| Neuromancer | |
| Author: | William Gibson |
| Language: | English |
| Audio Read By: | Robertson Dean |
| Cover Artist: | James Warhola |
| Series: | Sprawl trilogy |
| Genre: | Science fiction (cyberpunk) |
| Pub Date: | July 1, 1984 |
| Publisher: | Ace |
| Media Type: | Print (paperback and hardback) |
| Pages: | 271 |
| Isbn: | 0-441-56956-0 |
| Oclc: | 10980207 |
Neuromancer is a 1984 science fiction novel by American-Canadian writer William Gibson. Considered one of the earliest and best-known works in the cyberpunk genre, it is the only novel to win the Nebula Award, the Philip K. Dick Award, and the Hugo Award. It was Gibson's debut novel and the beginning of the Sprawl trilogy. Set in the future, the novel follows Henry Case, a washed-up hacker hired for one last job, which brings him in contact with a powerful artificial intelligence.
Before Neuromancer, Gibson had written several short stories for US science fiction periodicals—mostly noir countercultural narratives concerning low-life protagonists in near-future encounters with cyberspace. The themes he developed in this early short fiction, the Sprawl setting of "Burning Chrome" (1982), and the character of Molly Millions from "Johnny Mnemonic" (1981) laid the foundations for the novel. John Carpenter's Escape from New York (1981) influenced the novel; Gibson was "intrigued by the exchange in one of the opening scenes where the Warden says to Snake 'You flew the Gullfire over Leningrad' It turns out to be just a throwaway line, but for a moment it worked like the best SF, where a casual reference can imply a lot." The novel's street and computer slang dialogue derives from the vocabulary of subcultures, particularly "1969 Toronto dope dealer's slang, or biker talk". Gibson heard the term "flatlining" in a bar around twenty years before writing Neuromancer and it stuck with him. Author Robert Stone, a "master of a certain kind of paranoid fiction", was a primary influence on the novel. The term "Screaming Fist" was taken from the song of the same name by Toronto-based punk rock band The Viletones.
Neuromancer was commissioned by Terry Carr for the second series of Ace Science Fiction Specials, which was intended to feature debut novels exclusively. Given a year to complete the work, Gibson undertook the actual writing out of "blind animal panic" at the obligation to write an entire novel—a feat which he felt he was "four or five years away from". After viewing the first 20 minutes of the landmark film Blade Runner (1982), which was released when Gibson had written a third of the novel, he "figured [''Neuromancer''] was sunk, done for. Everyone would assume I'd copied my visual texture from this astonishingly fine-looking film." He re-wrote the first two-thirds of the book 12 times, feared losing the reader's attention and was convinced that he would be "permanently shamed" following its publication; yet what resulted was seen as a major imaginative leap forward for a first-time novelist. He added the final sentence of the novel at the last minute in a deliberate attempt to prevent himself from ever writing a sequel, but ended up doing precisely that with Count Zero (1986), a character-focused work set in the Sprawl alluded to in its predecessor.
Henry Dorsett Case is a low-level hustler in the dystopian underworld of Chiba City, Japan. Once a talented computer hacker and "console cowboy", Case was caught stealing from his employer. As punishment, Case's central nervous system was damaged, leaving him unable to access the virtual reality dataspace called the "matrix". Case is approached by Molly Millions, an augmented "razorgirl" and mercenary on behalf of a shadowy US ex-military officer named Armitage, who offers to cure Case for his services as a hacker. Case agrees, and his nervous system is repaired, though sacs of poison are placed in his blood vessels. If Case completes the job, Armitage will have the sacs removed; if not, they will burst and cripple him again.
Armitage has Case and Molly steal a ROM module that contains the saved consciousness of one of Case's mentors, legendary cyber-cowboy McCoy Pauley.
Case and Molly discover Armitage's former identity as Colonel Willis Corto. Corto was a member of "Operation Screaming Fist," meant to disrupt Soviet computer systems. As his team attacked a Soviet computer center, EMP weapons shut down their flight systems. He and a few survivors escaped over the Finnish border, but their helicopter was shot down, killing everyone except for Corto. After months in a hospital, Corto was visited by a US government official, who returned him to the United States to receive psychotherapy and reconstructive surgery. After providing what he came to realize was false testimony, misleading the public and protecting corrupt military officers, Corto snapped, killed the official who contacted him, and disappeared into the criminal underworld, becoming Armitage.
In Istanbul, the team recruits Peter Riviera, a sociopathic thief and drug addict. The trail leads Case to Wintermute, an artificial intelligence created by the Tessier-Ashpool family. The Tessier-Ashpools spend their time in cryonic preservation at Freeside, a cylindrical space habitat which functions as a Las Vegas-style space resort for the wealthy.
Wintermute reveals itself to Case and explains that it is one half of a super-AI entity planned by the family. It has been programmed with a need to merge with its other half, Neuromancer, and has recruited Armitage and his team since it cannot achieve this goal by itself. Case is tasked with entering cyberspace to pierce the software barriers with an icebreaker program. Riviera is to obtain the password to the lock from Lady 3Jane Marie-France Tessier-Ashpool, the CEO of the family's corporation.
Armitage's personality starts to revert to the Corto personality as he relives Screaming Fist. It is revealed that Wintermute had originally contacted Corto through a computer during his psychotherapy, creating his Armitage persona. As Corto breaks through, he is uncontrollable, and Wintermute ejects him into space.
Riviera meets Lady 3Jane and tries to stop the mission, helping Lady 3Jane and Hideo, her ninja bodyguard, capture Molly. Under orders from Wintermute, Case tracks Molly down. Neuromancer traps Case within a simulated reality after he enters cyberspace. He finds the consciousness of Linda Lee, his girlfriend from Chiba City, who was murdered by one of his underworld contacts. He also meets Neuromancer, who takes the form of a young boy. Neuromancer tries to convince Case to remain in the virtual world with Linda, but Case refuses.
With Wintermute guiding them, Case goes to confront Lady 3Jane, Riviera, and Hideo. Riviera tries to kill Case, but Lady 3Jane is sympathetic towards Case and Molly, and Hideo protects him. Riviera flees, and Molly explains that he is doomed anyway, as she had spiked his drugs with a lethal toxin. The team makes it to the computer terminal. Case enters cyberspace to guide the icebreaker; Lady 3Jane is induced to give up her password, and the lock opens. Wintermute unites with Neuromancer, becoming a superconsciousness. The poison in Case's bloodstream is washed out and he and Molly are profusely paid, while Pauley's ROM construct is apparently erased at his own request.
Molly leaves Case, who finds a new girlfriend and resumes his hacking work. Wintermute/Neuromancer contacts him, claiming it has become "the sum total of the works, the whole show" and is looking for others like itself. Scanning recorded transmissions, the super-AI finds a transmission from the Alpha Centauri star system.
While logged into cyberspace, Case glimpses Neuromancer standing in the distance with Linda Lee, and himself. He also hears inhuman laughter, which suggests that Pauley still lives. The sighting implies that Neuromancer created a copy of Case's consciousness, which now exists in cyberspace with those of Linda and Pauley.
Neuromancer was released without fanfare, but it quickly became an underground word-of-mouth hit. Lawrence Person in his "Notes Toward a Postcyberpunk Manifesto" (1998) identified Neuromancer as "the archetypal cyberpunk work". In its record of award-wins, the novel legitimized cyberpunk as a mainstream branch of science fiction literature. Gibson commented on himself as an author circa Neuromancer that "I'd buy him a drink, but I don't know if I'd loan him any money," and referred to the novel as "an adolescent's book". Even so, the success of Neuromancer was to effect the 35-year-old Gibson's emergence from obscurity.
Hence, Neuromancer became the first novel to win the Nebula, the Hugo, and Philip K. Dick Award for paperback original, an unprecedented achievement described by the Mail & Guardian as "the sci-fi writer's version of winning the Goncourt, Booker and Pulitzer prizes in the same year". The novel was also nominated for a British Science Fiction Award in 1984. By 2007 it had sold more than 6.5 million copies worldwide. It is among the most-honored works of science fiction in recent history, and appeared on Time magazine's list of 100 best English-language novels written since 1923.
Dave Langford reviewed Neuromancer for White Dwarf #59, and stated that "I spent the whole time on the edge of my seat and got a cramp as a result. In a way Gibson's pace is too frenetic, so unremitting that the reader never gets a rest and can't see the plot for the dazzle. Otherwise: nice one."[2] Langford also reviewed Neuromancer for White Dwarf #80, and stated that "You may not believe in killer programs which invade the brain, but Neuromancer, if you once let it into your wetware, isn't easily erased."[3]
In his afterward to the 2000 re-issue of Neuromancer, fellow author Jack Womack goes as far as to suggest that Gibson's vision of cyberspace may have inspired the way in which the Internet developed (particularly the World Wide Web), after the publication of Neuromancer in 1984. He asks "[w]hat if the act of writing it down, in fact, brought it about?"
Writing in F&SF in 2005, Charles de Lint noted that while Gibson's technological extrapolations had proved imperfect (in particular, his acknowledged failure to anticipate the impact of the cell phone), "Imagining story, the inner workings of his characters' minds, and the world in which it all takes place are all more important."[4]
The novel has had significant linguistic influence, popularizing such terms as cyberspace and ICE (Intrusion Countermeasures Electronics). Gibson himself coined the term "cyberspace" in his novelette "Burning Chrome", published in 1982 by Omni magazine, but it was through its use in Neuromancer that it gained recognition to become a synonym for the World Wide Web during the 1990s. The portion of Neuromancer usually cited in this respect is:
The 1999 cyberpunk science fiction film The Matrix particularly draws from Neuromancer both eponym and usage of the term "matrix".[5] "After watching The Matrix, Gibson commented that the way that the film's creators had drawn from existing cyberpunk works was 'exactly the kind of creative cultural osmosis" he had relied upon in his own writing."[6]
Outside science fiction, the novel gained unprecedented critical and popular attention e.g., as an "evocation of life in the late 1980s", although The Observer noted that "it took the New York Times 10 years" to mention the novel.
In 1989, Epic Comics published a 48-page graphic novel version by Tom de Haven and Bruce Jensen. It only covers the first two chapters, "Chiba City Blues" and "The Shopping Expedition", and was never continued.
In the 1990s a version of Neuromancer was published as one of the Voyager Company's Expanded Books series of hypertext-annotated HyperCard stacks for the Macintosh (especially the PowerBook).
A video game adaptation of the novel—also titled Neuromancer—was published in 1988 by Interplay. Designed by Bruce J. Balfour, Brian Fargo, Troy A. Miles, and Michael A. Stackpole, the game had many of the same locations and themes as the novel, but a different protagonist and plot. It was available for a variety of platforms, including Amiga, Apple II, Commodore 64, and MS-DOS-based IBM PC compatibles.
According to an episode of the American version of Beyond 2000, the original plans for the game included a dynamic soundtrack composed by Devo and a real-time 3D-rendered movie of the events the player went through.[7] Psychologist and futurist Dr. Timothy Leary was involved, but very little documentation seems to exist about this proposed second game, which was perhaps too grand a vision for 1988 home computing.
The BBC World Service Drama production of Neuromancer aired in two one-hour parts, on 8 and 15 September 2002. Dramatised by Mike Walker, and directed by Andy Jordan, it starred Owen McCarthy as Case, Nicola Walker as Molly, James Laurenson as Armitage, John Shrapnel as Wintermute, Colin Stinton as Dixie, David Webber as Maelcum, David Holt as Riviera, Peter Marinker as Ashpool, and Andrew Scott as The Finn. It can no longer be heard on The BBC World Service Archive. http://worldservice.prototyping.bbc.co.uk/search?utf8=%E2%9C%93&q=Neuromancer
In Finland, Yle Radioteatteri produced a 4-part radio play of Neuromancer.
Gibson read an abridged version of his novel Neuromancer on four audio cassettes for Time Warner Audio Books (1994), which are now unavailable.[8] An unabridged version of this book was read by Arthur Addison and made available from Books on Tape (1997). In 2011, Penguin Audiobooks produced a new unabridged recording of the book, read by Robertson Dean.
In 2021, Audible released an unabridged recording, read by Jason Flemyng.
Neuromancer the Opera is an adaptation written by Jayne Wenger and Marc Lowenstein (libretto) and Richard Marriott of the Club Foot Orchestra (music). A production was scheduled to open on March 3, 1995 at the Julia Morgan Theater (now the Julia Morgan Center for the Arts) in Berkeley, California, featuring Club Foot Orchestra in the pit and extensive computer graphics imagery created by a world-wide network of volunteers. However, this premiere did not take place and the work has yet to be performed in full.[9]
There have been several proposed film adaptations of Neuromancer, with drafts of scripts written by British director Chris Cunningham and Chuck Russell, with Aphex Twin providing the soundtrack.[10] The box packaging for the video game adaptation had even carried the promotional mention for a major motion picture to come from "Cabana Boy Productions." None of these projects have come to fruition, though Gibson had stated his belief that Cunningham is the only director with a chance of doing the film correctly.
In May 2007, reports emerged that a film was in the works, with Joseph Kahn (director of Torque) in line to direct and Milla Jovovich in the lead role. In May 2010, this story was supplanted with news that Vincenzo Natali, director of Cube and Splice, had taken over directing duties and would rewrite the screenplay.[11] In March 2011, with the news that Seven Arts and GFM Films would be merging their distribution operations, it was announced that the joint venture would be purchasing the rights to Neuromancer under Vincenzo Natali's direction.[12] In August 2012, GFM Films announced that it had begun casting for the film and made offers to Liam Neeson and Mark Wahlberg, but no cast members have been confirmed yet.[13] In November 2013, Natali shed some light on the production situation; announcing that the script had been completed for "years", and had been written with assistance from Gibson himself.[14] In May 2015, it was reported the movie got new funding from Chinese company C2M, but Natali was no longer available for directing.[15]
In August 2017, it was announced that Deadpool director Tim Miller was signed on to direct a new film adaptation by Fox, with Simon Kinberg producing.[16]
In November 2022, it was rumored that Apple TV+ was looking to begin work on a project to adapt Neuromancer into a TV series and were looking to cast Miles Teller in the lead role and with Graham Roland serving as writer, producer, and showrunner.[17] In February 2024, Apple TV+ announced that it had greenlit the series—to be co-produced by Skydance Television, Anonymous Content, and DreamCrew Entertainment—for 10 episodes, with J. D. Dillard joining Roland as co-showrunner.[18] Callum Turner was announced in April 2024 to play Case.[19] Briana Middleton joins the cast as Molly in June 2024.[20]