Paratexts to non-existent texts (as evidenced by Stanisław Lem’s short story collection “A perfect vacuum”)

Background. The article delves into the short story collection Doskonala próżnia (“A Perfect Vacuum”) by Stanisław Lem, a Polish science fiction writer, literary critic, and philosopher. This collection presents reviews of non-existent texts by non-existent authors. The study’s primary goal is to dissect the linguistic (semantic and pragmatic) means used to create the formal and content-related elements of texts that supposedly exist within the “body” of the reviews. A secondary objective is to identify the semantic and pragmatic means of modelling the images of the authors of the non-existent texts. Methods. The methods employed include descriptive analysis, elements of transformational methodology from structuralism, communicativepragmatic text and discourse analysis, and linguistic-narratological techniques for analysing storytelling. Understanding these linguistic and pragmatic means is crucial as it provides insights into the complex process of creating non-existent texts and the role of language in shaping our perception of these texts. Results. It was found that the linguistic representation of the formal and content-related aspects of non-existent texts (despite their synthetic nature) concerns the means of (1) deixis of forms that appear as if from officially published texts, (2) plot-content deixis, (3) the reproduction of the content parts of non-existent texts: (a) semantic, (b) semantic-pragmatic, (c) communicative-pragmatic (or simply pragmatic, as these occur in the communication between “the author” and a potential “reader”). The texts of the short stories reveal both the persona of the “reviewer” of non-existent works and the true persona of the author (S. Lem), who, although rarely, still “reveals” his presence. Conclusions. Future research could focus on the communicativepragmatic aspects of creating such paratexts, particularly concerning (a) the correlation between the modal and modulated aspects of the “reviewers” and “authors” as personas, (b) the perspectives of the “reviewers” and “authors”, (c) the empathy and direction of focus in the “reviewers” and “authors” (d) the evaluations of the “reviewers” and “authors” regarding the text’s history and its discursive realisation, (e) dialogues between the “reviewers”, “authors”, and readers, and (f) the pragmatic aspects of organising the speech acts and speech genres of the short stories in the collection. The tonal aspects of the “reviews” and non-existent texts and the linguistic means of expressing the unique humour of the great Polish writer and thinker S. Lem are also essential to consider.