Note on this edition: this is an electronic version of the 1999 book ...

244Demonic Texts and Textual Demonsexplore the possibilities of technology, and to make a change: “I got no ideaat all what’ll happen if Wintermute wins, but it’ll change something!” 183 Caseis also aware how deceptive the demonic imagery and discourse can be; Wintermute,for example, manipulates Case to feel aversion and hate towardsthe Tessier-Ashpool clan (the owners of the AIs) by editing his dream to includean association between them and the “alien horrors” of a wasp hive. 184Marie-France Tessier planned for the eventual metamorphosis of the humanspecies into a new, collective identity with AIs’ aid, but this is not an evilgoal, just an alien one. 185The only clearly evil character in the novel is Riviera, the “demonlover.” 186 He revels in his sadistic imagination with no real need for anyoneelse, except as victims or as an audience. He remains totally Other by choice– he does not connect, he feeds on the others, taking pride in the “perversity”of committing gratuitous acts. He smashes a heavy crystal glass inMolly’s face just to see if his lens implant would break, in the manner theandroid in Dick’s novel cut the spider’s legs to see if it could still walk. 187The empathic link to the desires and sufferings of others does not exist forhim. Still, the titular “divinity” of Neuromancer adopts Riviera’s eyes; evenextreme evil has its place in the aesthetic synthesis. The alliances with alien,ultimately mechanical systems and the heterogeny in general retain, despitethe narrative thrust towards synthesis, certain uneasy characteristics in thenovel. Case reflects on the “lack of feeling” evident in powerful people: heimagines it being caused by “a gradual and willing accommodation of themachine, the system, the parent organism.” 188 The interface and integrationwith non-human system tampers with the fundamentals of human identity,and it has its irreducible uncertainties. It can lead into something less as wellas more than human.After the successful operation the two opposing AIs are unified, andthey form a new entity encompassing cyberspace itself. 189 In the intertext ofshamanistic initiation, Case returns to life, transformed. He has dealt with183N, 307. See also N, 199-200.184 N, 151-53. Wintermute also edits Case’s perceptions of this goal; see N, 222. – Thevirus program, “Kung Grade Mark Eleven,” is spouting out conventional symbols of eviland bad luck (”swastikas, skulls and crossbones, dice flashing snake eyes”; N, 216), butthis is part of the aesthetics. An efficient weapon carries in this novel similar amoral andsublime power that “Tyger” embodies in Blake’s famous poem (Blake 1982, 49-50). Thevirus programmers favour names with demonic connotations, as Armageddon, Beast(666), Dark Lord, Demon, Devils Dance, Evil Empire, Nuke, Possessed, Rage, Rape,Shadow, etc. (Examples from the virus list of the Microsoft Anti-Virus program.) Theymark these programmers’ symbolic transition into the alternative “shadow world,” secludedinto the company of others practising this dark art.185N, 258.186 N, 252. – For an analysis of the “demon lover” tradition, see e.g. Grudin 1987 andReed 1988.187N, 261, 264.188 N, 243.189N, 316.