FROM BEING THE ENFANT TERRIBLE of British writing, producing such shockers as The Comfort of Strangers and Black Dogs, earning him the soubriquet Ian Macabre, McEwan has become something like the grand old man of British letters, producing 17 books, winning multiple awards, including the Booker (for Amsterdam, one of his least convincing novels), with at least five, by my count, of his novels being adapted for the screen.
In this, his latest, McEwan again tackles what one might call an existential question, perhaps the existential question: what is it to be human? And by extension, what is it to be a machine programmed to resemble, in all observable respects, a human, that is, a plausible android? What is a self, and can a machine have one?
Well, here’s the android, called, of course, Adam, “the first truly viable manufactured human with plausible intelligence and looks, believable motion and shifts of expression” just before having life streamed into him through a 13-amp socket: “He was compactly built, square-shouldered, dark-skinned, with thick black hair swept back; narrow in the face, with a hint of a hooked nose suggestive of fierce intelligence, pensively hooded eyes, tight lips…” He is also “uncircumcised, fairly well endowed, with copious dark pubic hair”, but “not a sex toy”, though “capable of sex”.
Adam’s owner, master, “user” (a term he rejects) is Charlie Friend, a somewhat feckless 32-year-old day trader, who has bought Adam with the proceeds of the family home he inherited. He is not quite sure what he wants Adam for (the Eves were all sold out), but he studied anthropology at university and has a layman’s interest in the intersection between technology and humanity.
Bu hikaye Noseweek dergisinin September 2019 sayısından alınmıştır.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 9,000+ magazines and newspapers.
Already a subscriber ? Giriş Yap
Bu hikaye Noseweek dergisinin September 2019 sayısından alınmıştır.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 9,000+ magazines and newspapers.
Already a subscriber? Giriş Yap
Lennie The Liquidator Faces R500,000 Defamation Suit
After losing his cool when his fees were questioned
Panel Beater De Luxe
Danmar Autobody and its erstwhile directors get a serious panel beating in court papers. Corruption and theft are said to have destroyed the firm chaired by Nelson Mandela’s eldest daughter, leaving 200 workers destitute and threatening to kill.
Meet Covid Diarist Ronald Wohlman
Ronald Wohlman – EX SOUTH African copywriter, author, and actor – never dreamt that his lockdown diaries, written on Facebook and followed by people all over the world – would become his “life’s work”.
A Picture Of Peace?
Beware: Appearances can be deceptive
Flogging A (Battery-Driven) Dead Horse
Why plug-in vehicles are not all they’re cracked up to be– and, likely, never will be
Everybody Drinks Corona
I am hesitant to go Into the pub today. Not because it’s illegal, but there is a crème colored 1985 Mercedes 300D parked behind the pine tree. This means the devil is inside; that’s what we call Dr. De Villiers. You don’t know whether you will encounter the good doctor with the charming bedside manner or the violent, bipolar bully. The problem is, most of the time, you can never be sure which it is, so it’s best to always keep a social distance.
Never Take A Hypochondriac To A Pandemic
From Ronald Wohlman’s New York Corona Diary
The money train
Transnet in court battle with liquidators of Gupta-linked audit firm over R57m in ‘corrupt’ payments and invoices
‘He's no pharmaceutical genius, he's a vulture'
Pharma con seeks prison release to ‘help find Covid cure’
Bush school – A memoir
OUR SCHOOL WAS IN THE MIDDLE of the bush, ten miles from the nearest town in the harsh beauty of the Zimbabwean highveld. It started life in World War II as No 26 EFTS Guinea Fowl, a Royal Air Force elementary flying training school and I arrived there in 1954, just seven years after it became an all-white co-ed state boarding school.