Some Remarks: Essays and Other Writing

One of the most talented and creative authors working today, Neal Stephenson is renowned for his exceptional novels — works colossal in vision and mind-boggling in complexity. Exploring and blending a diversity of topics, including technology, economics, history, science, pop culture, and philosophy, his books are the products of a keen and adventurous intellect. Not surprisingly, Stephenson is regularly asked to contribute articles, lectures, and essays to numerous outlets, from major newspapers and cutting-edge magazines to college symposia. This remarkable collection brings together previously published short writings, both fiction and nonfiction, as well as a new essay (and an extremely short story) created specifically for this volume.

Stephenson ponders a wealth of subjects, from movies and politics to David Foster Wallace and the Midwestern American College Town; video games to classics-based sci-fi; how geekdom has become cool and how science fiction has become mainstream (whether people admit it or not); the future of publishing and the origins of his novels. Playful and provocative, Some Remarks displays Stephenson's opinions and ideas on:

• The Internet, our dwindling national attention span, and the cultural importance of books and bookishness
• Waco, religion, and the cluelessness of secular society
• Metaphysics and the battle between Isaac Newton and Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz
• The laying of the longest wire on Earth — and why it matters to you
• Technology, freedom, commerce, and the Chinese
• How Star Wars and 300 mirror who we are today and what that spells for our future
• Modern Jedi knights, a.k.a. scientists and technologists, and why they are admired and feared by both the left and the right

By turns amusing and profound, critical and celebratory, yet always entertaining, Some Remarks offers a fascinating look into the prismatic mind of this extraordinary writer.

"This meandering collection of short works by speculative/science fiction writer Stephenson (Reamde) compiles his published nonfiction and short stories from 1993 to the present, and includes two new pieces: 'Arsebestos,' a pertinent and enjoyable essay about the dangers of sitting, and 'Under-Constable Proudfoot,' a bemusing one-sentence opener to an unfinished work of fiction. The collection covers a diversity of topics and genres, ranging from long-form journalism about the wiring of transcontinental submarine cables and a foreword written for David Foster Wallace's Everything And More to interviews with Salon and Slashdot and an essay on the ignorance of secularists in response to the 1993 Branch Davidian massacre in Waco. Selected shorter works such as 'Locked In' and 'Innovation Starvation,' which perform the unthinkable task of insightfully critiquing modern energy policy in general terms, provide concise and thoughtful arguments. Many pieces, however, are frustrating in their flimsy claims, such as his argument for the getting more respect from the literary world for science fiction. However, the collection's range and the author's lively voice keep it entertaining — despite the cumbersome selection 'Mother Earth, Mother Board' — and Stephenson fans will surely find much to enjoy. Agent: Liz Darhansoff, Liz Darhansoff Agency. (Sept.)" Publishers Weekly Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.

"Neal Stephenson has made a name for himself as a writer whose imagination knows no limits." Salon

#1 New York Times bestselling author Neal Stephenson is, quite simply, one of the best and most respected writers alive. He's taken sf to places it’s never been (Snow Crash, Anathem). He’s reinvented the historical novel (The Baroque Cycle), the international thriller (Reamde), and both at the same time (Cryptonomicon). Now he treats his legion of fans to Some Remarks, an enthralling collection of essays — Stephenson's first nonfiction work since his long essay on technology, In the Beginning... Was the Command Line, more than a decade ago — as well as new and previously published short writings both fiction and non. Some Remarks is a magnificent showcase of a brilliantly inventive mind and talent, as he discourses on everything from Sir Isaac Newton to Star Wars.

Neal Stephenson is the author of Reamde, Anathem; the three-volume historical epic the Baroque Cycle (Quicksilver, The Confusion, and The System of the World); Cryptonomicon; The Diamond Age; Snow Crash, which was named one of Time magazine's top one hundred all-time best English-language novels; and Zodiac. He lives in Seattle, Washington.