Evolution gave us a circuit that responds to good looks - call it the pleasure receptor for our visual cortex - and in our natural environment, it was useful to have. That's when it becomes addictive.īeauty has undergone a similar process, thanks to advertisers. But refine it, purify it, and you get a compound that hits your pleasure receptors with an unnatural intensity.
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In its natural form, as coca leaves, it's appealing, but not to an extent that it usually becomes a problem. And to those who're not shy from trying their own hand at writing science fiction, there's probably no other writer whose stories will make you think harder and from whom you'll learn more fruitfully than Chiang.“Think of cocaine. There are some very deep issues explored in these stories from a remarkably fresh, wonderfully new perspective. The best stories in his collection are Hell is the absence of God, Liking what you see: A documentary and the eponymous Story of your Life. And his stories have a component that is very, very rare in science fiction - indeed in most genre fiction (which is why even mediocre, run-of-the-mill literary fiction writers turn up their noses at genre fiction) - that of a lively, throbbing, understated but readily identifiable human connection - in its simple, unobtrusive, unassuming, even self-effacing, turning-attention-away-from-itself prose. His best stories are nothing but thought experiments - not very clever or convoluted or look-at-me-how-smart-I-am type. It is in fact deceptive in its utter, utter simplicity and straightforwardness. Ted Chiang's fiction is not grandiose, or with a hidden agenda of its own. gave up on Seventy-Two Letters after a few pages, may be try again in a few days (hard to read with all of the fancy words).
That's sort of the tone for the other stories I've gotten through so far: Tower of Babel, Understand, Division by Zero, and the Evolution of Human Science. I know I know it's supposed to make you focus on the philosophical aspects of our lives, it's meaning in the grander context of the cosmos, and try to make us understand other ways to see life. very deep but terribly nonsensical from a story telling climax point of view. yea yea all the future is forgotten and we need to catch up to remember (blah blah blah). would they really have bothered to land in the first place. it's as if the Vulcans visited Earth and chose not to give us even their "live long and propser" idiom (in Vullcan) and then said "See Ya". ?" it ended with a twist but somewhat anti climactic and bittersweet not in the sense of the plot itself necessarily (although obviously that was part of the challenge) but in that with all that "advanced" stuff (language, tech, anatomy, etc) it just came to an uninspiring conclusion. what's a bit odd is that feeling of "was there supposed to be something more to it. still thinking about it after having finished it several days ago. thoughtful, well-written, bitter sweet, thought provoking, and absolutely thrilling to read.
#Story of your life by ted chiang pdf movie#
The famous one "Story of Your Life" (inspiring the upcoming movie Arrival) was a great story as I'm readying through it. One of the few instances where the movie actually improved upon the source material, in my opinion.
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there are inconsequential variations of character and plot, but overall, Chiang's story feels much more 'detached' than the film - which is surprising since the story is written in the first person. Granted, some readers may find the situations themselves thought-provoking enough to feel rewarded, but I'm not ashamed to admit that I found each destination to be not worth the journey.Īnd if you're wondering specifically how "Story of Your Life" compares to "Arrival". Instead, most simply ended, and only one or two provided any sense of reward for having made it through to the end. In short, reading these felt like WORK - which would have been fine if the payoff of each story had justified the effort.
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Chiang's stories, on the other hand, are built on the foundation of such passages, and I found myself trying to wrap my head around his imaginative scenarios rather than enjoying the narrative. Tom Clancy's novels can be riveting and thrilling, even if the reader glosses over the long passages of technological information, as they usually aren't essential to the story. But I often got lost in the intricate philosophical and/or physiological material which is elemental to his storytelling, not just background. Chiang is undeniably a talented writer, adept at describing each story's characters and world in detail. I could write a separate blurb about each story, but my feelings are similar for all of them. Read this after seeing (and loving) the feature film "Arrival", as the movie is based on "Story of Your Life", one of the eight short stories collected in this volume.