Der futurologische Kongreß

Viac o knihe

Ijon Tichy attends the 8th World Futurological Congress, organized by Prof Tarantoga, focusing on overpopulation at the extravagant 164-storey Costa Rica Hilton. The conference is rife with absurdities, including guaranteed Bomb-free rooms and a suite featuring a palm grove with an 'all-girl orchestra playing Bach while performing a cleverly choreographed striptease'. The overwhelming number of papers leads to fragmented presentations, and Tichy, after drinking tap water, embarks on a hallucinogenic experience. He soon discovers that the government has contaminated the water with a drug that induces helpless benevolence, leading to chaos at the Hilton, where charred bombing victims are treated as mere inconveniences. Following a bombing, Tichy escapes to the sewers but is later evacuated by a military helicopter that crashes. He wakes up in a hospital to find his brain transplanted into the body of a young black woman, only to later find himself in the body of a fat, red-haired man. Struggling to distinguish reality from hallucination, he is frozen until medical advancements can help. When he awakens in 2039, he documents his experiences, facing a utopian society where money is irrelevant, and drugs regulate emotions. Disillusioned by the drug-dependent mentality, he confides in Dr. Trottelreiner, who reveals that everyday drugs are merely a fraction of what exists, hinting at even more powerful substances capable of obscuring