countries, kefir is consumed at any time of the day, especially with zelnik/zelja ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Parthenogenesis
Parthenogenesis (; from the Greek grc, παρθένος, translit=parthénos, lit=virgin, label=none + grc, γένεσις, translit=génesis, lit=creation, label=none) is a natural form of asexual reproduction in which growth and development of embryos occur in a gamete (egg or sperm) without combining with another gamete (e.g., egg and sperm fusing). In animals, parthenogenesis means development of an embryo from an unfertilized Gametophyte, egg cell. In plants, parthenogenesis is a component process of apomixis. In algae, parthenogenesis can mean the development of an embryo from either an individual sperm or an individual egg. Parthenogenesis occurs naturally in some plants, algae, invertebrate animal species (including nematodes, some tardigrades, water fleas, some scorpions, aphids, some mites, some bees, some Phasmatodea and parasitic wasps) and a few vertebrates (such as some fish, amphibians, reptiles and birds). This type of reproduction has been induced artificially ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Atavism
In biology, an atavism is a modification of a biological structure whereby an ancestral genetic trait reappears after having been lost through evolutionary change in previous generations. Atavisms can occur in several ways; one of which is when genes for previously existing phenotypic features are preserved in DNA, and these become expressed through a mutation that either knocks out the dominant genes for the new traits or makes the old traits dominate the new one. A number of traits can vary as a result of shortening of the fetal development of a trait (neoteny) or by prolongation of the same. In such a case, a shift in the time a trait is allowed to develop before it is fixed can bring forth an ancestral phenotype. Atavisms are often seen as evidence of evolution. In social sciences, atavism is the tendency of reversion. For example, people in the modern era reverting to the ways of thinking and acting of a former time. The word ''atavism'' is derived from the Latin ''atavus ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Amazons
In Greek mythology, the Amazons (Ancient Greek: Ἀμαζόνες ''Amazónes'', singular Ἀμαζών ''Amazōn'', via Latin ''Amāzon, -ŏnis'') are portrayed in a number of ancient epic poems and legends, such as the Labours of Hercules, the ''Argonautica'' and the ''Iliad''. They were a group of female warriors and hunters, who beat men in physical agility and strength, in archery, riding skills, and the arts of combat. Their society was closed for men and they only raised their daughters, either killing their sons or returning them to their fathers, with whom they would only socialize briefly in order to reproduce. Courageous and fiercely independent, the Amazons, commanded by their queen, regularly undertook extensive military expeditions into the far corners of the world, from Scythia to Thrace, Asia Minor and the Aegean Islands, reaching as far as Arabia and Egypt. Besides military raids, the Amazons are also associated with the foundation of temples and the estab ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Alan Myers (translator)
Alan Myers (18 August 1933 – 8 August 2010) was a noted translator, most notably of works by Russian authors. Biography Myers was born in South Shields, County Durham, in 1933. He attended the University of London between 1957 and 1960 and Moscow University from 1960 to 1961. Subsequently, he taught Russian and English in Hertfordshire 1963–86. During this period, he published reviews, translations and educational articles, and in summer worked as a travel courier on Russian Baltic liners, and as interpreter for the British Council in Britain and the USSR. He has broadcast on BBC Radio 3 and the BBC World Service on Russian themes. He retired in 1986 to work as a freelance literary translator. Work Poetry Robert Conquest has stated that translating rhymed poetry into English rhymed poetry is the most difficult of all arts. Myers took on the challenge and produced mimetic rhymed versions of 19th century Russian poetry (such as ''An Age Ago'' published by Penguin Books in ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Bantam Books
Bantam Books is an American publishing house owned entirely by parent company Random House, a subsidiary of Penguin Random House; it is an imprint of the Random House Publishing Group. It was formed in 1945 by Walter B. Pitkin, Jr., Sidney B. Kramer, and Ian and Betty Ballantine, with funding from Grosset & Dunlap and Curtis Publishing Company. It has since been purchased several times by companies including National General, Carl Lindner's American Financial and, most recently, Bertelsmann; it became part of Random House in 1998, when Bertelsmann purchased it to form Bantam Doubleday Dell. It began as a mass market publisher, mostly of reprints of hardcover books, with some original paperbacks as well. It expanded into both trade paperback and hardcover books, including original works, often reprinted in house as mass-market editions. History The company was failing when Oscar Dystel, who had previously worked at Esquire and as editor on Coronet magazine was hired in 1954 t ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |