Emotion and Antiquity

Gibson uses the scene in which Ashpool attempts to commit suicide as a means to suggest that technological advances seem to make conventional ideas into unnecessary ones.

While some say Neuromancer develops characters so as to strip them of their emotions, the novel actually appears to have some characters who do have old-fashioned human emotions as well as attachment to old-fashioned ways. The idea of suicide in itself has been around since ancient times. Whether for honorable or dishonorable reasons, suicide is a way to end one’s life and ensures complete control over the situation. Ashpool seems to feel as though he no longer needs to be around. He claims he is “over two hundred years old…if you include the cold” (Gibson 184). He begins to tell Molly that technology and the future has brought nothing but “lies” and disappointment. He says to Molly, “You weren’t born…They told us we wouldn’t dream, in that cold. They told us we’d never feel cold, either….Of course I dreamed. The cold let the outside in” (184). As Molly hadn’t even been born yet, the generation in which this happened to Ashpool was extremely different than the one in the present time in the novel. Through his ranting, Ashpool practically admits to Molly that technology does not work as it is promised to work. There are flaws in everything, and as technology continues to progress and advance itself, there are still more flaws even if they are undetected ones.

Additionally, Case describes the room to be one of antiquity: “The table was thick with vials, bottles of liquor, soft plastic envelopes spilling white powders. Case noticed an old-fashioned glass hypodermic and plain steel spoon” (183). Case also notices from when Molly first enters that amongst the old fashioned items, “Case registered the cyberspace deck and the trodes, but [Molly’s] glance slid over it without pausing” (183). This shows that, even though the room has been modernized to fit the times, the antiquity of the room is the true core of it, as Molly barely notices the new technology in any detail. Ashpool has kept the room old-fashioned in order to give himself some reminders of the past. He even sets up his suicide in an old-fashioned way. He drugs himself through mixing drugs and alcohol, and expects to shoot himself in the head with a pistol. Then, through a convoluted story, Ashpool tells Molly his reasons for wanting to kill himself, other than being old, in one simple statement: “they said…I was needed. Were you the something, Molly? Surely they didn’t need me to handle you, no. Something else…” (184). After the pause, Ashpool diverges into a different subject, meaning that he was unsuccessful in finding a reason for him to be awake. He admits that he is no longer “needed.” Rather than return to the lying technology of discomfort and cold, he wishes to die. Ashpool also offers Molly to go with him “down to hell” (184). Hell alone is an extremely ancient belief, further showing that Ashpool wishes to die along with the diminishing importance of conventionality.

Lastly, Molly tells Ashpool that her way of crying is to spit because her ducts have been “rewired,” and directly after that “a trickle of [brandy] ran from the corner of [Ashpool’s] mouth” (183). Gibson is metaphorically telling us that Ashpool is crying. Thus, Ashpool has plenty of emotion. He cries, wishes to die, and still believes in hell. Ironically, after the whole scene that stresses the importance of antiquity rather than technology, it is Molly who uses her new technology of a fletc.her to poison Ashpool rather than Ashpool’s idea of poisoning himself through drugs, alcohol, and then finally finishing himself off with a pistol. Therefore, Gibson shows that technology overrides the need for conventional ways and emotions, as Ashpool fails at suicide and controlling his death.

Overall, while others suggest that this novel rids characters of emotions completely, I disagree in a sense that characters do have emotions, as we see in this scene; however, I agree in another sense because Gibson is showing that old-fashioned human emotions and ideas are dwindling due to technology. All of the characters that do seem to hold some form of emotion and opposition to technology are either already dead, or beginning to die.