Story of Your Life - Ted Chiang

Discussion in 'TMB Book Club' started by RegimentML, Nov 11, 2016.

  1. Gonff

    Gonff Prince of Mousethieves
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    Has anyone read this?

    It's the science fiction short story that the new movie Arrival is based on (starring Amy Adams). Won the Nebula Award for best novella back in 2000. Seems really interesting.

    Deals with the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis (structure of a language affects view of the world).

    Here's the movie trailer.

     
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  2. Gonff

    Gonff Prince of Mousethieves
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    I bought Chiang's novella collection off Amazon. Read Story of Your Life yesterday. Man, such an interesting premise and really makes you think. Really enjoyed it. Have no idea how a movie will adapt it but Arrival has received glowing reviews so far. Worth a read for sure.
     
  3. Truman

    Truman Well-Known Member
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    Just read this today based on your post. Lets talk
     
  4. Gonff

    Gonff Prince of Mousethieves
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    What'd you think? Have you seen the movie yet? They added some plot elements so stop reading if you don't want to risk any spoilers at all.

    They made working with the other ships/sites a bigger deal and had some tension there. Also talked about the physicist (can't remember his name) found out about the daughter's death from Louise and that was a big part of why they split. I thought it was interesting because it really emphasized the decision she made.

    Anyways, if you bought his collection I read Tower of Babylon as well. It was good, though not as thought provoking.
     
    #4 Gonff, Nov 14, 2016
    Last edited: Nov 14, 2016
  5. Truman

    Truman Well-Known Member
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    Haven't seen the movie. Probably wont until I can torrance it in a few months, so I stopped reading when you told me to

    I sped through it quickly and some of it may have went over my head, but -

    My mind was blown a bit with the last part about how she stared talking to her daughter as it's the future and not as if her story was in the past. So does that have something to do with her learning the alien language? and now can see the future through language, or somethign else.

    Either way, it was a good short story. I DL the whole collection. I'll try that babylon next.
     
  6. Gonff

    Gonff Prince of Mousethieves
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    Yeah the Sapir Whorf hypothesis basically says whatever language you speak affects how you view the world. People who learn languages start to dream in them, etc. So since the heptapods see time as non linear she starts seeing her future as she immerses herself into their language.

    He's won a bunch of awards. I think like half of the collection has won Nebula awards or Hugos. So should have a lot of good stuff in the collection
     
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  7. Gonff

    Gonff Prince of Mousethieves
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    Finished this.

    I read his collection over a span of two months so I won't try and rank the stories, but I really enjoyed Divide by Zero and Seventy-Two Letters as well.

    This is hard sci-fi, so some of the material can be a bit dense, but I still really enjoyed the stories this guy tells. Pretty impressive what he's able to pull together out of some of the concepts he writes about.
     
    #7 Gonff, Dec 27, 2016
    Last edited: Dec 27, 2016