“From rebelling against this world to being part of the world”
Cyberpunk status
Lawrence Person has attempted to define the content and ethos of the cyberpunk literary movement stating:
Classic cyberpunk characters were marginalized, alienated loners who lived on the edge of society in generally dystopic futures where daily life was impacted by rapid technological change, an ubiquitous datasphere of computerized information, and invasive modification of the human body.
— Lawrence Person
Cyberpunk plots often center on conflict among artificial intelligences, hackers, and megacorporations, and tend to be set in a near-future Earth.There are sources who view that cyberpunk has shifted from a literary movement to a mode of science fiction due to the limited number of writers and its transition to a more generalized cultural formation.
Focus on：
These cyberpunk decided to bring realism into the fantasy world, bring humanistic care into technological imagination, and introduce discussions on gender, identity, and social issues. Topics involved include but are not limited to-
· Technology or something is making things worse
· Feel the shortcomings of human beings, suspect that human beings have introduced themselves into difficulties, and lack confidence in humans getting rid of the difficulties
· Exploring the dark side of science and technology, increasing distrust of science and technology, the focus shifted from natural science to social science
· Demonstrate social systems and more extreme social movements
· Sexual revolution and psychedelic drug culture under social upheaval
The resulting contrasts and confrontations have also become the cornerstones of cyberpunk-high-tech and low life, authority and personal will, freedom of thought and practically higher power. Control, the beautiful world that science and technology should bring and the criminal city actually present. Technology brings liberation and imprisonment.
Classic scene overview
From Philip Dick's "Do Bionics Dream of Electronic Sheep?" Cyberpunk 2077, a new open-world tour to CDPR, the life span of the sci-fi subcategory named Cyberpunk continues to this day, except that its formula has hardly changed, and they are implanted in your brain through illustrations and movie scenes The scene constitutes the classic "high-tech and inferior life" template:
A society ruled by a powerful company, random human body transformation and chip implantation, hackers flying fingertips on the keyboard, a combination of high-frequency rainy night neon signs, pollution, artificial animals, electronic music, psychedelic Medicine, privatized law enforcement, weird oriental elements, space exploration, physical liberation, virtual space operations, artificial intelligence, preservation, replication and immortality of consciousness, high-rise buildings and chaotic blocks ...
Cyberpunk had a glimpse of the gloomy future in the last century. It was the rapid development of technology that did not bring general well-being to most people, but consolidated the totalitarianism and deepened the inequality of the failed society. At the same time, technology also gives humans the opportunity to get rid of the flesh. Individuals have weapons of resistance. People ’s thoughts gallop freely in Cyberspace, feeling the thrill of direct stimulation of neurons by the virtual world, but in the end it is inevitable Thinking about existentialism.
Common elements
Digital space (information space) (Cyberspace)
Virtual reality (Virtual reality)
Artificial Intelligence
Cybernetics and Androids
Semi-robot (Cyborg)
Urban Expansion and Ghetto
Anti-Hero
Large Enterprise (Mega Enterprise)
Genetic Engineering
Human Augmentation
Bio-engineering
Terrorism (especially computer terrorism) (Terrorism)
Neuromancer
Neuromancer is a 1984 science fiction novel written by American Canadian writer William Gibson. It is the most famous one of the early cyberpunk novels. It is the first work that won the "three glory" in science fiction literature at the same time-Nebula Award, Philip K. Dick Memorial Award, and Hugo Award. It is Gibson's first novel and the beginning of a trilogy.
The background is set in a future world that is considered dystopian. The protagonist Keith is a cyber hacker. Before the story began, he lost the ability to connect to cyberspace. The plot revolves around him being cured by a mysterious person and hired to assist a seemingly impossible cybercrime.
The novel discusses many ideas that are now popular in popular culture, such as artificial intelligence, virtual reality, genetic engineering, multinational companies are far superior to traditional single country companies, and cyberspace (a computer network traditionally known as the mother). Gibson also discussed the impact of human nature being dominated by ubiquitous and inexpensive technology (High Tech Low Life).
This novel has a great influence on linguistics, popularizing some proper nouns such as cyberspace and ICE (Intrusion Countermeasures Electronics).
refection
Cyberpunk is a major category in science fiction today, and it is also the category I am most interested in. Researching cyberpunk has given me a better understanding of the proper nouns and patterns of science fiction, and has also determined how my fiction should develop.
The models it has set have been used repeatedly for decades: large corporations have secretly ruled the earth, it is as sophisticated and old-fashioned as a honeycomb, imprisoning everyone; technology cannot eliminate crime and inequality, neon signs and representatives of consumerism Under the shuttle boat of science and technology, buildings like the Kowloon Walled City constitute an underground ecosystem; humans get rid of physical restraints, human body transformation enhances functions, freezing and awakening to maintain longevity, dead people ’s thinking can be copied and stored, and everyone ’s consciousness is online Switching between online and offline caused a sense of nihilism, and the reader was involved in life thinking.
This is very helpful for the science fiction I want to write. Although I may not completely model a novel according to the cyberpunk template, cyberpunk's heavy "near future" setting, the development of the era framework from small stories, and the transfer of memory technology have given me a lot of Good inspiration.
REFERENCE
Tianpeng Gu (2019) From rebelling against this world to being part of the world, how is cyberpunk born, evolved, and stagnant? available at：https://www.qdaily.com/articles/60582.html (Accessed: 20/02/2020)
Tianpeng Gu (2019) From rebelling against this world to being part of the world, how is cyberpunk born, evolved, and stagnant? available at：https://www.qdaily.com/articles/60582.html (Accessed: 20/02/2020)