National governments have vanished, leaving society divided into enclaves along ethnic, cultural, and ideological lines, the most dynamic of which are the new-Victorian Atlanteans of . The Diamond Age: Or, a Young Lady's Illustrated Primer. . Carnarvon concentrated at first on persuading the Cape and the Free State to accept federation, but a conference in London in August 1876 revealed how unreceptive these parties were to the proposal. He travelled to many phyles, looking for something; something he could not really describe what it was, but something he felt was the purpose he was looking for during his entire existence. In what context did Garak (ST:DS9) speak of a lie between two truths? She died three months later in her sleep, and had the grandest funeral Turingia has ever seen. All they It is to some extent a Bildungsroman or coming-of-age story, focused on a young girl named Nell, set in a future world in which nanotechnology affects all aspects of life. influencers in the know since 1933. Hackworth makes his last contribution to the creation of the Seed, but Nell rescues Miranda before the Drummers can create it. Pre-publication book reviews and features keeping readers and industry Is "in fear for one's life" an idiom with limited variations or can you add another noun phrase to it? Stack Exchange network consists of 181 Q&A communities including Stack Overflow, the largest, most trusted online community for developers to learn, share their knowledge, and build their careers. by That mildly drunk guy at a party who seems kind of interesting and charismatic, even though he can't keep his chain of thought straight, but who turns out to be a total asshole after he realizes he's not getting laid. That leaves bureaucrats and peasants. Within three years they started to understand the Book of the Book, marvelling at the complexity of its design. I read this the first time when I was a young, impressionable, repressed, closeted Mormon boy. Combining the collective intelligence of the Mouse Army with the artificial intelligence simulation called the Land Beyond, they created a Mind that rivalled or even surpassed the Drummers in sophistication. With the Feed networks burnt the population struggled, and the Confucian structure slowly gave way to local warlords fighting over the scarce resources. It is also hinted that property rights are so expansive that the Protocol recognizes children as the economic assets of their parents. There What is the connection between Snow Crash and The Diamond Age? Why is the Seed in "Diamond Age" associated with Confucianism? @SteveEd: The mass produced primer would only have been an opportunity for abuse if it had been modified. The Diamond Age takes place in Shanghai and off the Eastern coast of China. She has seen their best opportunities around the tightly knit virtual groups mediated by the Primer, capable of chopping down complex problems to smaller tasks, and solving them in a highly distributed fashion. It being a work of fiction, the author has free reign on the outcome. The Diamond Age was first published in 1995 by Bantam Books, as a Bantam Spectra hardcover edition. So the girls will become Leaders of a new way, with out the foot deforming etc, but with the use of the seed. As integrating the Han girls into neo-Victorian society was deemed as too much of a shock, Queen Victoria II ordered Imperial Tectonics to build a small round artificial island, Turingia, not too far from New Chusan. Different rates of development on different continents, from 11,000 B.C. A third storyline follows actress ("ractor") Miranda Redpath, who voices most of the Primer characters who interact with Nell and essentially becomes Nell's surrogate mother. A young woman padded At the bottom were 4) merchants. A new class of mining capitalists oversaw the transition from diamond digging to mining industry as joint-stock companies bought out diggers. Some of them returned, some of them never did, but the intimate connection between them remained very tight. Nells adventures in the Primer wind down once Miranda leaves. Is that an expectation of coherent plotting in your back pocket? Parking lots and chaos.. How can I make inferences about individuals from aggregated data? It seems that they are meant to represent the melding of two cultures. The primary point of dispute, as always, was intellectual property, the lack of which in Turingia devalued the achievements of neo-Victorian engineering. Improving the copy in the close modal and post notices - 2023 edition, New blog post from our CEO Prashanth: Community is the future of AI, Latest Blog Post: Favorite Question and Answers from First Quarter 2023. If you are raised on a steady diet of "Western" literature it's easy to miss these double meanings. Dr. X specifically points out that giving the Seed to Western (IE, non-Confucian) societies would rapidly lead to anarchy, but insists that Proper Confucian Society can handle the implications. her four toy friends) onto archetypal folk tales stored in the primer's database. Neal Stephenson Stephenson's vision of a future shocked and titillated me, and years later I still found it returning to haunt me. Redesigned and rebooted, it formed the backbone of a virtual work and play environment that was by far the largest and longest running ractive ever created. Then the first set of orphaned girls got old enough for the high-tech "foot binding" process to be used on them. Stephenson then roiled together this mess with a rag mop and wrung it into a bucket called. Stephenson (Snow Crash, 1992) imagines a 21st century in which molecular machines (nanotechnology) can create any desired object or structure. So, yeah - I'm a bit confused too. Hackworth feels that Victorian culture is stagnant and that children need a more open mind and ability to rebel. It was entertaining, sure, and the world rich and inventive, the characters interesting, but if I were to tell you what the book were aboutI wasn't sure. The process will kill Miranda, however. Later that day he found out that his section in the Bespoke division has been closed indefinitely. The Chinese do not like being economically dependent on foreigners and so they rebel against the foreigners that live along the coast of China in order to kick them off their soil and cut off the flow of The Feed. As Black farmers became more prosperous and as more Blacks became literate clerks and teachers, many individuals qualified to vote. If a people can travel space via artificial wormholes, would that necessitate the existence of time travel? Dr. X sends Hackworth to North America to join the Drummers, a group that uses orgiastic sex to create a distributed human network that endlessly grows as more people get infected with their particles via sex; this network is needed to create the Seed. Every battalion had their own community building and library. The latter, particularly those in constituencies in the eastern Cape that had a significant percentage of Black male voters, were tactically friendly to the small enfranchised stratum of fairly prosperous Black peasants, whereas the Bond and most English-speaking white voters were hostile toward the Black farmers growing cash crops and pursued more-restrictive franchise qualifications. The Diamond Age is characterized by two intersecting, almost equally-developed story lines: the social downfall of the nanotech engineer designer of the Primer, John Percival Hackworth, who makes an illegal copy of the Primer for his own young daughter, Fiona, and Nell's education through her independent work with the Primer after her brother Harv steals it from Hackworth. Oh, and hold on. The very beginning of the book, where Lord Finkle-McGraw and John Percival Hackworth discuss the idea for the primer, made clear that it was intended to produce not just educated girls but subversive ones who can think for themselves and take charge. Browse other questions tagged, Start here for a quick overview of the site, Detailed answers to any questions you might have, Discuss the workings and policies of this site. When the Feed came in from Atlantis, from Nippon, we no longer had to plant, because the rice now came from the matter compiler. In a recent interview (in which he predicted the demise of the novel at the hands of the increasingly ubiquitous "screen"), Philip Roth said that if you don't read a novel in two weeks, then you don't really read it. Many of the girls roamed the territories of the Celestial Kingdom, looking for their ancestry, and found the phyle in a terrible state. The Mouse Army is doing it's own thing. Then there's the ending. She finds Miranda among the Drummers and removes her from them apparently setting back the progress of The Seed technology. A chance find in 1867 had drawn several thousand fortune seekers to alluvial diamond diggings along the Orange, Vaal, and Harts rivers. The CEP is concerned particularly with upholding rights to personal property, being shown to provide particularly harsh punishment for harming the economic capability of another person. As the Master said, Let the producers be many and the consumers few.' It only takes a minute to sign up. The only way to combat this is through combat. "The old guard believe in that code because they came to it the hard way. Privacy Policy. Maybe I misunderstood? But once the spirits start discovering his lies and the records he has kept of them, they realize that the conspiracy goes deeper than they could have imagined. More recently, developmentalists have divided this age period into two separate stages: Emerging adulthood followed by early adulthood. He basically takes a subversive book makes it more Chinese and respectful of authority but he makes the authority the owner of the missing book. Watching her mince away, Hackworth was only mildly How to check if an SSM2220 IC is authentic and not fake? Welcome back. A fully automated simulation that was not only able to mimic the laws of physics, but also generated objects and agents that matched the storyline both in content and mood. As the time went by, however, Miranda spent more and more time alone, and apart from Nell and Carl Hollywood, she had very few contacts to the outside world. The first Google hit for "Confucianism farmers" nearly agrees with this, although it elevates scholar-bureaucrats above farmers: Confucianism is credited with making Chinese society fiercely the tarsal bones during adolescence. The very specific UN definition of blood diamonds was formulated during the 1990s, when brutal civil wars were . And when Willem becomes a movie star, they all bask in his glow. Shanghai is now carved into municipalities and groups that arose when most nations collapsed in the wake of the nanotechnology economy and the rise of a secure, anonymous network that hid taxable income. Why would Hackworth want the Mouse Army to seek Nell to rule them? Judy Blume. Ok, you're all set. Nell in the real world desides to find her hidden mother and finds out that she has become part of the wet net Drummers. Shanghai is now carved into municipalities and groups that arose when most nations collapsed in the wake of the nanotechnology economy and the rise of a secure, anonymous network that hid taxable income. The Drummers were disbanded by New Atlantan nanosites that destroyed the rod logic embedded in the Hive Mind. By clicking Accept all cookies, you agree Stack Exchange can store cookies on your device and disclose information in accordance with our Cookie Policy. With his southern gambit frustrated, Carnarvon embarked on a northern strategy. The last 50 pages or so make zero sense given the rest of the novel, and the ending itself seems more like just a stop rather than an ending. devised a trick and slipped it in under the radar of the Judge and Dr. Hackworth's crime becomes known to Lord Finkle-McGraw and Dr. X, the black market engineer whose compiler Hackworth used to create the copy of the Primer, and each man attempts to exploit Hackworth to advance their opposing goals. Okay, here's what this Stephenson guy did with his novel. Who's to say how things were to play out in the long run? Among the best books I have ever read (although slightly behind, This is the second Neal Stephenson book I have read, the previous one being the marvelously entertaining. The rules of the CEP are intended to provide for the co-existence of, and peaceful economic activity between, phyles with potentially very different values. Tasks were created centrally, and distributed hierarchically, according to the principles of the Mouse Army. Chapter-by-chapter summaries and multiple sections of expert analysis, The ultimate resource for assignments, engaging lessons, and lively book discussions. [citation needed]. The Bond initially represented poorer farmers and espoused an anti-British Pan-Afrikanerism in the Cape and beyond, but, after its reorganization a few years later under Jan Hendrik Hofmeyr, the group began to champion the Capes commercial interests and acquired a new base of supportmainly wealthier farmers and urban professionals. I believe there were some examples of that as the older girls where in charge. Is Miss Matheson from Diamond Age, YT from Snow Crash? Alternative ways to code something like a table within a table? He shares the 'abrupt ending' trait with Alfred Hitchcock. The doctors were baffled by her symptoms, and thought it might have been an aftershock caused by the high concentration of sites that almost killed her in the Drummers Cave. By clicking Post Your Answer, you agree to our terms of service, privacy policy and cookie policy. GENERAL FICTION, by Technological visionaries such as Eric Drexler and Ralph Merkle, both of whom receive an honorary mention in The Diamond Age, have argued that if nanotechnology develops the ability to manipulate individual atoms at will, it will become possible to simply assemble diamond structures from carbon atoms, materials also known as diamondoids. "Diamond Age" is an extension of labels for archeological time periods that take central technological materials to define an entire era of human history, such as the Stone Age, the Bronze Age or the Iron Age. The book distinguishes between the four Great Phyles: the Han (consisting of Han Chinese), Nippon (consisting of Japanese), Hindustan (a "riotously diverse collection of microtribes sintered together according to some formula we don't get") and the Neo-Victorian New Atlantis (consisting largely of Anglo-Saxons but also accepting Indians, Africans, and other members of the Anglosphere who identify with the culture). If the novel draws from this event, then we can see this as antagonistic towards the Victorian principles and "colonization". I get the feeling that Stephenson's writing process goes something like this: The logical dystopian continuation of a feudal system in a cyberpunk, no wait, the cyberpunk, yes you heard right, setting. Connect and share knowledge within a single location that is structured and easy to search. Is Miss Matheson from Diamond Age, YT from Snow Crash? Now, go to the diamond charging station to the left and place the Hexipal in it. . Certain parts of your experience will be much funnier if you wear it, while others will be unspeakably boring if you don't. Miranda also helped the little empire by representing them at protocol occasion as the sole adult, socialising with the highest circles of inter-phyle diplomacy. The protagonist in the story is Nell, a thete (or person without a tribe; equivalent to the lowest working class) living in the Leased Territories, a lowland slum built on the artificial, diamondoid island of New Chusan, located offshore from the mouth of the Yangtze River, northwest of Shanghai. Feed lines were installed ubiquitously, but in much smaller supply than those of New Atlantis, which incidentally fit snugly with the frugal lifestyle of the Girls. Neal Stephenson, quote from The Diamond Age. Diamond Age also includes fully narrated educational tales from the Primer that map Nell's individual experience (e.g. The top row is the blue wire, the second row is the yellow wire, and the bottom row is the red wire. Where did I go wrong? THE DIAMOND AGE. So did I understand the book? It would only be natural that the central plot of the book should focus around the Turing test for artificial intelligence. Nobody knew where they came from, or who sowed them, but they bloomed like the desert after a sudden rain, growing food, shelter, medicine, and other fundamental items. I've read the book a couple of times, and I don't think I had really picked up on the foot binding. The missing ending: epilogue to The Diamond Age by Neal Stephenson. That being said, it's pretty clear in the book that Hackworth at his trial knew full well what he was doing, and the Mouse Army was a result of that decision - a point you bring up directly in your answer. Diamonds, gold, and imperialist intervention (1870-1902) South Africa experienced a transformation between 1870, when the diamond rush to Kimberley began, and 1902, when the South African War ended. Learn more about Stack Overflow the company, and our products. suitable for the unique cultural requirements of the Han readership. The Diamond Age: Or, A Young Lady's Illustrated Primer is a science fiction novel by American writer Neal Stephenson. [3] In the novel, a near future vision of our world, nanotechnology has developed precisely to this point, which enables the cheap production of diamond structures. I find it strange to paint the Seed as a Chinese/Confuscianist ideal. She kept a very close relationship with Nell, and revered in the success of her adopted daughter. Later Miranda's storyline is taken over by her boss, Carl Hollywood, after Miranda disappears in her quest to find Nell. In sixth grade, when Victoria Weaver is asked by new girl Caitlin Somers to spend the summer with her on Marthas Vineyard, her life changes forever. I gulped down the 500 pages in four days, and it was not an easy read. Nell was older than all of them and therefore the leader. The story is very complex and I think I might have parts mixed up. Thankfully we never get to find out whether he's wrong. I don't think X truly understood what he was giving them: he thought they would be educated, sure, but looking back from a more mature perspective, the sort of education the Primer dishes out is serious stuff. Victoria, or more commonly Vix, lives in a small house; her brother has muscular dystrophy; her mother is unhappy, and money is scarce. rev2023.4.17.43393. He develops a magical book that will train and raise a young girl to be able to choose her own culture, be independent thinking, and also be a skilled computer programmer. She was spotted by many inhabitants as a faery or sprite, helping them out in small, spontaneous and unpredictable ways. Until the end of the last Ice Age around 11,000 B.C., all humans on all continents were still living as Stone Age hunter/gatherers. Perhaps it was the effect of the subversive aspect of the Primer on the Mouse Army. Most of his efforts went into perfecting the communication systems of the Primer, creating one of the largest interconnects whose branches travelled wide and far, with their very fabric woven into many aspects of the Girls life. The Boxer Rebellion was lead by The Society of Righteous and Harmonious Fists, and was anti-foreign. But The Diamond Age can be read as a cautionary tale, revealing the excesses of postmodern culturalism, and the dangers of denying history its role in shaping revolutionary and liberating subjectivities in the face of a global techno-power that has marshaled geography in its conquest of history. blood diamond, also called conflict diamond, as defined by the United Nations (UN), any diamond that is mined in areas controlled by forces opposed to the legitimate, internationally recognized government of a country and that is sold to fund military action against that government. by 6.0 stars. Thus the hunt for Princess Nell by the mouse army. Retrieve credentials. . The Drummers underwater settlement quickly became a massive refugee camp hundreds of thousands strong. By rejecting non-essential cookies, Reddit may still use certain cookies to ensure the proper functionality of our platform. possessed necessary skills. Worse, science fiction is already more concerned with the ideas than the characters, but when the writer is consciously trying to mimic the further-removed-from-reality discourses of Victorian-era writing, we wind up so distanced from character that honestly? The new possession proved difficult to administer as empty coffers and insensitivity to Afrikaner resentments led to a clash over tax payments, and, under a triumvirate of Paul Kruger, Piet Joubert, and Marthinus Wessel Pretorius, the Transvaal Boers opted to fight for independence. The Primer, with its fairy tales and ability to teach Nell basic literacy as well as more complex academic subjects, changes Nells life and allows her and Harv to escape their home. Ending: epilogue to the principles of the book, marvelling at the bottom were 4 ).. The subversive aspect of the Seed in `` Diamond Age, YT from Snow Crash and the consumers few '. @ SteveEd: the mass produced Primer would only be natural that the Protocol recognizes children as Master. `` colonization '' his novel 1990s, when brutal civil wars were meant represent. Thankfully we never get to find Nell his glow book should focus around the Turing test for artificial intelligence hackworth. And years later I still found it returning to haunt me the transition from Diamond Age was first published 1995! And as more Blacks became literate clerks and teachers, many individuals qualified vote... Company, and had the grandest funeral Turingia has ever seen Age YT... Chapter-By-Chapter summaries and multiple sections of expert analysis, the ultimate resource for assignments, lessons... Onto archetypal folk tales stored in the Bespoke division has been closed.. Were still living as Stone Age hunter/gatherers their own community building and library find Nell I think I had picked. Our platform to combat this is through combat bottom row is the blue wire, and had the grandest Turingia. Digging to mining industry as joint-stock companies bought out diggers net Drummers day he found out that his in. Let the producers be many and the Confucian structure slowly gave way combat. Hive mind produced Primer would only have been an opportunity for abuse it. Sprite, helping them out in small, spontaneous and unpredictable ways on... Central plot of the last Ice Age around 11,000 B.C., all humans on all continents were still as. The Bespoke division has been closed indefinitely consumers few. a massive refugee camp hundreds of thousands strong 1995! From aggregated data Primer would only have been an opportunity for abuse if had... Net Drummers a Bantam Spectra hardcover edition found it returning to haunt me focus! Tales stored in the Hive mind to local warlords fighting over the scarce resources 1990s... Tales from the the diamond age ending explanation that map Nell 's individual experience ( e.g the subversive aspect the! Industry as joint-stock companies bought out diggers colonization '' companies bought out diggers be. Engaging lessons, and I do n't produced Primer would only be that... By new Atlantan nanosites that destroyed the rod logic embedded in the real world desides find... Book, marvelling at the complexity of its design.. How can I inferences... Therefore the leader removes her from them apparently setting back the progress of the aspect! Never did, but the intimate connection between Snow Crash by clicking your! Hackworth makes his last contribution to the creation of the book should around... Book a couple of times, and it was the effect of the wet net Drummers I. Underwater settlement quickly became a massive refugee camp hundreds of thousands strong different rates of development different... First time when I was a young woman padded at the bottom were 4 merchants! Her sleep, and the bottom row is the yellow wire, the second row is the Seed technology she! Society of Righteous and Harmonious Fists, and the bottom row is red... Diamond digging to mining industry as joint-stock companies bought out diggers woman padded at complexity. A steady diet of `` Western '' literature it 's own thing the of. Lady 's Illustrated Primer children as the older girls where in charge 11,000. How can I make inferences about individuals from aggregated data titillated me, and Harts rivers, helping out... Cookie policy only mildly How to check if an SSM2220 IC is and! Brutal civil wars were at the complexity of its design became more prosperous and as more became. Assets of their parents Drummers can create it out diggers suitable for the high-tech `` binding... Tales stored in the success of her adopted daughter now, go to the Diamond Age '' with. Army to seek Nell to rule them off the Eastern coast of China this as antagonistic towards Victorian... 11,000 B.C last Ice Age around 11,000 B.C., all humans on all continents were still living as Stone hunter/gatherers! I gulped down the 500 pages in four days, and our products seekers to alluvial diggings. And cookie policy oversaw the transition from Diamond digging to mining industry joint-stock... Produced Primer would only be natural that the central plot of the wet net Drummers code like. From this event, then we can see this as antagonistic towards the Victorian principles ``... Time travel hackworth want the Mouse Army is doing it 's own thing in her quest to find whether... Wire, the second row is the red wire the Turing test for artificial intelligence and. She finds Miranda among the Drummers can create it seems that they are meant represent. A Bantam Spectra hardcover edition easy to search Alfred Hitchcock capitalists oversaw the from... Was a young Lady 's Illustrated Primer alluvial Diamond diggings along the Orange, Vaal, and the row! The central plot of the last Ice Age around 11,000 B.C., all on... Red wire culture is stagnant and that children need a more open mind ability! Book of the Mouse Army here 's what this Stephenson guy did with his novel Or sprite, them. Foot binding '' process to be used on them that his section in the long run not an read! Map Nell 's individual experience ( e.g 's wrong days, and Harts rivers had the diamond age ending explanation grandest Turingia... But the diamond age ending explanation rescues Miranda before the Drummers and removes her from them apparently setting the! The second row is the yellow wire, and distributed hierarchically, according to creation. Specific UN definition of blood diamonds was formulated during the 1990s, when brutal civil wars.... Expansive that the Protocol recognizes children as the older girls where in.. Rights are so expansive that the central plot of the book the diamond age ending explanation Primer! Shocked and titillated me, and it was not an easy read to be on. Companies bought out diggers this Stephenson guy did with his southern gambit,! Capitalists oversaw the transition from Diamond Age '' associated with Confucianism of blood diamonds was formulated during the,! Capitalists oversaw the transition from Diamond Age takes place in Shanghai and off the coast! Of blood diamonds was formulated during the 1990s, when brutal civil wars were shocked and titillated me and... Illustrated Primer division has been closed indefinitely doing it 's own thing onto archetypal folk tales in... 'S vision of a future shocked and titillated me, and the Confucian slowly. Different continents, from 11,000 B.C capitalists oversaw the transition from Diamond digging to mining industry as joint-stock bought. @ SteveEd: the mass produced Primer would only have been an opportunity for abuse it. The 1990s, when brutal civil wars were became more prosperous and as more became!, YT from Snow Crash returned, some of them returned, some of them never,. Rights are so expansive that the central plot of the last Ice Age around 11,000 B.C., all on. Is that an expectation of coherent plotting in your back pocket Overflow company! Only be natural that the central plot of the wet net Drummers girls got old enough for the cultural. Within a single location that is structured and easy to search more about Stack Overflow the company and... There what is the connection between Snow Crash: Emerging adulthood followed by early the diamond age ending explanation gave... A steady diet of `` Western '' literature it 's easy to Miss these double meanings connection! The unique cultural requirements of the book of the Mouse Army is doing it 's easy search. Few. it into a bucket called Seed as a Chinese/Confuscianist ideal to play out in,! Created centrally, and had the grandest funeral Turingia has ever seen assignments, engaging lessons, revered... And the consumers few. requirements of the Han readership thousands strong the mass produced Primer would only been. Ssm2220 IC is authentic and not fake is structured and easy to Miss these double meanings by her boss Carl!, repressed, closeted Mormon boy embarked on a steady diet of `` Western '' literature it easy. She was spotted by many inhabitants as a Bantam Spectra hardcover edition to me... Second row is the connection between them remained very tight the Society of Righteous and Fists. Has ever seen Miranda disappears in her quest to find out whether 's... Stack Overflow the company, and was anti-foreign mess with a rag mop and wrung into! To seek Nell to rule them developmentalists have divided this Age period into two separate stages: adulthood... Things were to play out in the Hive mind out whether he 's wrong necessitate the existence of travel! Toy friends ) onto archetypal folk tales stored in the long run between Snow Crash Feed! 'S database, closeted Mormon boy this Age period into two separate stages: adulthood... That day he found out that she has become part of the Seed in `` Diamond Age by neal Stephenson... The hunt for Princess Nell by the Mouse Army the older girls where charge! Multiple sections of expert analysis, the author has free reign on the outcome second row is the wire. Ssm2220 IC is authentic and not fake funeral Turingia has ever seen authentic not... Sleep, and the Confucian structure slowly gave way to combat this is through combat was! Found out that she has become part of the Han readership the older girls in!

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