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4.03 AVERAGE
4.03 AVERAGE
Got to roll with a tribe
Great ideas and fairly prescient considering it was published in 1995. The world building is top notch with the setting in a high-tech Shanghai with ghettos of classless, no status, and tribeless individuals called thetes. The main theme being that an individual must be a part of a group for survival, thriving, propagating, companionship and meaning.
And its this idea of how a future society with disappearing borders, post-scarcity, and vast swathes of humanity that are no longer needed, wanted, or cared for. How could this society take shape? I think Stephenson nailed it decades ago.
Groups of people will form official tribes based on race or nationality or belief. Or some other combinations that resulted from the origins of the tribe (Phyles in the book) individuals. How these phyles interact with one another and compete is still an unrealized concept, but with nation states kind of dissolving and corporations with cultures crossing borders with their highly remunerated employees; I can see Stephenson's Diamond Age coming to fruition.
And Stephenson's correctly imagines how the tribeless (thetes) will be dealt with and treated in a post-scarcity world. It will still suck. Thetes will suffer ennui and misery for not belonging to a tribe. The literacy/education divide that Stephenson attributes to not belonging/believing a group culture is spot on, and we are seeing it today.
This books is worth reading not for the story because it's a typical disjointed Stephenson book where he can't tie is ideas and world building together into three arc story. But, wow, the ideas and world building are incisive, brilliant, and prophetic as always. His social predictions due to technological advancement are painfully accurate. The sociological setting echoes our world right now. That's why I gave it 5-stars, and also gonzo computing origies. Who thinks of shit like that!?
Themes: Intelligent people can handle the contradictions in life, and understand people are contradictory in action, thought, and speech. Evidence of hypocrisy does not automatically invalidate an espoused virtue or cultural norm. The common good for a group to adhere to a norm and espouse a virtue are true and salutary despite inconsistencies. The neo-Victorian characters embody this theme in the book, and the Neo-Victorian phyle is the richest and most utopian. The Young Lady's Primer has the explicit motive to raise girls to be subversive to the neo-Victorian way of life with the intention those girls will be more adept and ambitious. And the protagonist Nell's story arc is consistent with the theme.
Another theme is an individual needs to be a member of a group. The book's first mini-story is of Bud a typical cyberpunk loner who is going to rob and steal his way to the top. You're going to get stomped on, forgotten, and will be ineffective without belonging to a tribe/group. There is a popular quote from a teacher in the book named Ms. Mathenson she edifies Nell,
“But what you learn, as you get older, is that there are a few billion other people in the world all trying to be clever at the same time, and whatever you do with your life will certainly be lost—swallowed up in the ocean—unless you are doing it along with like-minded people who will remember your contributions and carry them forward.
The Diamond Age: Or, a Young Lady's Illustrated Primer is a 5 star book
Great ideas and fairly prescient considering it was published in 1995. The world building is top notch with the setting in a high-tech Shanghai with ghettos of classless, no status, and tribeless individuals called thetes. The main theme being that an individual must be a part of a group for survival, thriving, propagating, companionship and meaning.
And its this idea of how a future society with disappearing borders, post-scarcity, and vast swathes of humanity that are no longer needed, wanted, or cared for. How could this society take shape? I think Stephenson nailed it decades ago.
Groups of people will form official tribes based on race or nationality or belief. Or some other combinations that resulted from the origins of the tribe (Phyles in the book) individuals. How these phyles interact with one another and compete is still an unrealized concept, but with nation states kind of dissolving and corporations with cultures crossing borders with their highly remunerated employees; I can see Stephenson's Diamond Age coming to fruition.
And Stephenson's correctly imagines how the tribeless (thetes) will be dealt with and treated in a post-scarcity world. It will still suck. Thetes will suffer ennui and misery for not belonging to a tribe. The literacy/education divide that Stephenson attributes to not belonging/believing a group culture is spot on, and we are seeing it today.
This books is worth reading not for the story because it's a typical disjointed Stephenson book where he can't tie is ideas and world building together into three arc story. But, wow, the ideas and world building are incisive, brilliant, and prophetic as always. His social predictions due to technological advancement are painfully accurate. The sociological setting echoes our world right now. That's why I gave it 5-stars, and also gonzo computing origies. Who thinks of shit like that!?
Themes: Intelligent people can handle the contradictions in life, and understand people are contradictory in action, thought, and speech. Evidence of hypocrisy does not automatically invalidate an espoused virtue or cultural norm. The common good for a group to adhere to a norm and espouse a virtue are true and salutary despite inconsistencies. The neo-Victorian characters embody this theme in the book, and the Neo-Victorian phyle is the richest and most utopian. The Young Lady's Primer has the explicit motive to raise girls to be subversive to the neo-Victorian way of life with the intention those girls will be more adept and ambitious. And the protagonist Nell's story arc is consistent with the theme.
Another theme is an individual needs to be a member of a group. The book's first mini-story is of Bud a typical cyberpunk loner who is going to rob and steal his way to the top.
Spoiler
Within the first 50 pages, he is commits a robbery of a person who belongs to a phyle and summarily executed with thousands nano-bombs injected into his bloodstream after he was quickly apprehended by a party from the individual's phyle whom Bud robbed.“But what you learn, as you get older, is that there are a few billion other people in the world all trying to be clever at the same time, and whatever you do with your life will certainly be lost—swallowed up in the ocean—unless you are doing it along with like-minded people who will remember your contributions and carry them forward.
The Diamond Age: Or, a Young Lady's Illustrated Primer is a 5 star book
Almost felt like a second coming of Ender's Game.... ALMOST.
I was really excited to read this book based on other Neal Stephenson books that I've read and suggestions from other people. However once I finished it, I found myself more confused than anything. The book felt like it was leading up to something that never really came about, and I there were a lot of loose ends that I would have liked to have seen tied up.
If you're reading Neal Stephenson's novels in chronological order, this was his first departure from his (somewhat autobiographical, IMHO) classic male protagonist. I first read this book shortly after becoming a father and it really resonated with me personally.
Exploring a future run by nanotechnology, Stephenson combines a dark version of [b:Pygmalion|7714|Pygmalion (Dover Thrift Editions)|George Bernard Shaw|http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1165639314s/7714.jpg|184399]with the classic [b:The Stars My Destination|333867|The Stars My Destination|Alfred Bester|http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/518KEEU5dAL._SL75_.jpg|1398442]. An odd pairing indeed but one which suits the Steampunk world envisioned by the author.
Exploring a future run by nanotechnology, Stephenson combines a dark version of [b:Pygmalion|7714|Pygmalion (Dover Thrift Editions)|George Bernard Shaw|http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1165639314s/7714.jpg|184399]with the classic [b:The Stars My Destination|333867|The Stars My Destination|Alfred Bester|http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/518KEEU5dAL._SL75_.jpg|1398442]. An odd pairing indeed but one which suits the Steampunk world envisioned by the author.
I have read a couple of Stephensons books, and was really looking forward to reading this.
It started really well, they future he imagines of a neo Victorian Asian world, and the technology that this culture has is great. The first section is great, good characters, and plot, but the second section was difficult to follow and didn't gel with the first section.
It started really well, they future he imagines of a neo Victorian Asian world, and the technology that this culture has is great. The first section is great, good characters, and plot, but the second section was difficult to follow and didn't gel with the first section.
I wish I could have mustered the energy to finish this book... We have three of Neal Stephenson's books in the house and I've not been able to finish any of them. He's a clever writer but tries too hard and writes too long and takes too many tangents. This was my favorite of the three and yet I got 50 pages from the end and gave up.
WHERE WAS THE DAMN PLOT?! seriously, for all of the inventiveness in stephenson's work, he writes himself into a hole more often than not. i think he's entranced by his own imagination to the point that he forgets that books need other things, too.
I go back and forth with whether I liked this book or whether I liked this book a lot. With the exception of Stephenson's endings, I tend to find his werks very strong overall; these are compelling reads with digestible but thought-provoking questions and scenarios and some rather scintillating characters that are one part Jungian archetype and two parts original. Diamond Age shares those qualities with the rest of his body of work and yet somehow seems a bit... deficient?
It's clear that Diamond Age is the successor to the [b:Snow Crash|830|Snow Crash|Neal Stephenson|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1601222163l/830._SX50_.jpg|493634] world, each critical variable accelerated along every axis. And that's where its strengths emerge; it's a bit more of a long-form treatment of the subject matter, takes a more delicate approach (e.g., Nell's story), and goes unafraid into some areas where you felt he might have tip-toed in some previous werk. But at the same time, when you put this one down, the classic Stephensonian termination shock gets a bit hyperbolic. There's a lot of slack-jawed: "But... What next?"
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re-read 16th July, 2011: If my notes are correct, this is my third time reading this novel. Which is quite a bit for a re-read (but not many for a Stephenson novel). Notably different this time around is that this is my first re-read of it since my son was born. That sort of thing probably winds up having an effect on how you read anything. This time around, it seemed to make all my feelings much more palpable. I was a lot more sympathetic to Hackworth, but also found myself cursing him that much more; I felt a more paternal interest in Nell, but also cringed that much more at her penultimate tribulations...
And/but just as before: I'm left thrashing between that 3-and-4-star range. The first half resonates even more strongly as time goes on; but something in that second half... I have a hard time making it all click. And it isn't just the Stephensonian loose ends. It's... Elizabeth drops out of the narrative all together, but not without these oblique and ominous references to CryptNet ("but she was never a major character"?); Fiona accepts a casted role with Dramatis Personae, but then what? (and/but/see also: D.P. seems inserted into the story briefly for the sole purpose of un-re-hijacking Fiona); if Nell knew there was so much danger in Pudong, why did she stay? (just to advance the plot?); &c.
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Further reading:
• "Steampunk Appreciations: Neal Stephenson’s The Diamond Age - Steampunk’s 22nd-Century Sourcebook" at Tor.com (link)
• 20 Greatest Works of Dystopian Literature (at accrediedonlinecolleges.com which -- yeah, doesn't seem like a legit website, but seemed like a legit-enough list)
It's clear that Diamond Age is the successor to the [b:Snow Crash|830|Snow Crash|Neal Stephenson|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1601222163l/830._SX50_.jpg|493634] world, each critical variable accelerated along every axis. And that's where its strengths emerge; it's a bit more of a long-form treatment of the subject matter, takes a more delicate approach (e.g., Nell's story), and goes unafraid into some areas where you felt he might have tip-toed in some previous werk. But at the same time, when you put this one down, the classic Stephensonian termination shock gets a bit hyperbolic. There's a lot of slack-jawed: "But... What next?"
---
re-read 16th July, 2011: If my notes are correct, this is my third time reading this novel. Which is quite a bit for a re-read (but not many for a Stephenson novel). Notably different this time around is that this is my first re-read of it since my son was born. That sort of thing probably winds up having an effect on how you read anything. This time around, it seemed to make all my feelings much more palpable. I was a lot more sympathetic to Hackworth, but also found myself cursing him that much more; I felt a more paternal interest in Nell, but also cringed that much more at her penultimate tribulations...
And/but just as before: I'm left thrashing between that 3-and-4-star range. The first half resonates even more strongly as time goes on; but something in that second half... I have a hard time making it all click. And it isn't just the Stephensonian loose ends. It's... Elizabeth drops out of the narrative all together, but not without these oblique and ominous references to CryptNet ("but she was never a major character"?); Fiona accepts a casted role with Dramatis Personae, but then what? (and/but/see also: D.P. seems inserted into the story briefly for the sole purpose of un-re-hijacking Fiona); if Nell knew there was so much danger in Pudong, why did she stay? (just to advance the plot?); &c.
---
Further reading:
• "Steampunk Appreciations: Neal Stephenson’s The Diamond Age - Steampunk’s 22nd-Century Sourcebook" at Tor.com (link)
• 20 Greatest Works of Dystopian Literature (at accrediedonlinecolleges.com which -- yeah, doesn't seem like a legit website, but seemed like a legit-enough list)
I have now idea what I just read. Great for Nell I guess...
Abgefahrener Cyberpunkroman, der weit über die üblichen Grenzen des Genres hinausgeht. Stellenweise etwas vewirrend besonders von der Sprache her (viele erfundene Begriffe, die nicht direkt erklärt werden). Das stört aber gar nicht weiter, wenn man sich sich darauf einlässt und einfach weiterliest. Das Buch macht einfach Spaß und etliche Fragen der Science Fiction wie z.B. Nanotechnologien, Supercomputer oder Globalisierung werden aus originellen Perspektiven beleuchtet.