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Vass's Reviews > The Diamond Age
The Diamond Age
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by
I gulped down the 500 pages in four days, and it was not an easy read. I admit ruefully that Stephenson's vocabulary is better than mine. I feel like this book demands analysis, and I don't know enough to provide it. All I could do is count heads and make remarks about the colour and gender and fate of each major character. Which, OK, is worth doing, but it's 3:42am and I've been reading since about 8pm, so forgive me if I don't open it up again just now.
I want a primer.
I also want more about Dr X and Lord Finkle-McGraw. And I want to know more about what happened to Judge Fang and his assistants, although I'll admit that this (unlike Dr X and Lord Finkle-McGraw?) is outside the scope of the story. Unless I'm being stupid and this is something I'm meant to figure out for myself.
There are things in here that you won't get unless you know stuff about science, about computer science (the entire Handbook subplot from Castle Turing to the end is a potted history of computing,) about linguistics, for that matter. This is not a book for someone who can't figure out that 'ractive' is etymologically derived from 'interactive'. And it's driving me a little crazy that I can't work out the root of 'thete'. I only got 'phyle' = phylum right this second.
And I want a chevaline. Like, even more than I want a pony, though not as much as I want a primer.
I want a primer.
I also want more about Dr X and Lord Finkle-McGraw. And I want to know more about what happened to Judge Fang and his assistants, although I'll admit that this (unlike Dr X and Lord Finkle-McGraw?) is outside the scope of the story. Unless I'm being stupid and this is something I'm meant to figure out for myself.
There are things in here that you won't get unless you know stuff about science, about computer science (the entire Handbook subplot from Castle Turing to the end is a potted history of computing,) about linguistics, for that matter. This is not a book for someone who can't figure out that 'ractive' is etymologically derived from 'interactive'. And it's driving me a little crazy that I can't work out the root of 'thete'. I only got 'phyle' = phylum right this second.
And I want a chevaline. Like, even more than I want a pony, though not as much as I want a primer.
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Reading Progress
Started Reading
December 1, 2007
–
Finished Reading
December 29, 2007
– Shelved
December 29, 2007
– Shelved as:
sff
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I assumed "thete" was from "aesthete": one who professes great sensitivity to the beauty of art and nature": or "an expert able to appreciate a field; especially in the fine arts". Been a while since I read the book, one of my favourites, but that's what I recall...
I'm currently reading Diamond Age. So far, the tech talk about nano stuff is terribly hard to get through. I loved Snow Crash. Does it get easier to follow or should I hang it up?
"one who professes great sensitivity to the beauty of art and nature"you must not have read this book in a while, because there's no way you could think that's what the word meant in context of any section where it appeared.
"In Homer's time, poor people were just as screwed. The Greek word was thete, which meant to be a serf or a menial or to work for hire. In ancient Greece, to be a lowly wage earner was in some cases worse than being a slave. At least a slave belonged to a community and could not be killed outright. The wage earner had no such protection."