[Kaimee]: 5.Random Essays.William Gibson - Neuromancer

Class analysis/review of William Gibson's scifi novel Neuromancer:

Neuromancer

William Gibson’s Neuromancer shows not a pessimistic view of the future, but a reasonable reflection of human nature throughout time. The story realistically extrapolates certain aspects of today’s society, and shows them unchanged in the future. This is not pessimistic, merely realistic to assume that futuristic technology will not change human nature, simply give it different outlets.

Gibson’s Neuromancer starts off in the futuristic slums of the Japanese Chiba city, the sickly world our leading character tries not to exist in. Case, a former ‘deck jockey’ or ‘computer cowboy’, is kept from his life in cyberspace by the purposeful crippling of his nervous system, and spends his time trying to find enough money to stay permanently drugged and to obliterate the harsh realities of his life. In this he is much like the other inhabitants of Gibson’s Chiba City slums, getting higher and higher on the ever stronger drugs that come with the futuristic technology. And then into his life comes Molly, Armitage and his new job, leaving him little choice in the matter but allowing him to return to his cyberspace days and abilities. The work is for a manipulative artificial intelligence, ‘Wintermute’ and the job is to destroy ‘him’ and the other A.I, ‘Neuromancer’, both built and under the control of the cryogenically young Tessier-Ashpoole family, one of the largest corporate ‘zaibatsu’ powers in that world.

One of the more pessimistic facets of the future that Gibson’s Neuromancer depicts is the fact that he has presented only the one very unhealthy side of his futuristic society. One may believe that this shows a view of the future where such behaviour is completely normal, but perhaps these characters are only the regular portion of that type for a society, and do not represent the universal outlook as we may otherwise imagine. This story uses only the dregs of society, the drug addicts, the cruel, the corrupt, the greedy, the thieves, the pimps, the scum and the cowards. No other type of society, culture or even class is explored in the book, although several different levels and ranks of the same character type are introduced, their status not interfering with their natures. Such attitudes as this are recognisable from our time, and variations of them will always exist, no matter the time, style or culture. 

Gibson has ignored the other aspects of society in this book. While we are introduced to various classes and characters all in the same state of obliteration, we never meet a single one of the normal, everyday, hardworking citizens that make every society possible. Even though the location is transferred several times, initiating in the slums of Chiba City, to Istanbul, Paris, Rue Jules Verne and Freeside, the orbital space station, the type of people introduced into the story does not vary, even if their status does. The other aspects and classes of society are never offered, and it may seem as though they do not exist in the future. The characters and locations are all of the more ‘seedy’ variety, and these are found in every community, although on different scales. It would be illogical to imagine that the entire lower class would disappear in the future, and to acknowledge this fact is hardly pessimistic.

While the advanced technology does create new categories for these characters to divide themselves into, the technology has not encouraged them in their degenerate life styles, and is not the cause of their problems. These types of people existed long before technology, even only the technology of the present, came into existence and will continue on in the same way without the advanced drugs and weapons of Gibson’s future. The technology and advancements found in these people’s drugs, weapons and bodies are not in themselves evil, but the characters in this story are dishonest and manipulative, using the futuristic products for purposes other than the intended one, such as the crippling of Cases nervous system and the subsequent repair as blackmail. Such methods have always been used and the attitudes behind them are not solely related to this futuristic society, but to human nature itself. As such, they will not change solely because time has changed; they are inevitable factors in the human condition and will exist for as long as humans continue to survive.

It is not the future itself that Gibson shows a pessimistic view of, but of society today, and in the past and all throughout time, as people of this nature will always naturally occur, whatever the situation is. The characters in Neuromancer show the degenerate side of human nature, and it is not pessimistic to believe that human nature will continue in the future. It is merely sensible to assume so, as it should not be expected that technology will better human nature, only gives humans a higher advantage.

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