The Diamond Age

This book is difficult to summarize because the plot spirals around itself like the shell of an ammonite. It is an exploration of Stephenson's ideas about culture, and since his ideas are strange, the book is also strange. It takes place on the fringe of a modern China, where various Western barbarians have set up their own mini-societies protected and supported by fantastical nanotechnology that seems both impossible and plausible at the same time.

The story follows the progress of a young girl named Nell, born into an irrational society focused on short-term self gratification, who acquires an extremely unusual book: The Young Lady's Illustrated Primer. Designed by nanotechnical engineer John Percival Hackworth, the pseudo-intelligent book awakens Nell to the many possibilities to be found outside the stifling world where she is growing up and leads her through many adventures, some real, some imaginary. Gradually, she grows up into a truly competent and extremely rational individual. At least, in the Western tradition.

While this is going on the mysterious Dr. X lurks in the background, seeking a technology that he believes will solve the problems of Chinese culture by giving it access to the best of Western technology without having to adopt Western ideas and practices (individualism, freedom, rights). This nanotechnological Seed is being developed by a network of people who have connected themselves using nanosite transmitters and developed a sort of "collective" consciousness. Or, to be more specific, a collective unconsciousness, as these Drummers lose all higher mental function and become cogs in a data-processing machine.

He finds, however, that while they can process data at a tremendous rate, the Drummers need more than that to complete this Seed: they need a creative spark. They need an engineer. They need John Percival Hackworth. So, the Doctor sets about acquiring him.

Throughout, the Western society of Hackworth and Nell is contrasted with both the existing Chinese society and the theoretical ideal one that will be brought about by the seed. Many theories explaining their differences are posited, as well as theories of how to propogate the essentially stagnant Western society, which relies almost exclusively on imports for its progress. Stephenson stumbles around the answer but never really pinpoints it.

The answer is ideology. The Westerners are successful in passing on the trappings of their ideology, but not its substance. From their own youth, who are inculcated from an early age with stiff mannerisms and good posture yet shielded from the real world to such an extent that they never understand the purpose of anything they do, to the underclass "thetes" and even Dr. X, who believe that they can (and deserve to) share in the results without understanding or enacting the cause, no one quite comprehends just what it is that makes these Westerners what they are.

The result is a very 20th-century sort of battle of riots and screaming slogans, only a tiny minority able to put forth any principled resistance. The conclusion of the book comes as somewhat of a surprise, as the reader is never quite certain who they are supposed to be rooting for.

It's a very interesting book, and Stephenson is a very adept writer so it's very enjoyable to read, but I'd have to say that I don't really consider it a good book.