The diamond Age

the diamond Age or the illustrated Handbook of education for Young girls (original title: The Diamond Old but, has Young Lady' S Illustrated Primer ) is a novel of Science-fiction Postcyberpunk of the author states-unien Neal Stephenson published in 1995.

Presentation of work

the Age of diamond is a novel of Science-fiction which is also connected with the kind of the Bildungsroman, by telling the evolution of a underprivileged young girl who lives in a world of which all the aspects are determined by the Nanotechnologies. The set of themes of the novel as well exploits problems of education or social classes that the cultural tribalism, while passing by the possible answers sociétales to a world in prey with great technological changes.

the Age of diamond is a novel in two parts, divided into many chapters not numbered whose titles summarize the contents in a few words, with the manner of the literature victorienne represented by Charles Dickens at the XIXe century. The account is characterized by two developed narrative lines in equal ways and which cross: the education of Nell, an young girl of the hollows delivered to itself which will grow, thanks to the “illustrated Handbook of education for Young girls” that her brother gives him after having stolen it, and the social fall of the engineer néo-Victorien John Percival Hackworth, author and developer of known as Manuel. The novel develops from the first point of view a whole universe for fairy tale with the educational virtues based on the ancient principle of the Fabula docet (education by the fable). The account explores at the same time the consequences of new technologies on the companies and the intercultural faults of communication.

The title of the novel

The title, “the Age of diamond”, is the extension of an archaeological periodisation which makes use of a material to define a whole period of the history of humanity. Thus, the historians distinguish the age from the stone, the Bronze Age and the age of iron. Visionaries of the Technology like Eric Drexler and Ralph Merkle, both cities on a purely honorary basis in the Age of diamond , affirmed that if the Nanotechnologies succeeded in handling at will the atoms individually, it would become possible to recreate diamonds starting from assemblies of atoms of Carbone. Ralph Merkle had declared on this subject: “ In diamond, a dense network of strong connections creates a dense, luminous and hard material. Exactly as we named the various ages of humanity (the age of the stone, the Bronze Age and the age of steel) according to material which were able to work the men at these various times, we could call the new technological time which we enter the diamond age. ” In the novel, with the vision of the future near to our world, the nanotechnologies developed up to this precise point where the creation of structures of diamond became possible. Besides the Diamant replaces in the universe of the novel all that was in Verre at the time the preceding one.

Situation in the work of Neal Stephenson

the Age of diamond is located in the same romantic universe as the virtual Samurai , of the same author, but of many years later. This parallel can be made on the basis of analogy between Y.T., the main character of the virtual Samurai , and Miss Matheson, the old woman néo-Victorienne of the diamond Age. Thus, the diamond Age would be held 40 to 60 years after the events told in the virtual Samurai . the diamond Age can also be close to two other news of the author: The Great Simoleon To wrap , which describes the First distributed Republic, and Excerpt from the Third and Last Volume off “Tribes off the Pacific Coast” , which divides some characters with the novel.

Polemic on the end of the novel

the diamond Age is probably the example more quoted by the critics who seek to disparage the way in which Neal Stephenson finishes his novels. Some critical were disappointed by the end of the account, evoking the tension growing throughout the novel which does not find finally any conclusion satisfactory. While to become to it certain characters remains without continuation, the secondary account - which tells the history of engineer John Percival Hackworth - seems to take the step on that of Nell, which corresponds less to the prototype of the hero of a novel of Science-fiction. The ambiguity which reigns on this subject shows through for example in the title of the edition Dutchwoman of the novel, entitled “ the Alchemist ”, in reference to the crucial role which John Percival Hackworth plays.

Summary

Universe of the diamond Age

From the geopolitical point of view, the world of the Age of diamond is divided into “phyla” (also called “tribes”) which corresponds to Community regroupings based either on any right of the ground or right of blood, but on ideological and cultural affinities. The three most important phyla are the Chinese Hans (who find the customs and habits of the ancestral China and confucéenne), Néo-Victoriens (Anglo-Saxon compounds of , Indians, Africans and any person being identified with the culture néo-victorienne which takes as a starting point the England of the XIXe century under the Victoria queen) and the Japaneses (who correspond to the Japanese people). There also exists of other less important phyla like the Zulus, Hindoustanis, Senderos (Communists incas or Korean), the Boers (a Protestant community of Dutch origin), Uitlanders (a community of British having fled the South Africa), etc After the collapse of the State-Nations, phenomenon caused by the disappearance of their sources of revenue which were the taxes (become impossible to raise in a world where financial affairs sounds more traçables), the phyla gave up any concept of territory-nation to privilege the geographical dissemination. The geographical fields associated with each phylum are called “claves” and are delimited most of the time by a nanotechnologic barrier of monitoring. The human ones belonging to no particular phylum are called “thètes” and they live in the “Territories conceded” by the other phyla.

From the technological point of view, the world of the diamond Age is entirely determined by the Nanotechnologies which are used to carry out as well clothing as food or the means of transport. The population uses will médiatrons to view films and ractifs, while richest Since the nanotechnologies make it possible to handle the matter on the level of the atom, the microphone-machines produced by its technologies are of a so small size which they can be transmitted in human blood and other body fluids. The nanotechnologies can also simulate a thinking life, by creating for example an oneiric and fairy-like world with faunas and dinosauures on an artificial small island for the princess Charlotte, girl of the queen Victoria II. The multinational large companies of the novel are Machine-Phase Systems Limited (for the consumer goods) and Imperial Tectonics Limited (for the real estate).

First part of the novel

In XXIe century, in the China Sea around Shanghai, John Percival Hackworth , of the clave néo-Victorien “Atlantis/Shanghai”, a man strong well-read man and brilliance engineer, meets Lord Alexander Finkle-McGraw which entrusts a particularly delicate mission to him: to create a “illustrated Handbook of education for Young girls” for her own grand-daughter Elizabeth Finkle-McGraw . The rich person aristocrat indeed does not have any confidence in the education system néo-Victorien which does not aim that to subject young people to the rules of the “Phylum”, with the detriment of their own reflection. The Handbook thus is designed like a single interactive combination of educational, emotional and cognitive objectives, is manufactured starting from the nanotechnologies, and supposed to train an opened out, sure young girl of itself, cultivated, polished, but also independent and subversive.

Whereas Hackworth tries to create an illegal copying of the Manuel for his/her own daughter, Fiona Hackworth , it is made attack by young delinquents who steal his specimen to him. But Harv , one of the delinquents, instead of giving the book to the silent partner of the aggression, entrusts it to his/her sister Nell to comfort it various ill treatments inflicted to the two children by the many small-friends of his mother, Tequila . Once opened, the Handbook integrates the social and psychological background of Nell into the narrative diagram and creates the character of the “Nell Princess”, captive of imaginary “a black Castle”. The fairy-like princess crosses many countries, face perilous situations, accompanied and advised by variegated characters who are the interactive versions of his preferred toys. The Handbook is interactive, adapts to all the situations which Nell in its life meets to make new ramifications of the original tale of them and answers its questions. The answers all are read on a prompter by a ractrice, Miranda , which little by little sticks to Nell by the means of the history that she tells him day after day. One day, the new small-friend of the mother of Nell attacks the two children physically, so that Nell and his/her Harv brother must leave the family home, while in parallel the princess of the Handbook flees of the black Castle.

During this time, the artifex Hackworth , which lost the specimen of the handbook that it intended for his daughter, is the subject of an investigation of the Juge Fang and its two assistants, Miss CAM and Chang . The judge confucéen also meets mysterious Dr. X, a Chinese dignitary and rich person Mandarin of the Celestial Empire, implied in obscure criminal activities. Following this meeting, Fang Judge changes allegiance and joined the Celestial Empire, nauseated by the corruption which reigns in the coastal Republic of China and attracted by the revival of the habits and the culture of ancestral China, following the example the EC what one does the néo-Victoriens for the Anglo-Saxon culture of the XIXe century. The Doctor X then exposes his project to the judge confucéen: to collect the hundreds of thousands of Chinese young girls given up by their parents because of misery and to educate them thanks to an adapted copy of the Manual of John Percival Hackworth. The Doctor X and judges it Fang tighten a trap with the engineer néo-victorien at the time of a false lawsuit. To reduce its sorrow and to recover a specimen of the Handbook for his/her daughter, Hackworth delivers to Confucéens the key encryption of the data contained in the Handbook and promises to help them to adapt the Handbook to the Chinese culture confucéenne. Later, Hackworth is shown of high treason by Lord Finkle-McGraw and agrees to become a double agent in the service of Néo-Victoriens and to take part in the technological race which was installation between them and Confucéens. Néo-Victoriens fear for their cultural prevalence if ever the Celestial Empire had suddenly developed “Seed”, a nanotechnology which would escape any control resulting from a centralized capacity. In parallel, Hackworth is charged by Fang Judge and the Doctor X to find a mysterious character called “the Alchemist” and must go to the the United States and the Canada.

Second part of the novel

After having left the parental domiciel, Nell and Harv arrive at “Dovetail”, a clave craftsmen who produce objects worked with the hand in a traditional way to sell them to rich person néo-Victoriens. Whereas Nell is authorized to remain in the community, Harv must turned over in the Conceded Territories. Nell lives then at the sides of the Agent Moore , an unmarried soldier with the retirement which became guard of the clave. Nell is soon allowed in a famous school néo-Victorienne where it côtoie Fiona Hackworth and Elizabeth Finkle-McGraw, two other young girls in possession of a copy of the Handbook. The more it grows, the more the Handbook confronts it with difficult enigmas that it gets busy to solve by the reflection. Not supporting more the too rigid discipline of the school néo-Victorienne, Nell leaves the clave to join Pudong, in the economic zone of Shanghai, where it finds a work of scenario writer near Mrs Ping , in a brothel of luxury for néo-Victoriens in search of sophisticated erotic phantasms. Around it, the movement of the “Fist of the right harmony” organizes attacks against Alim and invests the building in which Nell works.

During this time, the life of John Percival Hackworth took a dramatic turning. After its arrival on the continent of North America, it was led to follow the traces of a sect mysterious, Tambourinaires, which live under the ocean and whose ritual consists of collective sexual fright during which nanotechnologic microéléments transport information in the body fluids, creating an immense collective brain with the extraordinary capacities. After ten last years in a semicomateux state at Tambourinaires to be taken part in interminable collective orgies, John Percival Hackworth returns at his place to the clave of Atlantis/Shanghai. Meanwhile, his wife obtained the divorce and his/her daughter left the school néo-Victorienne. Not being able more to join again with his former life, the deposed engineer takes again his search of the Alchemist, accompanied this time by his Fiona daughter. After a strange meeting with a company of theater called “ Dramatis personae ”, the engineer understands that it is itself the Alchemist whom it seeks since so a long time, the man who can create Seed that claim Confucéens.

At the end of the novel, at the top of the rebellion of the Fists of the right harmony, the Han young girls educated by the copies of the Handbook of Nell come to save Nell of the claws of the terrorist sect and proclaim it queen, creating de facto new “a Phyle ”. Strong of its victory and its increased conscience of its destiny, Nell wishes from now on to find Miranda, the affectionate and understanding voice which accompanied it during all its childhood by the means of the Handbook. After a survey which it jointly carries out with the business manager and ractor Carl Hollywood , it finds Miranda in the underwater tunnels of Tambourinaires and saves it of an ultimate collective orgy who would have been to him if not fatal.

Main characters of the novel

The main characters are classified alphabetically.

Bud , a thête (individual without tribal membership) criminal, small-friend of Tequila and father of Harv and Nell. He is condemned by Fang Judge and is carried out to have attacked and have wounded a member of the Ashanti phylum of Néo-Victoriens;
Chang , assisting of Fang judge;
Judge Fang , judge confucéen who condemns Bud and becomes an important character in the life of Nell. This character is an allusion to famous the Juge Ti of Robert van Gulik;
Lord Alexander Chung-Sik Finkle-McGraw , influences néo-Victorien which orders with engineer Hackworth the “ Manuel illustrated education for Young girls ”;
Elizabeth Finkle-McGraw , néo-Victorienne, grand-daughter of Lord Finkle-McGraw;
Fiona Hackworth , néo-Victorienne, girl of John Percival Hackworth;
Gwendolyn Hackworth , néo-Victorienne, wife of John Percival Hackworth;
John Percival Hackworth , néo-Victorien, engineer of the Order, second main character of the novel, inventor and developer of the “Manual illustrated education for Young girls ” thanks to the nanotechnologies. It creates an illicit copy of the Handbook for his own daughter, but the copy is stolen for him by Harv which gives it to his/her Nell sister;
Harv (abbreviation of Harvard ), brother of Nell, minor offender with the drift which takes care of his/her sister while moving away the small-friends from his mother badly intentioneds;
Carl Hollywood , ractor (actor in interactive productions) and artist, friend and director of Miranda, which wishes to enter to the néo-Victoriens;
Mrs. Hull , controlling of the Hackworth family;
Miss Matheson , principal néo-victorienne which Nell, Fiona Hackworth and Elizabeth Finkle-McGraw attend;
Colonel Arthur Hornsby Moore , soldier with the retirement which collects Nell;
Nell (abbreviation of Nellodee ), main character of the novel, little girl of the hollows of the Conceded Territories pertaining to a underprivileged social class. Thanks to the book which his/her brother gives him, it will become an independent woman who will direct her own Phyle;
Commander Napier , officer of the Intelligence services néo-victoriens;
Miss CAM , assistant of Fang judge;
Mrs. Ping , director of a brothel of Shanghai;
Miranda Redpath , ractrice (actress for interactive films) which lends its voice to the Book of Nell. By its implication in the history of the Book, it sticks to Nell and plays the part of surrogate mother;
Miss Stricken , person in charge of the discipline and the label néo-victorienne at the school of Matheson Miss;
Tequila , mother of Harv and Nell, often absent, it occupies few of his/her children and brings back many small-friends to his residence. These small-friends are often behave in a brutal way with his/her children;
Dr. X. , mysterious character who oscillates between the hacker specialist in illicit technologies and a charismatic and powerful leader.

Comments

Main themes

the diamond Age approaches and exploits the following topics:

preponderance of the cultural communities on the racial affiliations, even if the cultural communities themselves are treated on a hierarchical basis;
preponderance of education on the biological and family ascent;
literary concept of Bildungsroman which proposes the evolution of a central figure over several years;
the form of Cryptography literary and psychological which the fairy tales at educational ends represent;
contrast enters the néo-victoriens points of view of and confucéens, their contrasted approaches of new technologies and the artificial intelligence;
the disappearance of the State-Nations and the advent of cultural communities without geographical regrouping;
the emergence of a collective conscience (conscience of “hive” in the vocabulary of Neal Stephenson) as expression of a distributed intelligence which uses the human brains as modules of calculation and the fact of communicating by messengers nanotechnologic transmitted by the body fluids (cf the sect of Tambourinaires);
political and cultural history of the China, with a recall insisting of the Revolt of the Boxers. The revolutionary movement of the novel called “the Fist of the right harmony” is inspired directly by the Chinese name of the secret society at the origin of this war of the Boxers: “Yi He quan” (fists of justice and the harmony).

Literary references and intertextuality

The novel of Neal Stephenson calls upon multiple literary references such as:

universe of Charles Dickens, which is used as narrative background with the world of the néo-Victoriens of the novel. The name of the heroin of the novel, Nell, is directly inspired by Little Nell , a character drawn from the novel of Charles Dickens entitled the Store of antiquities ( The Old Curiosity Shop ), published into 1840/41;

the counting rhyme of Edward Lear. Indeed, the code name of the Handbook of Nell is Runcible , a reference to the last worms of a poem for children of the author and illustrator Edward Lear entitled The Owl and the Pussycat (XIXe century);

the world of the Tale of the brothers Grimm. Neal Stephenson takes up the idea of the tale as average of education such as it was reinvented by the Grimm brothers at the XIXe century, even if the characters of the tales of the “illustrated Handbook of education for Young girls” make loans with many fairy-like universes others that Germanic, for example that of the Thousand and One Nights ;

the Mysteries of the Judge Ti . The character of Fang judge directly refers to the novels of Robert van Gulik which put in scene the Judge Ti, a Chinese judge confucéen famous to succeed in elucidating several mysteries at the same time. The fictionalized investigations of the Judge Ti are based on novels with Chinese traditional mysteries whose principal elements were transposed in the kind of the Detective novel.

Bud, the father of Nell, represents a prototype of the character Cyberpunk. It is a criminal equipped with dangerous surgical implants. Neal Stephenson is replaced in a mobility postcyberpunk while making die symbolically its character Cyberpunk at the beginning of the novel.

Technological universe of the diamond Age

Following the example novel the Queen of the angels of the American author of Science fiction Greg Bear, the Age of diamond depicts a world completely metamorphosed by the full development of the Nanotechnologies, just like had considered it Eric Drexler in her work entitled Engines off Creation (1986). The nanotechnologies are omnipresent, generally in the form of “matricompilateurs” who produce objects also nanotechnologic. Certain researchers in nanotechnologies are explicitly introduced in the novel. Thus Richard Feynman, Eric Drexler and Ralph Merkle appears on the fresco which decorates the Merkle Hall, the place where and the new objects built are designed nanotechnologic.

The account also proposes more exotic technologies, like the “equine ” (a foldable mechanical horse enough light to be transported with only one hand), or of anticipations of technologies under development nowadays, as the electronic paper which can post personalized large-titles of press, while large the cities have made immunizing defenses of micromachines aerostatic. The domestic matricompilateurs produce free basic food, covers and water for most underprivileged. Those are true anticipation of the current printers 3D or nano-factories of office for all.

The “matricompilateurs” receive the raw material of Alim, a feeder system similar to the electric wiring of the modern societies. Alim transports the basic molecules to the matricompilateurs who assemble them to produce goods with the request. The Victoria Source, from which flow comes from raw material, is controlled by the néo-Victoriens, even if other more restricted sources exist in other communities. In the novel, the system of Alim is competed with by that of Seed, an opened technology, not centralized which induces another economic model and another shape of social organization more centered on individual freedom. The conflict of interests between the néo-Victoriens and the Celestial Empire of the Chinese is an at the same time technological and ideological conflict which opposes the centralism élitiste of Alim to the equal share and individual of Seed.

Educational and cultural Relativism

the diamond Age is a novel which relates primarily to the concept of cultural relativism and which seems to postulate the failure of it. The néo-Victoriens are clearly presented like a Micronation (or Phyle in the vocabulary of the author) technologically, culturally and economically higher than the others, simply competed with by Confucéens. Although the membership of different the Phyles is normally voluntary and nongiven by racial criteria or family antecedents, the hierarchies of class established in the novel establish de facto a distinction between the rich person and the poor. Neal Stephenson also describes a big number of other worships or communities, like the distributed reformed République which severely contrasts with the others more elaborate Phyles and impose a minimal social protocol. In certain cases, this protocol puts simply the will of the members of the phyla to the test by putting their life in danger at the profit of an superior interest which often exceeds them.

The cultural differences are also expressed in the various effects which has the Manuel illustrated on the young girls who use it. The young girls néo-victorienne who grew with the Handbook are all become of the independent, opened out and sure young women their objectives. Cepdendant the copies carried out by the Doctor X for the Chinese orphan young people do not have this effect and create on the contrary an army of cultural clones which put directly at the service heroin of the novel at the proper time. These copies, which did not propose for technical reasons any human mediation (as it was the case with the racteurs of the original copies), were only interactive machines automated and formatted on the same model. An allusion to the beginning of the novel suggests that the Chinese copies of the Handbook were intentionally designed like copies attached by the engineer néo-victorien John Percival Hackworth. This notable cultural difference in education of the young girls Hans can be interpreted as desiderata express of Confucéens which stress in priority on the direction of the honor, honesty and obedience.

Literary prizes

the diamond Age received the Prix Hugo of the best novel of science fiction in 1996 and was finalist for the Prix Nebula in the same category.

French editions

Neal Stephenson, the diamond Age, translated from American by Jean Bonnefoy, Payot Editions and Rivages, coll “Shores/Future”, 1996.
Neal Stephenson, the diamond Age, translated from American by Jean Bonnefoy, Editions the Book of Pocket, coll “Science fiction”, 1998.

Standard commodities

Galaxies n° 1, be 1996: the diamond Age (Shores), critical of Denis Guiot;
Bifrost n° February 12th, th and th 1999: the diamond Age (the Book of Pocket), critical of Jean-Felix Lyon;
Galaxies n° March 12th, th and th 1999: the Age of diamond (the Book of Pocket, Science fiction), critical of Christo Datso;
Berends, Jan Berrien. " The Politics off Neal Stephenson' S the Diamond Age." New York Review off Science Fiction 9.8 (104) (1997): 15.
Berry, Michael. ” High-tech Victorian Romp has. “ The San Francisco Chronicle . Sunday, January 8,1995. online.
Brigg, Peter. " Future The ace the Past Viewed from the Present: Neal Stephenson' S The Diamond Old . " Extrapolation: With Newspaper off Science Fiction and Fantasy 40.2 (1999): 116.
Dinello, Daniel. Technophobia! Science Fiction Visions off Posthuman Technology. Austin: University off Texas Near, 2005. ISBN 0-292-70954-4 (hardcover); ISBN 0-292-70986-2 (paperback)
Kleiman, Mark. ” Neal Stephenson: The Diamond Old . “ blogcritics.org . February 17,2003. online.
Merkle, Ralph. " It' S.A. Small, Small, Small, Small World." Technology Review (Feb/Mar 1997): 25. (available online young stag)
Merritt, Ethan A. " Re: The Diamond Old - Honourable Failure" newsgroup posting (9 May 1996)
Miksanek, Tony. " Microscopic Doctors and Molecular Black Bags: Science Fiction' S Regulation for Nanotechnology and Medicine." Literature and Medicine 20.1 (2001): 55-70.

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