Since the C. P. Snow lecture at Cambridge, there has been much talk about the Science-Humanities divide. In 1959, at the time of the lecture, there was truly a divide, with representatives of both fields turning backs on each other. Fifty years later, even if there have been some attempts to overcome it (like those by John Brockman and Edge), the situation is not so disimilar even today, as some of us would like. There is still a sorry gap.
How about literature? What is the paper of Science in that main "humanity"? If we had to identify an author in whose work the two realms are well and cleverly put together, that´s Polish writer Stanislaw Lem.
Often identified with Science-ficcion, Lem´s novels and short stories are part of the genre, true, but this could be misunderstanding, as the thing goes far beyond that. Novels like Solaris, His master´s voice, Fiasco or Return from the stars are also the most beautiful and balanced mixture of Science and the Humanities that a reader can enjoy.
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