Andromeda: A Space-Age Tale a.k.a. Andromeda Nebula is a science fiction

Science fiction

Science fiction is a genre of fiction dealing with imaginary but more or less plausible content such as future settings, futuristic science and technology, space travel, aliens, and paranormal abilities...

 novel

Novel

A novel is a book of long narrative in literary prose. The genre has historical roots both in the fields of the medieval and early modern romance and in the tradition of the novella. The latter supplied the present generic term in the late 18th century....

 by the Russian

Soviet Union

The Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991....

 writer and paleontologist Ivan Efremov, written and published in 1957

1957 in literature

The year 1957 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:* Lawrence Durrell publishes the first volume of The Alexandria Quartet. The final of the four volumes will be published in 1960....

. The novel was made into a film in 1967

1967 in film

The year 1967 in film involved some significant events. It is widely considered as one of the most ground-breaking years in film.-Events:* December 26 - The Beatles Magical Mystery Tour airs on British television....

, The Andromeda Nebula

The Andromeda Nebula

The Andromeda Nebula is a 1967 Russian Science fiction film starring Sergei Stolyarov and directed by Yevgeni Sherstobitov. The film was originally intended to be the first episode of a series of films but the remaining parts were never made. De facto name — The Andromeda Nebula: Episode I...

Plot summary

This is a classic communist

Communism

Communism is a social, political and economic ideology that aims at the establishment of a classless, moneyless, revolutionary and stateless socialist society structured upon common ownership of the means of production...

 utopia

Utopia

Utopia is an ideal community or society possessing a perfect socio-politico-legal system. The word was imported from Greek by Sir Thomas More for his 1516 book Utopia, describing a fictional island in the Atlantic Ocean. The term has been used to describe both intentional communities that attempt...

 set in a distant future. Throughout the novel, the author's attention is focused on the social and cultural aspects of the society; there are several principal heroes (a historian, an archeologist, a starship captain) involved in several plot lines. Though the world shown in the novel is intended as ideal, there's an attempt to show a conflict and its resolution with a voluntary self-punishment of a scientist whose reckless experiment caused damage. There's also a fair amount of action in the episodes where the crew of a starship fight alien predators.

Several civilizations of our Galaxy, including Earth, are united in the Great Circle whose members exchange and relay scientific and cultural information. Notably, there's no faster-than-light travel or communication in this world, so interstellar missions sent by Earth are few and can only reach nearby stars, and the Great Circle

Great circle

A great circle, also known as a Riemannian circle, of a sphere is the intersection of the sphere and a plane which passes through the center point of the sphere, as opposed to a general circle of a sphere where the plane is not required to pass through the center...

 civilizations almost never meet in person. The Great Circle radio transmissions are pictured as taking the energy of the whole Earth and therefore infrequent; one such transmission is a lecture on the history of the Earth civilization which gives the author an opportunity to put his world into a historic context.

Literary significance & criticism

Critics have accused this novel of being dry and illustrative , its heroes being more of philosophical ideas than live people. Nevertheless, the novel was a major milestone in Soviet sci-fi literature, which, in Stalin's era, had been much more short-sighted (never venturing more than a few decades into the future) and primarily focusing on technical inventions rather than social issues (the so called "short aim" SF). Boris Strugatsky wrote,

Yefremov was an ice breaker of a man. He has broken the seemingly unbreakable ice of the "short aim theory". He has shown how one can and should write modern SF, and thus has ushered a new era of Soviet SF. Of course those times were already different, the Stalin Ice Age was nearing its end, and I think that even without "Andromeda," Soviet SF would soon start a new course. But the publication of "Andromeda" has become a symbol of the new era, its banner, in some sense. Without it, the new growth would have been an order of magnitude more difficult, and a thaw in our SF wouldn't have come until later. http://rusf.ru/abs/int0099.htm

Crew of the First Class S.S. Tantra

(37th Space Expedition)

• 1. Erg Noor, chief of the expedition, spaceship commander
• 2. Niza Crete, astronavigator-I
• 3. Pel Lynn, astronavigator-II
• 4. Kay Bar, electronic engineer I
• 5. (?), electronic engineer II
• 6. Ingrid Dietra, astronomer-I
• 7. Pour Hyss, astronomer-II
• 8. Taron, mechanical engineer I
• 9. (?), mechanical engineer II
• 10. Eon Thal, biologist
• 11. Beena Ledd, geologist
• 12. Louma Lasvy, ship's physician
• 13. Ione Marr, teacher of gymnastics, dietary supervisor, storekeeper
• 14. (?)

Men

• Grom Orme, President of the Astronautical Council
• Diss Ken, his son
• Zieg Zohr, music composer
• Thor Ann, son of Zieg Zohr, Diss Ken's friend
• Mir Ohm, Secretary of the Astronautical Council
• Darr Veter, retiring Director of the Outer Stations
• Mwen Mass, successor to Darr Veter
• Junius Antus, Director of the Electronic Memory Machines
• Kam Amat, Indian scientist (In a former age)
• Liao Lang, palaeontologist
• Renn Bose, physicist
• Cart Sann, painter
• Frith Don, Director of the Maritime Archaeological Expedition
• Sherliss, mechanic to the expedition
• Ahf Noot, prominent surgeon
• Grimm Schar, biologist of the Institute of Nerve Currents
• Zann Senn, poet, historian
• Heb Uhr, soil scientist
• Beth Lohn, mathematician, criminal in exile
• Embe Ong, candidate for Director of the Outer Stations
• Cadd Lite, engineer on Satellite 57

Women

• Evda Nahl, psychiatrist
• Rhea, her daughter
• Veda Kong, historian
• Miyiko Eigoro, historian, Veda's assistant
• Chara Nandi, biologist, dancer, artist's model
• Onar, girl of the Island of Oblivion
• Eva Djann, astronomer
• Liuda Pheer, psychologist (in a former age)

Extraterrestrial characters

• Goor Hahn, observer on the diurnal satellite
• Zaph Phthet, Director of External Relations of the planet of 61 Cygni
  61 Cygni
  61 Cygni,Not to be confused with 16 Cygni, a more distant system containing two G-type stars harboring the gas giant planet 16 Cygni Bb. sometimes called Bessel's Star or Piazzi's Flying Star, is a binary star system in the constellation Cygnus...
  
  

Sequel

Efremov's 1968 novel The Bull's Hour

The Bull's Hour

The Bull's Hour is a social science fiction novel written by Russian author and paleontologist Ivan Yefremov in 1968...

 is set in the same universe taking place some 200 years later and is considered a sequel.

External links

• Andromeda: A Space-Age Tale by Ivan Yefremov in the Udmurt mirror of the Maksim Moshkow's Library
• Andromeda: A Space-Age Tale by Ivan Yefremov full text
• Andromeda at the Library of Congress