William Gibson's "Neuromancer" : a critical companion / Graham J. Murphy.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Murphy, Graham J., 1970- author.

Series:

Palgrave science fiction and fantasy: a new canon 2662-8562

Palgrave science fiction and fantasy: a new canon, 2662-8562

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Gibson, William, 1948- Neuromancer.

Gibson, William.

Science fiction, American--History and criticism.

Science fiction, American.

Physical Description:

xv, 122 pages ; 21 cm.

Place of Publication:

Cham : Palgrave Macmillan, [2024]

Summary:

Graham J. Murphy had had his own cyberpunk implant, and like many of us it's a Gibson augmentation. You can upgrade yours by reading this ecstatic account of how William Gibson's Neuromancer does what it does. Murphy matches Gibson's super specificity with his own, keenly detailing the cultural factors that shape cyberpunk and Neuromancer. The range of scholarly references here indicate the importance of Gibson's novel as much as Murphy's seriousness about representing the discourse. Read it, teach it, cite it. - Dr. Brent Ryan Bellamy, Trent University William Gibson's Neuromancer: A Critical Companion presents Gibson's rise as an influential figure within and beyond the science fiction field. Gibson's success with Neuromancer, the first novel to win the Hugo Award, Nebula Award, and Philip K. Dick Award, is in part a direct result of the rising popularity of cyberpunk in the early- to mid-1980s, although it could just as easily be said cyberpunk's success was in no small part a direct result of Neuromancer's explosion onto the science fiction scene. Neuromancer's ongoing relevance remains undiminished because we are effectively living in a technocultural age that is increasingly difficult to distinguish from Gibson's novel. As Graham J. Murphy demonstrates in this companion, the novel remains instrumental in thinking through the ongoing explorations of the posthuman: transhumanism, the Utopia/Anti-Utopia dynamic, and capitalist realism, to name a few of the more significant critical vehicles with which to better understand and contextualize our technocultural age and Neuromancer's role in both shaping it and responding to it. This book provides a critical introduction to Neuromancer and cyberpunk culture. Graham J. Murphy is Professor with the School of English and Liberal Studies, Seneca Polytechnic, Canada. He is co-editor of Fifty Key Figures in Cyberpunk Culture (2022), The Routledge Companion to Cyberpunk Culture (2020), Cyberpunk and Visual Culture (2018), and Beyond Cyberpunk: New Critical Perspectives (2010) and co-author of Ursula K. Le Guin: A Critical Companion (2006).

Contents:

Introduction

Chapter One: The Posthuman Problematic

Chapter Two: A Case Study of the Post/Human

Chapter 3: Transhumanism and the Myth of Morphological Freedom

Chapter Four: 'Things are Things': The Resigned Pessimism of the Psuedo-Dystopia

Conclusion: Neuromancer and Accessible Moments

Appendix.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN:

9783031566264

3031566262

OCLC:

1455349774