posted
Has anyone read many books by Neal Stephenson? I've read most of his books, and Cryptonomicon is my favorite fictional book. I also heard him speak at USENIX in San Antonio a few years ago, and found him even more interesting as a person than as an author. He also has written the occasional article in Wired.
One thing of interest here, is that there are usually some LDS characters in his books. They are mostly just throwaway scenery, but still present. For instance, in The Diamond Age there is the scene with two LDS missionaries in rural China. Also, there are the Mormon "burbclaves" in Snow Crash. The interesting thing to me, is that even though it is pretty obvious that Neal Stephenson is not LDS, the LDS characters in his books are depicted pretty accurately as LDS. He doesn't go out of his way to make them look particularly ideal, but there is nothing that is really incorrect, or demeaning, either.
Has anyone else noticed his LDS characters? Has anyone else even read his works?
posted
I'm about 200 pages into Cryptonomicon and am enjoying it quite a bit. I haven't noticed any LDS characters yet. I haven't read any of his other stuff yet but I probably will eventually.
Posts: 43 | Registered: Aug 2002
| IP: Logged |
posted
I'm not sure if there are many (or any) LDS characters in Cryptonomicon or it's prequel series, the Baroque Cycle. But, like many things in his books, a throwaway paragraph about something can go unnoticed pretty easily, because he goes off on so many tangents. I've come to appreciate that his tangents are the real gems anyway.
He also has some ideas about an original human language that diverged, a la Babel, that don't exactly conflict with LDS theology.
UBBFriend: Email this page to someone!
Printer-friendly view of this topic
