Pharyngula::Neal Stephenson interview

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Wednesday, April 21, 2004

Neal Stephenson interview

PZ Myers • 2 Comments

Check out the excellent interview with Neal Stephenson in Salon today. I’m still trying to plod my way through The Confusion, but work keeps interfering—it’s good so far, rather different from Quicksilver in that it has a more conventional plot (which is good, I suppose), but there’s less science and far more economics, which I regret. Although I must say I’m surprised that economics is so exciting; I had no idea it was so involved with swashbuckling pirates, beautiful women having sex in carriages, Armenian coffee shops, and cunning plans to undermine invasions by the French. What the heck is my son the economics major learning out there at St. Cloud State?

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Comments:

#1809: john m lynch — 04/21 at 11:50 PM
Have to say I was disappointed with Quicksilver and am holding off on getting The Confusion until I finish the former. It started off OK, and I certainly (as an historian of biology) enjoyed the early material on the Royal Society and suchlike, but after that (Jack's adventures on the Continent), I lost a lot of interest. Shame really. Maybe I need to just start it again after grading and suchlike

#1810: PZ Myers — 04/22 at 08:12 AM
I rather liked Quicksilver, although I also appreciated that it was intensely weird for a novel.

I don't know whether you'll like The Confusion, though—I'm really missing the Royal Society element, which you also liked, and most of this book is a comic Sabatini-esque swashbuckler starring Jack and Eliza, which you didn't care for.

I recommend them both, but I suspect that the real make-or-break judgement will have to come after Stephenson releases The System of the World. I am going to be disappointed if, after all this build-up and bulk, the trilogy fizzles out into another lame Stephenson ending.

You hear that, Neal? There's a lot of pressure on you for an ending to this next book that lives up to your slam-bang beginnings!

PZ Myers
Division of Science and Math
University of Minnesota, Morris

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Pharyngula has moved to http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/

Wednesday, April 21, 2004

Neal Stephenson interview

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