Machines Like Me? Monsters Like You!: The Librarian Is In, Ep.159
Welcome to The Librarian Is In, The New York Public Library's podcast about books, culture, and what to read next.
Welcome back! This week Rhonda and Frank have the first episode in which they read and discuss books of their own choice. Hey, Alexa? What would life be like if we were a graphic novel about humanoid monsters? (This will make sense if you keep reading, we promise…)
Harkening back to our first episode of the season and Rhonda's love of graphic novels, her choice was :
My Favorite Thing Is Monsters by Emil Ferris
Written and drawn over the course of years while Emil recovered from West Nile virus, this 2017 novel has drawn praise from noted artists such as Art Spiegelman and Alison Bechdel.
Frank's pick this week was:
Machines Like Me by Ian McEwan
What would you do if you could have a lifelike human machine at your beck and call? Set in the 1980s, but with current day technnology, this novel written by Ian McEwan imagines an alternate history and explores just that scenario.
Have you read either of these books? What did you think? Leave us a note in the comments!
Don't forget to head over to your local library and take out a copy of our next book (or e-book, or audiobook) for our book club episode. On April 9th, Frank and Rhonda will discuss Flannery O'Connor's A Good Man Is Hard to Find.
More things we talked about today:
- The Jefferson Market branch of the NYPL and its history
- Rhonda's most recent scary movie viewing: Annabelle Comes Home
- "Stupid Love" by Lady Gaga
"Jefferson Market" by Flickr user Wally Gobetz is licensed under CC BY 2.0
Tell us what everybody's talking about in your world of books and libraries! Suggest Hot Topix(TM)! Send an email or voice memo to podcasts[at]nypl.org.
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Transcript
[ Music ]
[Frank] Hello and welcome to The Librarian is in, the New York Public Library's podcast about books, culture and what to read next. I am Frank.
[Rhonda] And I'm Rhonda.
[Frank] And we're here on, actually, we've done a couple of podcasts together, and now this is our first one where we're actually going to discuss books that we've read individually.
[Rhonda] Yeah, super excited.
[Frank] Because a lot of what we're doing on this podcast is going to talk about the New York Public Library's 125 books we love list.
[Rhonda] Yeah.
[Frank] Celebrating the 125th anniversary of the library.
[Rhonda] That's a long time.
[Frank] So cute. And so but today we're going to talk about just what we've been reading. But we should maybe announce our next book that we're going to read together.
[Rhonda] Yeah.
[Frank] And that's what we invite our listeners to read along with us. And this podcast is going to be April 9th.
[Rhonda] April 9th.
[Frank] So you've got a month if you'd like to read along with us, and the book is --
[Rhonda] So let's see, our April 9th book club book is A Good Man is Hard to Find and Other Stories by Flannery O'Connor. So, run out to your local library branch and get your copy so that you can read it and participate, so to speak, in the discussion with us on April 9th. So get ready folks.
[Frank] Cool. I'm excited. You know that Mae West quote. I shouldn't say, God I shouldn't go there.
[Rhonda] Well no, you can't leave me hanging now. What is the Mae West quote?
[Frank] Mae West has a connection to my library actually, the Jefferson Market Library.
[Rhonda] Okay. Was she an inmate there?
[Frank] She was brought in on charges of obscenity.
[Rhonda] Oh, I knew, I think I knew that story.
[Frank] Yeah and held in a jail next door. If any of you out there know who Mae West is, she was a seriously salacious wit of the 1930s and movie star. But she had a quote that was a riff on a good man is hard to find. I'm not going to go further than that.
[Rhonda] Okay, well. Everybody look it up.
[Frank] She sort of inverted the two words good and, yeah.
[Rhonda] I know. Do people know the history of Jefferson market?
[Frank] Huh?
[Rhonda] Do people know the history of Jefferson Market?
[Frank] I think I've talked about it before.
[Rhonda] Okay.
[Frank] Jefferson Market was a courthouse.
[Rhonda] I thought it was a women's prison.
[Frank] See everyone things that. But the prison was next door.
[Rhonda] Oh, interesting.
[Frank] The library that is today, the Jefferson Market Library, was a courthouse, and the prison was next door where the garden is now. There's a garden.
[Rhonda] Oh, a beautiful garden.
[Frank] A beautiful garden. So it's pretty amazing that the jail and then women's prison was knocked down in the 70s and a garden was created rather than something with developed real estate wise.
[Rhonda] So the actual --
[Frank] We're sort of lucky we have a greenspace.
[Rhonda] Actually, yes.
[Frank] And the city is the village.
[Rhonda] I love that library. And the actual building was the courthouse.
[Frank] The library.
[Rhonda] The library building, which looks like a church almost from the outside.
[Frank] It's very gothic.
[Rhonda] It's one of the most beautiful branches of the New York Public Libraries.
[Frank] Yeah, so come visit.
[Rhonda] Yes, go visit Frank. Say hello everyone.
[Frank] We're under renovation, as I've mentioned before. I've mentioned this before. So our upper floor, which is the most beautiful floor, is currently inaccessible because we're putting a new elevator and all that stuff. So, actually, don't come visit. Come visit like in early 2021, because that's when it'll be done. And that second floor is --
[Rhonda] It's going to be beautiful.
[Frank] it's going to be beautiful. It's funny, my boss, I was complaining about tourists coming in, and I was like oh, there's so many people coming in to look at the library. And I'm, oh, I can't take it. And she's like you're just upset because you feel like you have nothing to show them.
[Rhonda] Oh wow.
[Frank] And I was like, you're so right. Like I was being mad at people visiting the library because I was just like, oh, what an inconvenience. But then I was like, it's because I can't show off the whole building.
[Rhonda] Because you have that beautiful tower that people want to see.
[Frank] I know, so nothing against tourists whatsoever. I mean I'm a tourist in other places. But I just feel bad that I don't have anything to show them. So I see people come in and they look around like, is this all? Anyway.
[Rhonda] Well, libraries are for everyone.
[Frank] They are.
[Rhonda] Even tourists.
[Frank] Absolutely.
[Rhonda] Frank.
[Frank] I was just telling you honestly how I was working through an emotion. I always talk about this in the podcast, how when you have an opinion about something, sometimes you have to delve deeper and you realize it's really about you and your own problem. Rather than the other person being the problem. I mean they weren't the problem. The problem was that I felt bad that I had nothing to offer them, like I was showing them a diminished space.
[Rhonda] And your anger was misplaced.
[Frank] Thank you.
[Rhonda] As that they were tourists and not that they were coming in to see the library.
[Frank] I was misplacing it. You have to look into yourself to figure out what your stress is, and usually it has something to do with a personal issue rather than the other person. They're just igniting it.
[Rhonda] All right.
[Frank] So I have nothing against anybody. I love everyone, all of you, so don't even, don't even suggest otherwise.
[Rhonda] For that therapy session, that will be $325 for the 15 minutes that I just gave to you.
[Frank] Thank you, Rhonda. I think you're going to work out well. If you can handle me, you can handle anything, baby.
[Rhonda] I can handle many things. All right. So, let's talk about books.
[Frank] All right.
[Rhonda] Let's get off your issues for a minute and talk about books.
[Frank] Wow, tough broad over here. Okay, good.
[Rhonda] Did you call me a broad?
[Frank] That's what we're here for.
[Rhonda] All right.
[Frank] So who wants to go first? We've never done this quite before together, but would you like to go first, or would you like me to go first?
[Rhonda] I feel like I kind of already ruined my surprise when you saw my book.
[Frank] I know, I saw your book.
[Rhonda] So maybe I should just --
[Frank] I like a surprise.
[Rhonda] All right, let's do it.
[Frank] Go for it then.
[Rhonda] All right. Okay, so, I think I mentioned in our first podcast that I, in the past year or so, I've really gotten into reading graphic novels. So I decided to choose a graphic novel today. And my book is called My Favorite Thing is Monsters by Emil Ferris. Okay.
[Frank] It ties into all the passions for horror and all that.
[Rhonda] All the passions.
[Frank] It's a big, beautiful book.
[Rhonda] It's a big book. And it's really like, not like a graphic novel that I've ever read before. And you know, for graphic novels, they usually have a lot of different people doing a lot of different things. Like someone will write, someone will draw, someone will color, someone will letter. Emil Ferris did everything.
[Frank] Okay.
[Rhonda] She did everything. She did all the drawing, the lettering, the coloring, and I just want to tell you a little bit about her before I get into the book. This is her first graphic novel that she published when she was --
[Frank] Emil Ferris.
[Rhonda] Yes.
[Frank] Okay.
[Rhonda] When she was 55. So --
[Frank] Oh, there's hope for me yet.
[Rhonda] Yes, you can still publish that book. But what's interesting is, and I got this from an NPR article. I'm just going to read the quote by John Powers. She was a 40-year-old single mom who supported herself doing illustrations. When she was bitten by a mosquito, she contracted West Nile virus.
[Frank] Oh no.
[Rhonda] Became paralyzed from the waist down and lost the use of her drawing hand. Fighting chronic pain, she taught herself to draw again, then reinvented herself as a graphic novelist, spending six long years creating this emotional autobiography. So this book, My Favorite Thing is Monsters, came out of six years of Emil Ferris recovering from West Nile virus which paralyzed her, right.
[Frank] What a story. We're not going to go on a tangent, if you know what I mean, about other --
[Rhonda] Right. Do you have something about West Nile virus?
[Frank] No, about other viruses.
[Rhonda] No, we're not going to do that. But just to say, but you know, if it was me, I would just be, you know, finishing my Netflix queue, but she was like I'm going to write this masterpiece.
[Frank] That's a great backstory. Okay. I'm hooked.
[Rhonda] Yeah, which is like, you know, she used that time. And so it's kind of autobiographical, and it kind of takes us back to 1967 Chicago. And we're being the told the story by a ten-year-old girl, Karen Reyes. And it's in her voice, meaning not that she's just narrating it to us, but it's her visual journal. And that's kind of why it makes it so different because we don't see in this graphic novel the usual, the what do you call them, frames that you have. It's very much like you're actually looking into someone's notebook.
[Frank] So there's lined, it's like lined paper. Loose leaf paper.
[Rhonda] It's like lined paper. There's no --
[Frank] Like doodles as we do as kids.
[Rhonda] Exactly.
[Frank] People in class used to doodle on loose leaf paper. So that's what it emulates.
[Rhonda] Yeah. But the thing is, it's not like a ten-year-old's actual drawings. Like these are masterful drawings.
[Frank] I can see. It's very beautiful.
[Rhonda] But it's her story that she's telling us. Just to kind of preface that, this is not a kid's story. There's a lot of really adult content in this, even though we're seeing it through the eyes of this kind of, this ten-year-old girl. So, there's a few storylines that are going on here, but the kind of one we get started with and the woman who's on the cover is her upstairs neighbor, Anka, who was murdered, right.
[Frank] Oh no.
[Rhonda] And so she kind of uses this as a distraction for what else is going on in her life, and she wants to know like who murdered her neighbor, Anka. So she kind of delves into Anka's life, and she finds these tapes that Anka recorded, telling about like what happened to her when she was young. And it turns out she was a Holocaust survivor. She was sold into prostitution when she was young. Kind of all of these really awful things happened to her that she survived. So what's great about that, not just hearing that story but visually is that Anka is always colored blue. And she uses color in this book so sparingly. Kind of like do you remember in Schindler's List like the girl with the little red dress?
[Frank] Oh yeah.
[Rhonda] Right?
[Frank] Of course.
[Rhonda] That's kind of what she does with this. She uses color as almost like a subtext to kind of really highlight important things. So kind of Anka going through all of this, she has her colored blue. And she does that with certain people. She has these like different, she uses the color when she needs it. And I open it to a page with Anka being blue. And it's really, really beautiful how she does that. So we hear Anka's story as her trying to cover, trying to understand who murdered her. Then there's this whole aspect of her being an outsider status, you know. So, she kind of understands she Latina in this neighborhood, which is --
[Frank] Oh wait, not Anka.
[Rhonda] Yeah, so this is kind of another storyline.
[Frank] Oh, another person?
[Rhonda] Going back to Karen.
[Frank] Karen.
[Rhonda] Yes.
[Frank] Right, she's investigating Anka's death, and you find those things about her. And now there's Karen's backstory.
[Rhonda] Yes.
[Frank] Okay.
[Rhonda] And Karen has kind of two issues going on, which I think she uses the murder of Anka as kind of a distraction in her life to kind of distract her. Because she has some rough things. Her mother has cancer. So that's a really sad part of the story. And I actually was brought to tears a few times kind of when Karen's dealing with that as a ten-year-old. But also, Karen is Latina in this neighborhood. She also realizes that she likes girls. She doesn't like boys. So she's really bullied, and that's where the whole monster thing comes in, right.
[Frank] I was going to say, do we need a monster, because my God, there's so much going on here.
[Rhonda] There's so much going on.
[Frank] Is this a real monster coming>
[Rhonda] No, there's no real monster.
[Frank] Okay.
[Rhonda] But she loves monsters.
[Frank] Like movie monsters.
[Rhonda] Like movie monsters, you know, magazine monsters, because I think --
[Frank] Comic.
[Rhonda] Yeah. To her, they're like the outsiders, just like her, you know. They're misunderstood.
[Frank] And this is the 1960s.
[Rhonda] Yeah. And so one of the things that she does in here that's really interesting is all the visual representations of herself, she's a little monster. She's a little werewolf. Everyone else is drawn normally, but she's a little --
[Frank] Show me.
[Rhonda] She's a little werewolf, and she's kind --
[Frank] So that's Anka on the cover.
[Rhonda] That's Anka on the cover. And I'm trying to find --
[Frank] Ooh, I just saw something.
[Rhonda] Yeah, there's a lot that goes on in here. And so let's see, let's find a good picture of her. But yeah, she's always going to be a werewolf.
[Frank] You never see the girls face? You see the werewolf's?
[Rhonda] Only one time do we see her actual face. And that's when her brother who read her journal like makes her look in the mirror and say why do you draw yourself like this? So she's always a monster. And then she's also obsessed with drawing these covers of monster magazines. So we just randomly get these really beautifully drawn monster magazine covers, they just appear kind of randomly in the story. And it's just kind of her being obsessed with these monsters. And it's really kind of interesting because when you think about this, like one of the things she loves about monsters is they kind of never die. And so, you know, she's dealing with the death of her mother. And she kind of has this dream that like a vampire or a werewolf will come and like turn all of her family into monsters so they can kind of live together forever. And it's kind of scary but it's also kind of a like sweet thought, you know.
[Frank] Well, I mean it begs the question of there are monsters, don't monsters usually sort of live off human beings in a way?
[Rhonda] Interesting.
[Frank] So that means they, like the Interview with a Vampire conundrum, like, had do you justify, you know, living forever with having to kill people.
[Rhonda] Right. And she kind of does address that a little bit. She kind of tries to make the distinction between there are good monsters, and there are bad monsters.
[Frank] Any monster story can be fudged, because you can create your own rules. You can create your own rules of monsterdom.
[Rhonda] Yeah, and she seems to like --
[Frank] Wow, it's beautifully, the book is beautiful to look at.
[Rhonda] It's beautiful to look at.
[Frank] I have to say.
[Rhonda] And the monsters that she thinks are bad are like she's, you know, the people in the Holocaust, the Nazis that she hears about with Anka's stories. And the people who bully her. Those are like the bad monsters. But the monsters that she's talking about are the ones like misunderstood, that kind of have to stay in the shadows. And you know, all of this is in the backdrop of the 1960s. So we have that going on too, so, you know, the Civil Rights Movement. Dr. King is assassinated. There's riots in Chicago. So there's like so much going --
[Frank] It's an epic.
[Rhonda] It's an, it really is an epic. This book is about, I would say close to, it's a little over 300 pages.
[Frank] All graphic novel.
[Rhonda] All graphic novel.
[Frank] Wow. She really put, well, this woman has quite a story.
[Rhonda] Sixty years.
[Frank] And she put a lot in here.
[Rhonda] She put a lot in here.
[Frank] She was also suffering. I mean she was in pain as she was writing this, recovering.
[Rhonda] Exactly.
[Frank] Wow. What's the title again?
[Rhonda] My Favorite Thing is Monsters.
[Frank] Emil Ferris, okay.
[Rhonda] And you know what's interesting like, she's a really good, not just a great artist, but she's a really good writer.
[Frank] Wow.
[Rhonda] You know. So it's like you want to keep turning the page because you want to see what's going to happen in the story. But you also want to kind of linger on the page because we want to just look at her drawings, you know. And you know, she has everything in here. She has like, she goes to the art museum of Chicago, I don't know what the big one is called, but she goes there all the time. And she recreates the paintings because she loves it.
[Frank] She puts it all in there.
[Rhonda] Puts it all in there.
[Frank] Does she solve the murder? Well, you know, just --
[Rhonda] Well, I'm not going to say, but I don't know. Because this is actually volume one. So there's going to be a second book. I think it might have already come out. Which I can't wait to read because we don't know who solved the movie.
[Frank] I have a bias against these.
[Rhonda] About?
[Frank] Series. They drive me crazy.
[Rhonda] She couldn't put all her story in just this one book. It would be massive.
[Frank] They just drive me crazy, though, because I want one book, the whole story. But I get it. Some people love series because it gives you lots to look forward to, and I see that.
[Rhonda] I feel the same way, actually.
[Frank] Yeah.
[Rhonda] Although this one I feel a little bit different about, because I loved it so much. But I'm with you on the series. I kind of like just to get it done.
[Frank] I mean I sort of want to be told a story where the creator sort of knows where everything's going to go and like is going to give you like the full deal.
[Rhonda] Right.
[Frank] I feel like sometimes the series, not always, and this is just a judgment I'm making, that it's sometimes drawn out because they have to create another series book. I don't know. But certainly, there are many popular series --
[Rhonda] There are, and this I don't think is actually going to be a series.
[Frank] that are beloved.
[Rhonda] I think two is it.
[Frank] Okay.
[Rhonda] I think like part two is it.
[Frank] Well, I can deal with that.
[Rhonda] And again, like you're going to read it faster than you expect because it's mostly --
[Frank] It's a graphic novel.
[Rhonda] It's mostly images. So, you know, it's, and you get to see, and I think one of the things about what's so great about having a ten-year-old protagonist is you get to use like a ten-year-old's imagination. So like she goes to the art museum and she can jump in the paintings and she can become a monster. And, you know, it's a really, it's a really beautiful book. And people are putting it up there with like Art Spiegelman and Alison Bechdel. So, I, this is a really nice discovery kind of jumping into this new genre of graphic novels for me.
[Frank] Cool.
[Rhonda] Yeah.
[Frank] Well, you sold it, babe.
[Rhonda] I sold it.
[Frank] You sold it.
[Rhonda] Well, let me know what you think in the comments if anyone reads it.
[Frank] It sounds overwhelming. I have a feeling reading is not as overwhelming as it is to hear. Like all that's in there, I feel like when you were talking at the end I realized this could be a very adult view of a child's mind.
[Rhonda] Exactly what it is.
[Frank] Or a young person's mind. And Lord knows, monsters and bad news and fantasy and imagination all play a huge part. So I feel like, it sounds solid.
[Rhonda] Awesome.
[Frank] Solid, babe.
[Rhonda] Yeah, let me know what you think if you all read it, I want to hear your opinions.
[Frank] All right. You know, it's funny, I always look for connections. And you did remind me of something which I won't say, because we're going, it's one of the books we're going to read together coming up that's on the list that also has figures as a monster, metaphorical monster as outsider. It was one of my choices, but I'm not going to tell you. You'll have to wait. Or you can look at the list and guess. So, okay. Thank you.
[Rhonda] Thank you.
[Frank] Is it my turn? My turn, my turn, my turn, me, me, me, me, me.
[Rhonda] Yeah, I want to hear Frank.
[Frank] Pick me. Pick me, teacher.
[Rhonda] What you got?
[Frank] Such a spoiled brat. Well, let me see. What should I, I was thinking about how to present this. I could ask you, are you, would you consider yourself and early adopter of technology?
[Rhonda] Absolutely not. I'm always late to the game.
[Frank] Okay.
[Rhonda] I will hold on to my iPhone until there's like seven generations past.
[Frank] All right. Well, everyone knows I'm not. So would you actually be curious if an artificial human or robot or, came on the market? Would you want to have one in your own home?
[Rhonda] I don't, not at first. I'd want to see, I'd let other people try it out first.
[Frank] Well, the book I read is called Machines Like Me, and it's by Ian McEwan.
[Rhonda] Okay.
[Frank] Have you ever read any Ian McEwan?
[Rhonda] No, I know. He's part of the cannon.
[Frank] What a shame.
[Rhonda] But I have not.
[Frank] His book Atonement is on our list.
[Rhonda] Yes, yes.
[Frank] I read the book, his last book, called Nutshell.
[Rhonda] Okay.
[Frank] Which I talked about on the podcast, which is basically an entire novel told from the point of view an unborn fetus.
[Rhonda] I've heard of this.
[Frank] So cool. So good. So Ian McEwan is one of those authors that I will read because I feel like I trust him, like and I was thinking about this issue of trust. I felt like going to authors like I trust they're going to do the job. They've done the diligence of research or thought. And then they're going to write in a really cool way or interesting way or beautiful way and tell a story, whether I fully love it, hate it, get into it, it's worth it because I trust the author. Ian McEwan is one of those. So, I picked up Machines Like Me by Ian McEwan, and basically, it's about, it's got a lot of things. Like talk about your book My Favorite Things is Monsters, there's a lot in this one. Because it has an artificial human, like a robot. It also is alternative history, because it's set in 1982.
[Rhonda] Oh.
[Frank] But an alternative 1982 in Britain. So there's a couple of things that are going on that are sci-fi-esque, but it's actually very literary and sort of psychologically questioning. So, it's about this guy named Charlie, and he's like a 32-year-old guy who's sort of casting about for a career. Has like a sort of, you know, not shady but like, you know, troubled past. Living in a small apartment in London and just sort of, you know, figuring out what he's going to do with his life. He comes into some money, and he actually buys a robot or artificial human because they've just come on the market. Basically, 25, only 25 of the, I don't know what to call them. Robots?
[Rhonda] Okay.
[Frank] I guess human, artificial human. Machine.
[Rhonda] Does he have a name for them? Machine?
[Frank] It's funny, I think he calls them multiple things. And then it eventually changes and it's not even referred to as a robot at all. It's just a person in a way. But there are 25 of these robots come on the market, 13 female, 12 male. And they're called Adam and Eve. All the girls are Eve.
[Rhonda] There's only 25 total.
[Frank] All the boys are Adam. Twenty-five total worldwide. And he comes into this money, but he's an early adopter, because he was into tech and AI, artificial intelligence.
[Rhonda] Right.
[Frank] And he buys this robot for 86,000 pounds.
[Rhonda] In 1982 money?
[Frank] Well, it is alternative history.
[Rhonda] Oh, okay.
[Frank] So, by 1982, technology is advanced enough where you can have a personal robot. And it's anatomically correct. It's fully functional in every way, wink, wink. And will basically, you get the robot and you put, you sort of, you input data via a questionnaire on your own preferences. Like you can input stuff into the robot that will download into the robot that will inform its personality. But the robot also has access to the internet, so it has like worldwide knowledge for better or worse.
[Rhonda] So there's internet now in 1982.
[Frank] There's internet, correct.
[Rhonda] Okay.
[Frank] All the technology is actually what we know but beyond in this alternative history in 1982.
[Rhonda] And when was this written?
[Frank] Last year.
[Rhonda] Oh, last year.
[Frank] This year. So, I think he, so do you get that basic premise?
[Rhonda] Yeah, right.
[Frank] And then so he gets this male robot Adam who is in his little apartment, and Charlie, the guy, also is sort of having this flirtation and imminent affair with the woman upstairs named Miranda. So now you have these three characters and stuff happens from there. So the alternative history thing, though, is interesting because he deals with, Ian McEwan deals with some historical events that happened differently. He changes the ending to certain ones and other things like John Lennon survives, lives, and the Beatles come together again. Things like that.
[Rhonda] Wow, okay.
[Frank] Margaret Thatcher who's in charge of, who's the prime minister of England, has a controversy. But I think the primary reason why he might have done it was because, do you know, I'm not that familiar with a scientist, a computer scientist, named Alan Turing.
[Rhonda] I feel like I've heard that name.
[Frank] Alan Turing, there was a movie made about him with Benedict Cumberbatch. I can't remember the name, and Keira Knightly. He was a leading computer scientist and artificial intelligence expert in World War II, and he actually made huge advances during that time for the war effort. He was gay, and he horribly was found out, like in those days, it was illegal in England. And he was found, caught in a situation, and offered either jail time or chemical castration. Which I'm not going to go into.
[Rhonda] Oh, right.
[Frank] He chose the latter, and eventually, supposedly, killed himself in 1954, after doing all this heroic war work. And anyway, so in Machines Like Me, Ian McEwan keeps him alive. He chooses jail and survives it and becomes like a legendary figure in artificial intelligence world. And by the time of the book in 1982, because Alan Turing was born in 1912, I think he wanted to set it earlier so that he could be alive, is sort of the grand statesman of artificial intelligence in the book. So he sort of gives homage to Alan Turing, who was a controversial, interesting figure in history, in actual history. So you get a little history. There's some history of science in this book. He brings a lot into it. Talk about a lot into it like your book. He talks about quantum mechanics, and I'm like hmm, I want to know more about that, but I'm not really understanding. I was more interested in the sort of psychological aspects and moral aspects of bringing an artificial human into your life, or even creating them in the first place. Because a triangle of sorts forms between Charlie, Adam and Miranda. Like I said, these robots are fully functional.
[Rhonda] So Adam like develops over time, like --
[Frank] Great, thank you. Absolutely. He learns from the humans he interacts with. Not only do you get to pre-give him data. You never really know what the questionnaire is. Like you get your owner's manual when you get the robot. And then the owner can then, before it's fully charged, input information via this questionnaire. But you don't, the reader does not ever know what that questionnaire is. You don't really know what he's getting. And you don't know what Charlie is telling him. He also, Charlie, because he's in love with Miranda and feels that Adam, the artificial robot, who's an adult robot, can be a sort of bonding factor for the two of them, almost like a child. So he wants, he actually gives Miranda half the questionnaire to input into Adam. He doesn't know what Miranda says, and that's part of the tension of the book is that they both seem to have this input into Adam's personality. But neither knows what the other really said to this robot. So the robot is informed by the access to the internet. Like he has world history access, they all do, the female robots as well. And as well as the data input by the owner of the robot and as well as learning organically from interacting with humans.
[Rhonda] So it's like a child again, from one parent, the other parent --
[Frank] Sort of setting that up.
[Rhonda] what you get from the [inaudible].
[Frank] Exactly. And you know, a lot goes on in this book. And there's actually an actual child that figures as well in this, plus a situation, Miranda, well I should say early in the book, Adam tells Charlie, this is not giving away anything spoilery too much, tells Adam, Adam tells Charlie that, because Adam knows everything, says Miranda is possibly a malicious liar and systematic liar. And Charlie's in love with Miranda. And Miranda also put this data into him, so you're like what? So you think, what happened there? And then you find out Miranda's story about what she's telling, what her possible lie/story is about. But --
[Rhonda] So Adam's starting drama.
[Frank] I guess I won't, like I said, sometimes to reveal any of these plot points. But what was interesting to me and exciting either to read through this book, and I found, I find Ian McEwan very propulsive, and the forward movement of his work keeps me going. And his psychological insight too. There's lots of psychological insight in this book, I think. But one of the issues was, things develop, and Adam gets, you know, oh boy, talk about language. If you buy something, let's just start there.
[Rhonda] Okay.
[Frank] And then that something doesn't please you.
[Rhonda] Yeah.
[Frank] You know, do you feel entitled that you bought this thing and that you're like hey, wait a minute, I don't like what's going on here. You get rid of it. You throw it away or whatever.
[Rhonda] Absolutely.
[Frank] So, Adam as this artificial human, though, starts doing things that are not pleasing Charlie. And it begs the question, does he have the right anymore, Charlie, to unplug Adam? You can't unplug --
[Rhonda] That's what I was going to ask, does he have an off switch? Can he --
[Frank] You can. I will reveal one thing. I'm probably going to reveal more. But one thing that, at one point, it's fairly early, Charlie tries to unplug him, and Adam grabs his wrist and snaps it.
[Rhonda] Wow.
[Frank] Dun, dun, dun.
[Rhonda] And this is early on?
[Frank] Fairly. Yeah. So, that's a sort of red flag.
[Rhonda] Yeah, that's a real red flag.
[Frank] And I was made. Like I was reading it and I was like, you know what, I'm not going to get into this whole drama of like is this human? Is this a real person? Because it was created artificially. It's a technological device. We have the right to smash it up and get rid of it. It's like I'm not going to get into this moral quandary Ian McEwan. And then the book goes on, and I completely reversed my thought.
[Rhonda] Really, so that's interesting.
[Frank] My thought was like, you know what, and it really ties into a lot what's going on now. And I think Ian McEwan know this about believing people. It's like if it talks like a person that has feelings and acts like a person that has feelings, I'm like, you have to treat it like a person who has feelings. I really was like siding on that side. I was like --
[Rhonda] So that's where you came down on.
[Frank] And then I thought, don't create these things, these artificial humans, things. See I can't, now I feel emotional towards the robot like I can't even call it a thing.
[Rhonda] You don't want to call it a thing.
[Frank] These artificial humans at all, because we as a human race can't deal with all of us yet anyway. Let's get us together. Let's get our world together before we create an artificial quandary in the form of these robot humans. I mean that's what I was really thinking. It was like, that's what I was about the early adopter. It's like, do not do this until we can accept each other as human. You know what I mean?
[Rhonda] So you think that's what Ian McEwan was saying in this book?
[Frank] One of the things for sure.
[Rhonda] One of the things he was saying.
[Frank] I mean, Alan Turing who's the person I just, the historical person I just described, comes down on the side of like you absolutely treat these creations as real humans. I mean you can see how much it ties into Frankenstein.
[Rhonda] Yeah.
[Frank] I mean so many books have been written about this subject.
[Rhonda] Have addressed this.
[Frank] And it's so interesting though, because I really at first was like you know what, I don't want to get into this because it's a machine, and I'm not doing it. But then Turing, who's the scientific voice in this book, describes like, you know, yes, it's circuits and it's whatever the technology right terms are. But those circuits and gender have engendered new thoughts. Because that's how far the technology is. I mean, there's quotes in here about we are just matter, and matter only explains, this is where the quantum mechanics come in, which I don't understand. We are matter, and matter seems to engender consciousness. There's no other way to explain it unless we bring in God. But scientifically, there's no other way to explain it other than consciousness is engendered for matter and what is an artificial robot but matter.
[Rhonda] So then why do you think, what was the purpose of creating him? Or creating --
[Frank] Good question.
[Rhonda] Yeah, why even --
[Frank] Because we can.
[Rhonda] Right --
[Frank] And I hate that. I mean I hate that. Like I was thinking on the way here like creating things that people adopt and are obsessed with, as we all know the devices, but like when we don't know what the real benefit or not benefit will be. I mean, certainly there's a lot written about now about how the internet was supposed to be this unifying force for the world.
[Rhonda] And exactly not that.
[Frank] And a lot of us talked about how it did not turn into that per se. If anything, the baseline is that it's this very malicious playground that's not so great. And people are already, after ten years of iPhones is like we have no phone time. I mean all this stuff about getting away from them.
[Rhonda] Yeah.
[Frank] You know, no one says I should stop reading books. Oh my God, I should stop reading books. You know, thank God. But like we try to get away from technology. So, be careful what you create.
[Rhonda] I'm interested in Charlie, so I know he's an early adapter, but what was he planning to do with this? Was he going to be like a servant to wash his clothes? Was he a friend? Was he --
[Frank] Yeah. He does do chores. There's a sad side note with some, of course, some of the female robots who, you don't really know what happens. But like eight of them are bought by this one person, and you don't even want to know what they possibly go through.
[Rhonda] So they do kind of say what happens to the other ones.
[Frank] Because they are anatomically correct. Not really. Something does happen to all of them at some point, which I won't say, which really is a direct result from their inability to comprehend human beings. Because human beings are so crazy. But you just said why did Charlie buy it? Charlie bought it because he was just excited about AI. He was excited about technology.
[Rhonda] And I guess people do that today.
[Frank] Right. And it was not about doing the dishes or anything sexual or anything like that. It was more he was excited to interact with this technology and see what would happen. Because he was a believer in it. Which things change as the book goes on.
[Rhonda] Pretty interesting.
[Frank] Yeah. Oh, and he said, like I said at all the insights there's one part, I was going, I have all these little post-its in the book, but I'll just tell you the part where Adam is, Adam has some great monologues in a way about his observations and feelings. And he talks about literature, like fiction and why we create fiction and books to read. He said, books won't be, stories like that won't be necessary anymore because the union between artificial intelligence and human beings will eradicate human misunderstanding. He says, all the great works of literature come from our inability to understand another human being. The tension between two human beings trying to understand the other, to love them, to get them. And he says the comingling of technology and humanity will be such that that will be gone. That we will be in perfect union and harmony. There will be no need for writing these stories of tension between human beings. The only form of literary work that would need to exist would be the Haiku.
[Rhonda] The Haiku.
[Frank] Because it's very specific. It's very --
[Rhonda] Structured. Right.
[Frank] I was like, he goes on about that, and I was like that's so fascinating. And --
[Rhonda] That's fascinating. But that's kind of what you said we thought the internet was going to be like. And it's the exact opposite, so, in my opinion.
[Frank] It brings up a lot of ideas. What's the other, there's a bunch of other quotes, about fiction. Oh, he talks about whichever people might now, I always like to talk about death. But he has an insight about Adam who's the robot. Has an insight about death in a positive way where he equates death with our vision. So you said, you see, but you don't see behind you or particularly to the either side of you. But the periphery is blurred out, is there. And he was saying that death is something like that. That it's the zone you can't see. That it's, it's there, and it's on the periphery, but it's not quite in your field of vision.
[Rhonda] So Adam said that.
[Frank] Ian McEwan, yeah. One of his insights. Ian McEwan writes much better than I just talked.
[Rhonda] I mean it's a good point. But how can Adam understand that?
[Frank] Well, you have to read the book to find out.
[Rhonda] Okay.
[Frank] It's, like I said, Ian McEwan Machines Like Me, actually the subtitle is Machines Like Me and People Like You.
[Rhonda] Is it really?
[Frank] Which I find a very sad statement somehow.
[Rhonda] That is a sad statement.
[Frank] Machines Like Me and People Like You.
[Rhonda] What does that, well I guess I'd have to read it to understand what that means.
[Frank] Yeah. Yeah, well I didn't really spoil it.
[Rhonda] Okay.
[Frank] So there it is.
[Rhonda] All right, wow. We covered two really different ends of the spectrum this episode.
[Frank] Yeah.
[Rhonda] But I'm intrigued. I'm intrigued by Machines Like Me. But I'm not an early adapter, so I wouldn't have an Adam or an Eve in my house.
[Frank] I wouldn't either because it's like, like I said, the core of it is like let humanity get its act together.
[Rhonda] Exactly.
[Frank] Everyone have rights. Everyone have the same story, I mean the same capabilities and possibilities before you bring in another possible human into the equation that might demand rights. I mean you can see how this book touches on all those things. And this is what made me turn my story about if it acts like a feeling human and talks like a feeling human, it is a feeling human. Think about through history all the times we've regarded one, has one kind of person has regarded another kind of person as not human, as less than human.
[Rhonda] Yes, exactly.
[Frank] As someone who's not deserving of rights, who can be destroyed. The entitlement of you're not a human being. I'm going to, I can do whatever I want with you. I mean, when that came into my head I was like whoa, that changes the story for me. And then I was like, don't even make robots, people out there, technology people, just don't do it.
[Rhonda] But people are doing it. It'll come at some point.
[Frank] You know, I even think that I don't have Alexa or even Siri. It's like I think, and I know that people just by hearing a human voice have emotions to Alexa. I know they must.
[Rhonda] I wonder if that's true.
[Frank] You have to develop that. You just do. Because it's an entity, I just think we as humans we do that.
[Rhonda] So do you think that's the goal of having these things that you will get emotionally attached to them? You'll get connected to them?
[Frank] I mean people who've created the internet have said they've created something they wanted to be addicting. They've said it.
[Rhonda] Yeah, I have heard of that, of social media --
[Frank] A lot of the media titans, the internet titans, don't let their own kids on it because they know how addicting it is. So, don't get me started.
[Rhonda] All right.
[Frank] Do you have any, all right, do you have any non-book recommendations?
[Rhonda] Oh, well let's see.
[Frank] What's on Rhonda's cultural radar?
[Rhonda] So, you know, I love my horror films. So I actually just watched this weekend --
[Frank] Don't tell me. Did you see Invisible Man?
[Rhonda] No, no.
[Frank] Okay.
[Rhonda] This is a movie that came out I think last year, but I just saw it out on television.
[Frank] Oh.
[Rhonda] Annabelle Comes Home. Okay, listen.
[Frank] Is that the doll?
[Rhonda] That is the doll. But that is a scary doll.
[Frank] I don't know.
[Rhonda] Let me tell you. All of those movies in that Conjuring franchise, I love them. They have those old school scares.
[Frank] Yeah, I guess.
[Rhonda] You know, they have those --
[Frank] I saw one, I think.
[Rhonda] They pull from those myths and those old stories that just keep going. You know, like scary dolls will be scary forever.
[Frank] I never got into scary dolls.
[Rhonda] You know, Poltergeist when he --
[Frank] Chucky, Child's Play, Chucky.
[Rhonda] pulled the kid under the bed. That was a clown/doll.
[Frank] Well that, Poltergeist is one of my favorites. But --
[Rhonda] Chucky, I love, I've seen all of those films.
[Frank] Chucky had a comedy element to it that I liked.
[Rhonda] Yeah, that was, it was --
[Frank] Especially the recent Child's Play reboot which I thought was great.
[Rhonda] I saw that one as well.
[Frank] I'm not in love with Annabelle.
[Rhonda] Yeah, Annabelle, Annabelle --
[Frank] I could try it.
[Rhonda] And she also kind of pulled it from some of the other Conjuring franchise stories.
[Frank] Yeah.
[Rhonda] But I thought it was, I really enjoyed this one.
[Frank] I never, the horror-wise, we can get off this, but, I know half of the people out there are like we can't stand horror. But I never got into like possession-y, demonic-y, possession-y movies or books. I never, somehow that didn't interest me as much. Exorcist, of course, I would love, but I don't know why. Well thanks.
[Rhonda] Yes. We'll --
[Frank] I'm going to wrap it up with something hot and happy.
[Rhonda] Okay. Hot and happy.
[Frank] This is going to sound so trite and so on brand for me, but it's actually not. The latest Lady Gaga song. Have you heard it?
[Rhonda] I haven't. Tell me about it.
[Frank] It's called Stupid Love. And you know what? It's a dance song to its core. Happy, joyous, elegiac, get on the floor and dance song. If I still went to clubs, I wish I did so I could go out and dance crazy.
[Rhonda] I want to hear about Frank's club days.
[Frank] O-M to the G. I used to club it out.
[Rhonda] Did you really?
[Frank] Oh God. My knees are probably going to start complaining.
[Rhonda] You got some stories there.
[Frank] But oh, I used to dance my face off.
[Rhonda] What's it called? Stupid Love.
[Frank] Stupid Love. And the video is crazy. The dance is great. It's just like an old school dance anthem. And it's sort of designed to make you feel joyous. And you know what, after all we just talked about and all that's going on, take, you know what, everybody out there just after we're done in a couple of minutes, look up Lady Gaga's Stupid Love and dance around your kitchen, or wherever you are.
[Rhonda] Or wherever you are.
[Frank] Just do it. We should all do that. Have a dance party, an international dance party.
[Rhonda] I think that's what Frank and I will be doing after we're finished.
[Frank] Just gave a shout out to lady Gaga. But I loved it. I don't even know how I heard it, but I wasn't particularly a fan. I mean she was cool.
[Rhonda] Really?
[Frank] Yeah I mean, I was like oh she's just a cool thing. And then she did A Star is Born, which was like --
[Rhonda] I haven't seen it.
[Frank] dressed down Lady Gaga. But this is like fully, crazy outfit dancer.
[Rhonda] Original Gaga.
[Frank] O-G-G-G.
[Rhonda] O-G-G-G.
[Frank] That ain't right. So go out and dance.
[Rhonda] Love it.
[Frank] Oh my God. Monsters, machines and Lady Gaga.
[Rhonda] So don't forget, April 9th, we're going to be talking about A Good Man is Hard to Find and Other Stories by Flannery O'Connor, so we really want you to read and be able to join in our discussion.
[Frank] Right, and you can find out about our books we discussed on the blog posts, which is NYPL.org/125. You can get it through the 125. I had fun.
[Rhonda] I had fun too.
[Frank] You're as feisty, I sensed a little feisty Rhonda in there, and I'm sort of loving it.
[Rhonda] Really? Okay, okay.
[Frank] You were just like enough of this therapy session, let's talk about books. I'm like, no, it's about me.
[Rhonda] It's all right, Frank. We'll get it together.
[Frank] If I ever bore you, just come right in and cut me off.
[Rhonda] You're never boring, never boring.
[Frank] Well, thank you everybody for listening, and review us and find us wherever you attain your podcasts. And you can get our blog posts at NYPL.org/125 among many other goodies celebrating the 125th anniversary of the New York Public Library including us, The Librarian is In. So, chow.
[Rhonda] And thanks for listening and join us next time. Bye.
[Speaker] Thanks for listening to The Librarian is In, a podcast by the New York Public Library. Don't forget to subscribe and leave a review on Apple Podcast or Google Play. Or send us an email at podcasts@NYPL.org. For more information about the New York Public Library and our 125th anniversary, please visit NYPL.org/125. Your hosts are Frank Collerius and Rhonda Evans. We are produced by Christine Farrell and recorded at our Andrew Heiskell Braille and Talking Book Library in Manhattan.