"What people do isn't determined by where they live. It happens to be their damned fault. They decided to watch TV instead of thinking when they were in high school. They decided to take blow-off courses and drink beer instead of reading and trying to learn something. They decided to chicken out and be intolerant bastards instead of being openminded, and finally decided to go along with their buddies and do things that were terribly wrong when there was no reason they had to. Any who hurts someone else decides to hurt them, goes out of their way to do it...The fact that it's hard to be a good person doesn't excuse going along and being an asshole. If they can't overcome their own fear of being unusual, it's not my fault, because any idiot ought to be able to see that if he just acts reasonably and makes a point of not hurting others, he'll be happier."

Uneven but somehow still consistent and surprising enough to make me keep reading. By the time Sarah Jane Johnson, the Student Government President, speaks the lines above I felt like Stephenson improved on the design of what Ballard established with n  High-Risen as an examination of what happens in enclosed space with different societal groups slowly descending into chaos. Whereas Ballard peaked early with his work, Stephenson slowly drags you along and establishes a world that reminded me of my time in college.

Much like American University, my school was downtown and close to the interstate. Although we didn't have a Plex, the towers I lived in sophomore year always seemed to be at the edge of a chaotic meltdown. However, it was my freshman year in a six-story dormitory that closely mirrored the violence of the book--my floor constantly staged boxing matches in the cramped hallways and by the end of the academic year, there were enough holes in the ceilings and walls that nearly every resident on the floor had over a $500 bill to fix the damage.

I will admit that I am guilty of everything in that above speech. My college time was mostly spent drinking or sleeping off a hangover and it is a minor surprise that I actually graduated in four years. I say minor because once the tuition check cleared, it was in the university's best interest to have me graduate so they can use me as a statistic in their recruitment efforts. Since those days, I have slowly matured as human to know only slightly better, to not view the world the foggy glasses of cheap beer, and only occasionally use my higher thinking skills for less selfish purposes such as not standing idly by when I feel a wrong has been committed (either against myself or a fellow human/animal/external element that is not me yet a part of me on a cosmic level).

That Sarah Jane Johnson has a lot of great wisdom in the book and clearly the character I most identified with. Here's another wonderful nugget:

"I don't need some terrific reason for resigning. If I'm spending time on a useless job I don't like, and I find there are better things to do with that time, then I ought to resign."

That's a statement which I am currently in the process of living out.

Первый роман Стивенсона — чуваку было сколько, 29, когда он вышел? — и совсем непонятно, почему он обойден вниманием руссоидателей, так обильно на Стивенсона фапающих (уважительная причина может быть только в том, что сам Стивенсон не дает его на русский переводить, оберегая нервную систему своих фанов, но переиздавать же дал, так что все равно непонятно).
Т.е. это конечно, не фонтастега для умных, где литературным мальчикам там приятно опознавать знакомые буквы, это натурально грубо сляпанный балаган, шизокомический эпос из студенческой жизни. Там все как бы сметано на живую нитку, но в этом и есть определенная прелесть — видно, как из автора фонтаном бьют придумки.
С виду роман — эдакий гибрид Мэтта Раффа, Линды Джейвин и Тома Шарпа, а в глубине было лень разбираться, Стивенсона я же для развлечения читаю. Ну и карнавал имени Пинчона, конечно. Здесь отлично видно, у кого на самом деле он учился писать.

A true disappointment. Ridiculous to the point of boredom. Impossible to follow characters and pointless plotlines. After stickling through to the very end, I still couldn't quite understand what the point of the book was supposed to be.

The Big U is a good indication of how much Neal Stephenson has grown in his writing. It's an early novel and in some ways it reminds me of Neil Gaiman or Terry Prachett, because it is fun reading. He makes some insightful pokes at the the corporate model of the university, and institution whose face is undergoing remarkable changes since the GI bill went through in the US. Strange because I have been reading Neuman's The Idea of the University, a rather long and ponderous essay written in the mid to late 1800's. It's a chilling shift in the concept of the university, especially in light of the idea of discontinuing tenure to purge schools of bad professors. Yet tenure was designed to give academics liberty to spak their minds without fear of termination, not necessarily to provide them with the ability to coast after publishing. I would like to read more books on this topic, fiction or non fiction, so suggestions welcome.

If you like Neal Stephenson's sense of humor and have read some of his later books, this is a rather fun look into how early that sense of humor manifested itself in his writing.

If you haven't read anything else by Stephenson and are looking for a good book, then you may be disappointed. Start with "Snowcrash" instead, and work your way forward in time from there. (Then, if you like Stephenson, "Zodiac" is fun too. It contains a quite memorable quote about people who shop in hardware stores and the kinds of clerks that might approach them that I have used to explain what I do in hardware stores many times :-))

I enjoyed it.

I may have enjoyed this if I had read it when I was closer to college age and could relate better to the satire. At this point in my life,it was just not interesting or entertaining.

While the prose comes off as smooth and entertaining at the start of the novel, and the story has good momentum and drive, the latter half of this book falls flat because it drags itself down. The prose becomes oversaturated and derivative, and the story nonsensical to the point where I'm wasn't sure exactly what I was reading anymore. I'm a big fan (heh) of Stephenson, but this was a struggle to get through for me. Some neat moments scattered throughout, but overall not something I'll think back on fondly.

I read this for "completeness" (so I could have read all of Neal Stephenson's work), even though he hates it and had tried to suppress it. Not great, not horrible; if it hadn't been a Neal Stephenson book I might not have sought out another by the same author, but it wasn't so bad to have regretted reading it. What was interesting was seeing how some of the elements (plot and character motivations, style) developed in his subsequent books.

It was cool to read Neal's first published book! I'm probably hugely biased, because Neal's writing tends to align well with what I enjoy and I've grown fond of pretty much every novel of his that I have read. This was definitely the most raw writing I've seen from him. It seems like he experienced a shift in style between The Diamond Age and Cryptonomicon. The Big U fits well with the earlier cyberpunk style, consistent with hacker themes but with more ridiculousness instead of polish.

Many moments reminded me of Infinite Jest, which I finished a few months ago. I think this is due to the similar setting (univeristy megadorm vs. high school tennis academy) with eccentric student personalities and an overwhelming sense of absurdity. Everything was hilarious. There was more explicitly sci-fi stuff (railgun, radiation, big ole rats, etc.). I am personally partial to radiation humor.

Another cool aspect of reading this was the Boston University inside jokes and understanding some of the context behind the novel. My sister recently graduated from BU (Big U or Boston U?), where she spent some time as a resident living in Warren Towers (inspiration for big mega dorm).

Definitely a fun read if you enjoy some DFW humor or other Neal Stephenson works!

At first I thought: "Cool, it's Yossarian Goes to College." And for a while, that's what this book felt like. Then, it either derailed or got on track, depending on how you look at it. Ultimately, the whole thing becomes a giant, but always fun, mess. There are alot of great parts here, and they are all jammed together in ways that might or might not make sense. From a pure plot standpoint, the various parts actually fit together pretty nicely -- but the way they fit, it feels like Stephenson has built something out of the game "Mousetrap". They all fit together like a bizarrely conceived puzzle, but none of them really seem to go together, except perhaps by the force of the author's will.

But they are really cool parts: Stereo wars of Bach Organ works that hit upon the resonant frequencies of redundant skyscrapers; irradiated giant rats living in the sub-sewer systems; college frat boys who worship a neon sign; a clandestine nuclear waste facility; a computer virus that becomes a kind of overarching artificial intelligence... And these are just a smattering of the assorted craziness that forms the Big U. Ultimately, however, it seems to fall apart, as though Stephenson is a juggler running out of hands. But, even for its flaws, it was almost always fun and engaging. It lacks the diversions and infodumps that come in his later books. The characters are reed thin. The satire is so over-the-top that it becomes hard to even think of it as satire -- it's closer to pipe dreams. But there's plenty of humor and exuberance to pull through these weaknesses.

This book made me think. Is it possible to hate a book? This book pushed the envelope. I'm a dedicated Stephenson fan and reader. I've read and liked all his other books. In fact I consider one of them the best book title ever - "In the Beginning There Was the Command Line". It's wonderfully biblical. But this book is not like the others. I've seen video games turned into movies. Those have at least interesting images. This felt like a video game turned into a book. It lost a lot in translation. It was devoid of engaging characters, just caricatures. It had no plot, just incident after incident. Worst of all was it made be think less of the books I had loved reading. There was a formula developing here which you can see in the newer works. Exaggeration, technical detail, computers, engineering, etc. I'm old enough to have lived through the era depicted/satirized here. We used terminals to get to mainframes. But there were limits which this book just loved to ignore. Ignore this book. Somebody must have taken Stephenson aside and pointed him in a better direction - thankfully. I now understand why this book was out of print for several years.

Ta knížka je celá tak nějak v rauši, skoro jako Lemův Futurologický kongres. Špatná věc to není, je to prostě takový úlet, je to i zábavné, je tam spousta zajímavých nápadů, ale má to tu smůlu, že Stephenson prostě napsal řadu daleko lepších knížek. Za přečtení ale určitě stojí.