I’ve been going through William Gibson’s Sprawl Series. I feel a bit like a digital archeologist digging for the root kit of a particular flavor of science fiction that has, over the years, morphed into something larger and more infectious. Gibson’s scuffed bootprints are all over the stuff we watch on TV. In truth, the terminology we use:Cyberspace, the Matrix, is most likely a result of his musings. I know that Shadowrun is entirely derivative of Gibson’s work, which is partly why I found myself scrolling back to the beginning of his cyberpunk scenarios in order to get a sense of intent and be clear about what I was doing moving forward in that derivation and trying to make something that is mine entirely.
For the record, we are in too deep for anything to feel like it isn’t him. I remember a debate at the forefront of the Eclipse Phase game and story era where they writers, once Shadowrun producers, decided to step aside and pursue this new direction namely because it was what they felt would be their version of starting fresh and putting their own print on what a dystopian future might be in light of technological advances made post 80’s cyberpunk. Yet as I read these older books and I watch the world unfold around me I wonder if we are not chained to some variation of Gibson’s future without even realizing we are dragging ourselves there on purpose.
Gibson’s Peripheral is next on my list and I wonder what insights will haunt me from that perch?