Janusz Andrzej Zajdel (15 August 1938 – 19 July 1985) was a Polish science fiction author, second in popularity in Poland to Stanisław Lem. His major genres were social science fiction and dystopia. His main recurring theme involved the gloomy prospects for a space environment into which mankind carried totalitarian ideas and habits: Red Space Republics, or Space Labor Camps, or both. His heroes desperately try to find meaning in the world around them.
The Polish science fiction fandom award was named after him: the Janusz A. Zajdel Award. He was a trustee of World SF. After graduating, he worked many years as a radiological engineer and an expert on nuclear physics at the Central Laboratory of Radiological Protection in Poland. He has also been described as the writer who replaced Lem as the "top Polish SF writer", after "Lem vacated [this position] earlier of his own volition".
He is recognized as an originator of the social science fiction genre in Polish science fiction, known in Poland as the sociological speculative fiction (fantastyka socjologiczna). He has been an inspiration to a number of younger Polish science fiction authors such as Maciej Parowski and Marek Oramus. , the only work translated into English is the short story Wyjątkowo trudny teren ("Particularly Difficult Territory") that Zajdel wrote for the English language Tales from the Planet Earth anthology edited by Frederik Pohl and Elizabeth Anne Hull. In 1980 Zajdel received the Polish Ministry of Culture and Arts Best SF Book of the Year Award for Van Troff's Cylinder. Zajdel also received the Golden Sepulka Award two times: for Limes Inferior (1982 novel; 1983 award) and Wyjście z cienia ("Out of the Shadow") (1983 novel; 1984 award).
Frederik Pohl dedicated the anthology Tales From The Planet Earth to Zajdel and A. Bertram Chandler.
Bibliography
In addition to the solo-authored works listed below, Zajdel's stories have also appeared in many anthologies of science-fiction stories, together with works by other authors.