Gentle zits
Encyclopedia
Gentle zits are fictional objects mentioned in the Stanisław Lem's story How the world was saved (Polish: Jak ocalał świat) in the anthology Cyberiada.
The story in which zits are mentioned does not tell its readers what zits really are. Nobody knows almost any physical or mental features of the gentle zits, since they were totally destroyed by the "machine that could create anything starting with n
". The machine that could create anything starting with n completely erased zits from the reality
when an constructor called Klapaucius ordered it to do nothing
. From the story we know only that the zits were splendid and gentle and that without them life loses all its charm. According to Stanisław Lem, they were to some extent similar to pritons and scrupts
Zits have appeared also in the story Bardzo zły by Tomasz Bochiński - the story explains, why zits are gentle and in his story Szczęśliwego 3012 roku, where they were being used as aircraft.
A fragment of the Lems's story about zits has been included to the handbook of the Polish language for foreigners Od słowa do słowa – wybór tekstów do nauczania cudzoziemców języka polskiego. The style of the story has been analyzed by linguists.
The author of the English translation of the term "pćmy" into English is Michael Kandel
, one of the most important Lem's translators. However, the Polish word "pćmy" has no meaning similar to the English "zits". The German translation of the term pćmy is süßen Singuine.
The story in which zits are mentioned does not tell its readers what zits really are. Nobody knows almost any physical or mental features of the gentle zits, since they were totally destroyed by the "machine that could create anything starting with n
N
N is the fourteenth letter in the basic modern Latin alphabet.- History of the forms :One of the most common hieroglyphs, snake, was used in Egyptian writing to stand for a sound like English ⟨J⟩, because the Egyptian word for "snake" was djet...
". The machine that could create anything starting with n completely erased zits from the reality
Reality
In philosophy, reality is the state of things as they actually exist, rather than as they may appear or might be imagined. In a wider definition, reality includes everything that is and has been, whether or not it is observable or comprehensible...
when an constructor called Klapaucius ordered it to do nothing
Nothing
Nothing is no thing, denoting the absence of something. Nothing is a pronoun associated with nothingness, is also an adjective, and an object as a concept in the Frege-Church ontology....
. From the story we know only that the zits were splendid and gentle and that without them life loses all its charm. According to Stanisław Lem, they were to some extent similar to pritons and scrupts
Zits have appeared also in the story Bardzo zły by Tomasz Bochiński - the story explains, why zits are gentle and in his story Szczęśliwego 3012 roku, where they were being used as aircraft.
A fragment of the Lems's story about zits has been included to the handbook of the Polish language for foreigners Od słowa do słowa – wybór tekstów do nauczania cudzoziemców języka polskiego. The style of the story has been analyzed by linguists.
The author of the English translation of the term "pćmy" into English is Michael Kandel
Michael Kandel
Michael Kandel is an American translator and author of science fiction. He received a doctorate in Slavistics from Indiana University, and is an editor at the Modern Language Association. Kandel is also a part-time editor at Harcourt, editing Ursula K...
, one of the most important Lem's translators. However, the Polish word "pćmy" has no meaning similar to the English "zits". The German translation of the term pćmy is süßen Singuine.