Anathem

“Yes,” Criscan said, “I did that just to distinguish it from the others. But it’s no different in principle or in kind from any of the other cosmi in this diagram; here, all worlds are potentially habitable cosmi that would look similar to the one that we live in.”

“Okay, so you have completely dispensed with the idea that there might be a special HTW full of pure ideas,” I said.

Criscan shrugged. “Perhaps there’s something like that somewhere, way off to the left, but you’re basically right. This is a network of cosmi like ours. And there is one thing about it that is not shown on any of the other topologies I’ve drawn, which is—”

“I think I see it,” I said, and tapped my toe on the “Arbran Causal Domain” box. “In the Wick, we are shown as a source of the Hylaean Flow for other worlds.”

“Exactly,” Criscan said. “The Wick introduces the notion that our world might, in effect, be the HTW of some other world.”

“Or might be seen that way,” Lio corrected him, “if there was no one in that world, yet, who had thought up the idea of Complex Protism.”

“Yes,” said Criscan, a little surprised to hear such a good point from someone he had written off as a tiresome clown.

“It makes you wonder about the Cousins,” I said, thinking back to a wild notion that Arsibalt had raised last night: that the Cousins might have come, not just from another solar system, but from another cosmos.

“Yes,” Criscan said, “it makes you wonder about the Cousins.”

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

ANATHEM COULD NOT HAVE been written had the following not come first:

the Mille

a philosophical lineage that can be traced from Thales through Plato, Leibniz, Kant, Godel, and Husserl.

the Orion project of the late 1950s and early 1960s.

The author is, therefore, indebted to many more people than can comfortably be listed on a traditional acknowledgments page. The premise of the story, as well as the simple fact that it is a work of fiction, rule out the use of footnotes. This is unfortunate in a way, since many readers will presumably wish to know where the ideas being discussed by the characters actually originated, and how to learn more about them. Accordingly, detailed acknowledgments, complete with links to other resources, may be found at www.nealstephenson.com/anathemacknowledgments.

About the Author

NEAL STEPHENSON is the author of seven previous novels. He lives in Seattle, Washington.

www.nealstephenson.com

Visit www.AuthorTracker.com for exclusive information on your favorite HarperCollins author.

ALSO BY NEAL STEPHENSON

The System of the World

The Confusion

Quicksilver

Cryptonomicon

The Diamond Age

Snow Crash

Zodiac

Credits

Jacket design by Ervin Serrano

Jacket photographs by Yolande De Korte/Dave Wall @ Arcangel Images

Copyright

This book is a work of fiction. The characters, incidents, and dialogue are drawn from the author’s imagination and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

ANATHEM. Copyright © 2008 by Neal Stephenson. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.

Mobipocket Reader August 2008 ISBN 978-0-06-170131-3

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

Australia

HarperCollins Publishers (Australia) Pty. Ltd.

25 Ryde Road (PO Box 321)

Pymble, NSW 2073, Australia http://www.harpercollinsebooks.com.au

Canada

HarperCollins Publishers Ltd.

55 Avenue Road, Suite 2900

Toronto, ON, M5R, 3L2, Canada http://www.harpercollinsebooks.ca

New Zealand

HarperCollinsPublishers (New Zealand) Limited

P.O. Box 1

Auckland, New Zealand http://www.harpercollins.co.nz

United Kingdom

HarperCollins Publishers Ltd.

77-85 Fulham Palace Road

London, W6 8JB, UK

http://www.harpercollinsebooks.co.uk

United States

HarperCollins Publishers Inc.

10 East 53rd Street

New York, NY 10022

http://www.harpercollinsebooks.com