Stephenson: Quicksilver—The Opening of The Baroque Cycle

Book One of Neal Stephenson's Quicksilver introduces Daniel Waterhouse as a complex character intimately enmeshed with the major controversies of his day. As a child, he witnessed the death of the King of England with the coming of Oliver Cromwell and the Roundheads. As a youth, he attends a re-emergently Catholic Cambridge, rooming with young Isaac Newton and studying "natural philosophy" instead of preparing for the Apocalyse his father expects in the year 1666. (Instead of the expected end of days, Daniel meets the Black Plague in that year, and watches his father die in the Great London Fire.)

And we know that in later years, this pilgrim does finally go to the New World, where he starts the Massachusetts Bay Colony Institute of Technological Arts, and intrigues a young boy named Ben (Franklin) into scientific inquiries. (Actually, the book opens on the seventy-plus year old Waterhouse, and the rest of the story is told as flashbacks interspersed with "current day" journeys. This is the same Innis-mode technique Stephenson used in Cryptonomicon.)

Quicksilver is shot through with references to mercury—I counted twenty-three overt occurrences in the first few chapters. The quicksilver theme brings together messages (Mercury was the messenger of the gods), natural philosophy, alchemy and chemistry (mercury is an important element to all three), medicine (Mercury's symbol was used by physicians, and elemental mercury was often prescribed), and war (Hg was an essential ingredient in explosives of the day).

Daniel Waterhouse explores his belief in religious free will against the background of revolutions in science, mathematics, cryptography, religion and politics. Like drops of mercury on a heated plate, he ranges far and wide, and reflects the brilliance of those around him.

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Bobby Shaftoe went to sea,
Silver buckles on his knee.
He'll come back to marry me.
Mother says so!

Half-Cocked Jack Shaftoe is the eponymous King of the Vagabonds in Book Two, and easily the most likeable character in the novel. Here is where Quicksilver swings into adventure-mode, as Jack gallivants across the Holy Roman Empire, liberating damsels in distress and rescuing the odd coin or two—or vice versa.

Like the other principals, his life is intertwined with Liebnitz', and serves as well to illustrate the mathematician-philosopher's other vocation: mining engineer. Like Isaac Newton (as well as Thomas Jefferson and Ben Franklin), Liebnitz was a wildly productive genius whose efforts spanned nearly all of the industries and intellectual pursuits of his time.

Half-Cocked Jack is almost his antithesis, preoccupied with getting and spending his gains, ill-gotten and virtuous alike. As such, Jack is much closer to the Bobby Shaftoe of the nursery rhyme than is his g-great-grandson Bobby in Stephenson's Cryptonomicon.

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Book Three, Odalisque, centers around the activities of the harem girl rescued in the relief of Vienna by Shaftoe in Book Two. Eliza has come a long way from the slave trudging across Europe at Jack's heels. She is becoming a wealthy woman through her understanding of the Byzantine commodities market—and a chance meeting with Liebnitz that supplies her with the essential ingredient for wealth-building then (and today), a truly unbreakable cipher.

Historically, Liebnitz was known to have been fascinated by the I Ching, and to have used it as a cipher key to encode personal correspondence. Stephenson has incorporated the political backgrounds and historical battlefields, the customs and entertainments of the late 17th and early 18th centuries, to flesh out the first part of his tale of the (historical) scientific rivalry between Liebnitz and Newton, and the rise of the (fictional) Societas Eruditorum.

As with the first two books, Odalisque is shot through veins of mercury. This section adds numerous references to Minerva as the patron of Amsterdam, model for scientists, and goddess of wisdom and guile.


Intrigued by the Baroque Cycle and where it intersects history and reality? Check out the Metaweb.

Jane Chord: Enoch wind. Mother died. Like Daniel.

Stephenson: Quicksilver - Odalisque Enobled

Odalisque, Book Three of Stephenson's Quicksilver centers around the activities of the harem girl rescued in the relief of Vienna by Half-cock Jack Shaftoe, in Book Two, King of the Vagabonds. Eliza has come a long way from the slave trudging across Europe at Jack's heels. In Odalisque, she is becoming a wealthy woman through her understanding of the Byzantine commodities market - and a chance meeting with Liebnitz that supplies her with the essential ingredient for wealth-building then (and today), a truly unbreakable cipher.

Historically, Liebnitz was known to have been fascinated by the I Ching, and to have used it as a cipher key to encode personal correspondence. Stephenson has incorporated the political backgrounds and historical battlefields, the customs and entertainments of the late 17th and early 18th centuries, to flesh out the first part of his tale of the (historical) scientific rivalry between Liebnitz and Newton, and the rise of the (fictional) Societas Eruditorum.

As with the first two books, Odalisque is shot through veins of mercury. This section adds references to Minerva as the patron of Amsterdam, model for scientists, and goddess of wisdom and guile.


Quicksilver is the first volume of The Baroque Cycle. The first book of three in Quicksilver is Quicksilver, the second is King of the Vagabonds.

Jane Chord: Enoch wind. Mother died. Like Daniel.

Stephenson: Quicksilver - King of the Vagabonds

Bobby Shaftoe went to sea,
Silver buckles on his knee.
He'll come back to marry me.
Mother says so!

Half-Cocked Jack Shaftoe is the eponymous King in Book Two of Stephenson's Quicksilver, and easily the most likeable character in the novel. Here is where Quicksilver swings into adventure-mode, as Jack gallivants across the Holy Roman Empire, liberating damsels in distress and rescuing the odd coin or two—or vice versa.

Like the other principals, his life is intertwined with Liebnitz', and serves as well to illustrate the mathematician-philosopher's other vocation: mining engineer. Like Isaac Newton (as well as Thomas Jefferson and Ben Franklin), Liebnitz was a wildly productive genius whose efforts spanned nearly all of the industries and intellectual pursuits of his time.

Half-Cocked Jack is almost his antithesis, preoccupied with getting and spending his gains, ill-gotten and virtuous alike. As such, Jack is much closer to the Bobby Shaftoe of the nursery rhyme than is his g-great-grandson Bobby in Stephenson's Cryptonomicon.

King of the Vagabonds is the second book of Quicksilver, the first volume of The Baroque Cycle. Book One of Quicksilver is also titled Quicksilver. Book Three is Odalisque.

Stephenson: Quicksilver - Pilgrim's Progressive

Book One of Neal Stephenson's Quicksilver introduces Daniel Waterhouse as a complex character intimately enmeshed with the major controversies of his day. As a child, Daniel witnessed the death of the King of England with the coming of Oliver Cromwell and the Roundheads. As a youth, he attends the re-emergently Catholic Cambridge, rooming with young Isaac Newton and studying "natural philosophy" instead of preparing for the Apocalyse his father Drake expects in the year 1666. (Instead of the expected end of days, Daniel meets the Black Plague in that year, and watches his father die in the Great London Fire.)

And we know that in later years, this pilgrim does finally go to the New World, where he starts the Massachusetts Bay Colony Institute of Technological Arts, and intrigues a young boy named Ben (Franklin) into scientific inquiries. (Actually, the book opens on the seventy-plus year old Waterhouse, and the rest of the story is told as flashbacks interspersed with "current day" journeys. This is the same Innis-mode technique Stephenson used in Cryptonomicon.)

Quicksilver is shot through with references to mercury - I counted twenty-three overt occurences in the first few chapters. The quicksilver theme brings together messages (Mercury was the messnger of the gods), natural philosophy, alchemy and chemistry (mercury is an important element to all three), medicine (Mercury's symbol was used by physicians, and elemental mercury was often prescribed), and war (Hg was an essential ingredient in explosives of the day).

Daniel Waterhouse explores his belief in religious free will against the background af revolutions in science, mathematics, cryptography, religion and politics. Like drops of mercury on a heated plate, he ranges far and wide, and reflects the brilliance of those around him.


Quicksilver is the first volume of three in the Baroque Cycle. Book Two of Quicksilver is King of the Vagabonds, while Book Three is Odalisque. Intrigued by the Baroque Cycle and where it intersects history and reality? Check out the Metaweb.

Jane Chord: Enoch wind. Mother died. Like Daniel.

Tepper: Grass - Moral Responsibility

Sheri Tepper's Grass is a rabbit-hole entry into rich moral questions: Do good people have a moral responsibility to act to prevent evil actions by others? And even deeper: Can that action include killing the evil actor to prevent the evil action? Deeper still: Is there an objective measure for good and evil? By the time you know who (what) characters the protagonist finds good, you're already well into Wonderland.

As with all of Tepper's novels, there is also a frontal attack on a recurring question (in case you don't have philosophical indigestion already): What is a worthwhile life? Can it be deferred for "heaven"? Can it be lived without the non-human other?

Marjorie is a "small being" faced with these questions on the planet Grass, where every plant is a variant of grass, and an evil intelligence lurks in the forest of blades. Her Catholic family and the prevalent humanist religion are both under attack by a widespread plague that has struck mankind everywhere—except on Grass. The monoculture of grass echoes the monoculture of humankind, which has reduced most other species of animals to a sterile gene-sample library. Will Marjorie solve the problem and find the answer to the deeper questions? Will she choose to act?

I always feel as if this is the first Tepper novel I read (actually it was After Long Silence), because it was the first that resonated with my life. The day I opened the book, Iraq invaded Kuwait. Marjorie's dilemma was being played out on the Gulf sands. When the US decided to go into Afghanistan, I reread Grass, and the resonance was still there.

Reviews examine the feminist and environmental/religious exploration themes.