Solaris Versions of Reality Quotes

How we cite our quotes: (Chapter.Paragraph) Note that chapters aren't numbered, so need to be numbered manually, 1 to 14.

Quote #1

"Mad! Good God!" He tried to smile. "But you haven't understood a thing, not a single thing. He never for one moment thought that he was mad. If he had he would never have done it. He would still be alive." (3.105)

Madness would have comforted Gibarian, because he would have been able to separate his own version of reality from the really real reality. If your chair got up and danced a jig, would it be more upsetting to think you were imagining things or to think you really had a jig-dancing chair?

Quote #3

There was only one possible explanation, one possible conclusion: madness. Yes, that was it, I had gone mad as soon as I arrived here. Emanations from the ocean had attacked my brain, and hallucination had followed hallucination. (4.88)

Again the suggestion is that it's better to be mad than to have reality go mad on you. Part of the point of Solaris, though, is that you can't always tell the difference—especially in a book which is a fantasy in the first place.