William Gibson’s Neuromancer is the Penultimate Cyberpunk Novel

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Recommended: Analysis of William Gibson's Neuromancer

William Gibson’s Neuromancer is the Penultimate Cyberpunk Novel

It could be the near future or the distant future. It could be in the biggest companies or in your den. It could be traditional science fiction or it could be cyberpunk. Technology is pervasive. There is nothing in our lives that technology does not touch; it doesn’t matter if you use it directly, chances are that something (if not everything) in your life relies on technology to function or even exist. "Traditional" science fiction, if there even is such a thing, uses extrapolation as a foundation for its stories. Extrapolation, predicting or tracing a path of continuation for an idea or event, is also used in cyberpunk. Cyberpunk is known for its use of extrapolation in the fabric of daily life. (Sterling 348) It takes common science fiction themes, such as body and mind manipulation, and events of daily life and describes them with intensely dizzying detail. Neuromancer by William Gibson is a perfect example of cyberpunk writing because it uses this dense, rapid-fire description and language in combination with the themes of body/mind manipulation.

The body manipulation in Neuromancer is so obvious it’s accepted as commonplace to the characters. When Case first meets Molly, her eyes draw his attention. He first thinks she’s wearing glasses, but then realizes that the lenses "grow from…her cheekbones" and are "surgically inset" into her eye sockets. (Gibson 24) Does he find this odd? Does he question it at all? Nope. He recognizes it, makes a note of it, and moves on to her next implant—the steel claws under her nails. Same response. Why is that? He is used to the fact that bodies are meant to be manipulated. Gibson even gives the reader a push in that direction by naming the lead "Case"—as in: he is nothing but a case in which to store things. Within a matter of hours Case has had his own body manipulated, his pancreas is replaced, his blood is changed, and he has new liver tissue which is "biochemically incapable" of allowing him to get high off coke or speed (36). All that and the only thing he’s worried about is when he’ll be able to get back to work!

The descriptions of these modifications border a foreign language at times. They are detailed and technically specific, a hallmark of cyberpunk. A head-spinning example of this is the scan of Molly: "Silicon, coat of pyrolitic carbons.

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