The Matrix

The Matrix is a 1999 American–Australian neo-noir science fiction action film written and directed by The Wachowski Brothers, starring Keanu Reeves, Laurence Fishburne, Carrie-Anne Moss, Hugo Weaving, and Joe Pantoliano. It depicts a dystopian future in which reality as perceived by most humans is actually a simulated reality called "the Matrix", created by sentient machines to subdue the human population, while their bodies' heat and electrical activity are used as an energy source. Computer programmer "Neo" learns this truth and is drawn into a rebellion against the machines, which involves other people who have been freed from the "dream world".

The Matrix is known for popularizing a visual effect known as "bullet time", in which the heightened perception of certain characters is represented by allowing the action within a shot to progress in slow-motion while the camera's viewpoint appears to move through the scene at normal speed. The film is an example of the cyberpunk science fiction genre. It contains numerous references to philosophical and religious ideas, and prominently pays homage to works such as Plato's Allegory of the Cave,Jean Baudrillard's Simulacra and Simulation and Lewis Carroll's Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. Over the years, numerous critics have pointed out the many similarities between the highly successful Matrix series and the earlier box office bomb but cult classic Dark City, some going on to cite plagiarism. The Wachowskis' approach to action scenes drew upon their admiration for Japanese animation and martial arts films, and the film's use of fight choreographers and wire fu techniques from Hong Kong action cinema was influential upon subsequent Hollywood action film productions.

Aryan

"Aryan" (/ˈɛəriən, ˈɛərjən, ˈær-/) is a term meaning "noble" which was used as a self-designation by ancient Indo-Iranian people. The word was used by the Indic people of the Vedic period in India to refer to the noble class and geographic location known as Āryāvarta where Indo-Aryan culture was based. The closely related Iranian people used the term as an ethnic label for themselves in the Avesta scriptures, and the word forms the etymological source of the country Iran. It was believed in the 19th century that it was also a self-designation used by all Proto-Indo-Europeans, a theory that has now been abandoned. Scholars point out that, even in ancient times, the idea of being an "Aryan" was religious, cultural and linguistic, not racial.

Drawing on misinterpreted references in the Rig Veda by Western Scholars in the 19th century, the term "Aryan" was adopted as a racial category through the work of Arthur de Gobineau, whose ideology of race was based on an idea of blonde northern European "Aryans" who had migrated across the world and founded all major civilizations, before being degraded through racial mixture with local populations. Through Houston Stewart Chamberlain, Gobineau's ideas later influenced the Nazi racial ideology, which also saw "Aryan peoples" as innately superior to other putative racial groups. The atrocities committed in the name of this racial aryanism caused the term to be abandoned by most academics; and, in present-day academia, the term "Aryan" has been replaced in most cases by the terms "Indo-Iranian" and "Indo-European", and "Aryan" is now mostly limited to its appearance in the term of the "Indo-Aryan languages".

The Star Diaries

Dzienniki gwiazdowe is a 1957 collection of short stories by Polish writer Stanisław Lem, expanded in 1971 around the character of space traveller Ijon Tichy. The collection was published in English in two volumes, The Star Diaries (published New York, 1976) and Memoirs of a Space Traveller (published London, 1982).

Stories

The Star Diaries

Translated by Michael Kandel.