History Literature / TheStarDiaries

* FamedInStory: From ''Memoirs of a Space Traveller'' onward, Ijon Tichy's celebrity status on Earth well-established, and often forms a set-up for new adventures.

!! ''The Star Diaries'' and ''Memoirs of a Space Traveller'' provide examples of the following tropes:

* AndIMustScream: Particularly in one story, where [[spoiler:an alien civilization's super computer, who they designed to be perfect and to organize their everyday lives perfectly, starts turning the aliens into shiny disks and arranging them in perfect geometrical patterns and sculptures. It's hinted they don't die in the process]].
* AssimilationPlot: One story has Tichy visit a series of societies by "The Great Architect", whom Tichy is supposed to meet. The last society is one where everyone is engineered to look exactly the same, and there's a lottery where everyone takes a different role in life (banker, janitor, wife, child, etc.) every week. This is the Architect's "masterpiece", because it eliminates identity, and thus eliminates death. Tichy then decides the Architect is completely off his nut, and runs away as fast as possible.
* BioAugmentation: Taken to the extreme in one story's aliens, who start genetically reforming their bodies in so many different ways, that in the end they start treating the whole thing [[LegoGenetics almost like fashion]].

* {{Dedication}}: Parodied. The book contains a foreword by a character called Professor Tarantoga. He ends it with saying that one helped him in his work, and listing those who set him back would take too much space.
* DoorstopBaby: The "28th Voyage" reveals that Ijon was found by his father, Auror Tichy, as a Doorstop Baby in front of his spaceship cabin (complete with a note saying "It's yours"). He never found out who the mother was ...
* FailureIsTheOnlyOption: In one story, Tichy becames the head of an organization from the 27h that century that attempts to correct history and create a better world using time travel. However, every plan fails spectacularly due to a combination of mishap, incompetence, and malice resulting in a thoroughly fouled-up world -- ie. the one we currently live in.
* FamedInStory: Especially from ''Memoirs of a Space Traveller'' onward.
* FunWithAcronyms: Used quite often.
* HumanAliens: Parodied in one of the stories, where a group of StarfishAliens living on an extremely hot planet discuss a possibility of an intelligent species living in a lower temperature; the oldest one explains that the existence of such creatures is impossible, and any other sapient species must be exactly like them.
* HumansAreTheRealMonsters: In the eighth voyage, Tichy represents Earth to petition for its admission to the United Planets. The members, who are highly advanced creatures are utterly disgusted and outraged by humans. In the end, it turns out that life on Earth was actually created by two crew members of an alien spaceship as some kind of sick joke. Fortunately, it's AllJustADream.
* MoodWhiplash: Purely satirical stories are followed by completely serious ones, about hard themes like the creation of a truly independent mechanical intelligence, or the horror of having an immortal soul without a body.

* RoboticReveal: Inverted in the eleventh voyage. Tichy, sent in a robot disguise to a planet inhabited solely by machines that are hostile to all humanity, discovers in the story's finale that there is no single robot around the place. All of the alleged machines are in fact secret agents like himself, who have been exposed one by one, and forced to keep up appearances. Furthermore: the computer mastermind behind this plot shows up to be merely a humble human gofer working for the agency responsible for sending all those people on a mission to that planet.
* SexIsEvil: One of Tichy's ancestors created a substance that made sex painful, so humanity wouldn't be controlled by carnal desires anymore. When he put it into the water supply of his city, he was lynched.
* StarfishAliens: Most of them. One particularly funny moment has Ijon Tichy mistake an alien ambassador for a soda machine.

* WhoWantsToLiveForever: In one of the stories, Tichy meets with an inventor who created an immortal soul. However, for that, the body has to be destroyed, and the soul is kept in a box, without any external stimuli. Tichy realizes that this is a fate worse than death. He tells to the inventor that people don't want immortality; they just want to live.

* HumansAreBastards: In the eighth voyage, Tichy represents Earth to petition for its admission to the United Planets. The members, who are highly advanced creatures are utterly disgusted and outraged by humans. In the end, it turns out that life on Earth was actually created by two crew members of an alien spaceship as some kind of sick joke. Fortunately, it's AllJustADream.

* BioAugmentation: Taken to the extreme in one story's aliens, who start genetically reforming their bodies in so many different ways, that in the end they start treating the whole thing like fashion.

* HumansAreBastards: In the eighth voyage, Tichy represents Earth to petition for its admission to the United Planets. The members, who are highly advanced creatures are utterly disgusted by humans.

[[quoteright:300:http://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/StarDiariesCoverArt_px300_1837.jpg]]

That, or a brazen impostor, charlatan and liar, who makes a living off bamboozling gullible Earth-lubbers with astronautical folklore and hair-raising tall tales too absurd to be believed by anyone with so much as a grain of common sense.

The Ijon Tichy character went on to star in three more satirical novels: ''The Futurological Congress'', ''Observation on the Spot'', and ''Peace on Earth''.

That, or a charlatan and liar, who makes a living off bamboozling gullible Earth-lubbers with astronautical folklore and hair-raising tall tales too absurd to be believed by anyone with so much as a grain of common sense. Take your pick.

That, or a brazen impostor, charlatan and liar, who makes a living off bamboozling gullible Earth-lubbers with astronautical folklore and hair-raising tall tales too absurd to be believed by anyone with so much as a grain of common sense.

''The Star Diaries'' (1976) consists of [[ShortStory short stories]], all narrated by its personable [[TheMunchausen Space Munchausen]]. In the process, the book [[{{Satire}} satirizes]] or [[{{Parody}} parodies]] countless [[SpeculativeFictionTropes science fiction tropes]], yet it also explores - [[PlayedForLaughs in a comical guise]], but otherwise quite straightforward - many classical themes of science fiction; such as meeting and interacting with [[CultureClash alien civilizations]], TimeTravel, ArtificialIntelligence, and the consequences of technological and scientific progress for humanity.

The {{sequel}}, '''''Memoirs of a Space Traveller''''' (1984), also consists of short stories, but differs notably from ''Star Diaries'' in that most of the stories are set on Earth and are also quite serious, [[DarkerAndEdgier even dark]] (though not all of them). Mostly they feature Tichy, now a [[FamedInStory respected celebrity]], meeting eccentric scientists and inventors (making the title somewhat [[NonIndicativeTitle non-indicative]]), and only a few deal with Ijon Tichy’s adventures with alien civilizations.