Hello again fellow readers. On the cutting board this week is The Nine Billion Names of God and how Marx's ideas on society functions in terms of culture, economy, religion, etc. First off let me just talk about how excited I was to read this story. Being a HUGE fan of 2001: A Space Odyssey, as you probably have read in one of my previous blogs, as soon as I saw Arthur C. Clarke I could not wait to dive into the story. Although relatively short, I really enjoyed the story and how it flowed. It read very quickly, but in a good way. This was the reason I chose to analyze this story for this week. I really understood where it was going, leaving me with virtually no confusion, as with stories we have read in the past. This story mainly focuses on religion and essentially the purpose of mankind on earth. To the monks in the story, the purpose of man is to discover the true name of God. If this can be achieved, God will end the universe, thus ending the human race. Upon learning this, the two computer programmers, of course, think this is a bit absurd and make plans to escape the blame at the end of the process. Marx had a relatively "anti religious" view on religion. He viewed as a downfall of society and that it held back innovation. The monks in the story have been told of this mission to find the name of God, a mission that has been passed down for centuries through many generations. They have no choice whether to give the mission a rational thought of whether it makes sense or not. Are they to go against something their ancestors began thousands of years ago? How could they possibly do that? The westerners, however, who have been employed to run the computer that will eventually discover the correct combination, think about this in a much different way. Marx's ideas would obviously favor those of the computer programmers and their plan to escape before a possible failure of the end of the universe, as the monks have predicted. Marx feared an outbreak of chaos as a result of religion, something seen in this very story. Its hard to say religion is necessary, but even harder to say it should be forbidden. I believe Marx had some innovative ideas, but something more in the middle seems most effective. Before I conclude, I have to mention that last line. A real mind fuck, excuse the language. Falling stars? I guess one would conclude that the universe has begun to end. But what if that's not what the author meant? What did he mean? I am personally a big fan of leaving the reader with a cliffhanger. (see Shutter Island) Gives the story much more flavor.

For this week's concept, we have to write about something I had never even heard of before we were assigned it. Something called the novum. After discussing it in class and reading over the prompt, I found the idea of the novum to be very interesting. Generally in science fiction stories, there is some sort of device or machine per say that classifies the story under the genre of science fiction. Examples include a computer, a robot, or any fictional element that is plausible but not necessarily existent within our present time. I will get to a literary example from class, but first I wanted to use an example to expand my point with one of my favorite films, 2001: A Space Odyssey. In the film, one of the main characters is HAL 9000. He is an intelligent computer that controls that space ship the remaining characters are on to Jupiter. This is an example of the novum in the sense of a character. I just personally found it interesting that it was a character in the story, but also a science fiction element that enhanced the story, but I digress. One of the stories we read recently, Dead Space for the Unexpected,  we meet several characters that work in some sort of marketing or advertising firm, it never really says but that's the impression I got for some reason. At this firm, it seems as if every aspect of their daily tasks are scrutinized and eventually scored. These scores, especially for our main character, are the only thing that matters. It's almost as if what their job services or provides does not even matter. I viewed the company as selling some useless product, like a plunger or a workout machine.Only the scores determined everything. It didn't matter that what you were selling was maybe not the most honorable practice, but the way you did it. This is all, by the way, my personal interpretation, essentially what I, "read between the lines." Without getting off topic too much, I wanted to bring all of these points back to the original concept. I viewed these scores as the novum of the story. There are many similar programs at various places of employment that we today, but in no way the manner seen in the story. Thats really what validated the science fiction element for me. These scores determine every aspect of the work day, and that just seems eerie. I got this weird vibe that they were being watched. I had this picture of a huge room with hundreds of screens analyzing every move the employees made. This in turn made up a large portion of the scoring. The concept of the novum is very clear in the stories we have read this semester, particularly in the story I have talked about today. A concept I was not initially familiar with, but now have a concrete understanding of  and will apply to future readings.

We kind of got a little more freedom than usual on this week's topic. We can pick any story that we have read up until now. Thinking back I always come back to Burning Chrome. I have not written about it yet, so I will just jump in. This week we have to do what's called a Close-Focus Reading. I am pretty much going to break down a section of Burning Chrome and analyze it word by word.
I have chosen a  paragraph early on in the story. "Chrome: her pretty childhood face," to "none of them at all reassuring." (Gibson 372) In this paragraph it gives a unique, chilling description of the title character. Who is Chrome? What is she all about? Why is she such a well known, important figure of society in this futuristic world? This is the first time in the story that we get to know who she really is.
"Chrome: her pretty childhood face smooth as steel, with eyes that would have been at home on the bottom of some deep Atlantic trench, cold gray eyes that lived under terrible pressure." She is described as having a pretty but childhood face. This conveys a sense of innocence about her. Pretty, therefore has power. I love how the author describes her face as smooth as steel. Steel? Chrome? A coincidence? I think not. At first glance one might not see her as a powerful figure, but as we see the story continue, we learn that this is quite the opposite. "They said she cooked her own cancers for people who crossed her, rococo custom variations that took years to kill you." This is another example of the innocent, but powerful force that Chrome projects. She may appear to be the girl next door, but she has an effect on people that takes a lasting toll that can take a man's life. Maybe this talent that she yields is what drew the mafia to her. They know what she is capable of, and to me it sounds like she could get anyone to do anything, which means money for the mafia. "They said a lot of things about Chrome, none of them reassuring." She doesn't really sound like someone you would want to take home to your parents does she? Absolutely nothing that is said about her is reassuring? Damn, that's cold. This perhaps foreshadows the motive of our main characters. Someone has to take out this demon woman and take her for all she is worth.
I really enjoyed the way this paragraph flowed, which is why I chose to focus on it for this assignment. At the point in the story, we don't know much about the title character. But after reading this, we get a good idea of who she is, what she is all about, and perhaps why someone would plot against her. This sets the tone for the remainder of the story, as we now have an emotional connection to the main characters mission and their plan to, "burn," Chrome."