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238

The Salon Interview

2004

1
terms
2
notes

with Laura Miller. some questions about the Baroque Cycle (the characters, the period; he really admires the Puritans). some questions about how he started writing: he was a physics major, but dropped out before he got his degree, and then started writing while also taking on other jobs (office, construction). also, he writes longhand now (after crypto).

Stephenson, N. (2012). The Salon Interview. In Stephenson, N. Some Remarks: Essays and Other Writing. William Morrow, pp. 238-263

(noun) sustained and bitter railing and condemnation; vituperative utterance / (noun) an act or instance of vituperating

241

The reason people are so vituperative about those generations is not because they know anything about the history

on Victorians and Puritans

—p.241 by Neal Stephenson
confirm
7 years, 5 months ago

The reason people are so vituperative about those generations is not because they know anything about the history

on Victorians and Puritans

—p.241 by Neal Stephenson
confirm
7 years, 5 months ago
254

Fiction that's not considered good unless it has interesting ideas in it. You can write a minimalist short story that's set in a trailer park or a Connecticut suburb that might be considered a literary masterpiece or well-regarded by literary types, but science fiction people wouldn't find it very interesting unless it had somewhere in it a cool idea that made them say, "That's interesting. I never thought of that before." If it's got that, then science fiction people will embrace it and bring it into the big-tent view of science fiction. That's really the role that science fiction has com to play in literature right now. In arty lit, it's become uncool to try to come to grips with ideas per se.

god he's such a snob about "ideas" as if technological ideas are superior to, say, ideas about what it means to be human

though he does love DFW so at least there's that

(right after this, the interviewer disagrees with him citing Don DeLillo as an example)

—p.254 by Neal Stephenson 7 years, 5 months ago

Fiction that's not considered good unless it has interesting ideas in it. You can write a minimalist short story that's set in a trailer park or a Connecticut suburb that might be considered a literary masterpiece or well-regarded by literary types, but science fiction people wouldn't find it very interesting unless it had somewhere in it a cool idea that made them say, "That's interesting. I never thought of that before." If it's got that, then science fiction people will embrace it and bring it into the big-tent view of science fiction. That's really the role that science fiction has com to play in literature right now. In arty lit, it's become uncool to try to come to grips with ideas per se.

god he's such a snob about "ideas" as if technological ideas are superior to, say, ideas about what it means to be human

though he does love DFW so at least there's that

(right after this, the interviewer disagrees with him citing Don DeLillo as an example)

—p.254 by Neal Stephenson 7 years, 5 months ago
261

Damasio is arguing that one of the innate faculties of our brain is that we can envision a wide range of possible scenarios and then sort through them very quickly not by logic but through a kind of process of the emotions. [...]

referring to Antonio Damasio, a neuroscientist who happens to be a friend of his, who claims that what we think of as "reason" and what we think of as "emotion" are more linked than we'd think

—p.261 by Neal Stephenson 7 years, 5 months ago

Damasio is arguing that one of the innate faculties of our brain is that we can envision a wide range of possible scenarios and then sort through them very quickly not by logic but through a kind of process of the emotions. [...]

referring to Antonio Damasio, a neuroscientist who happens to be a friend of his, who claims that what we think of as "reason" and what we think of as "emotion" are more linked than we'd think

—p.261 by Neal Stephenson 7 years, 5 months ago