Expect to feel pleasure. Knowledge is sexy. Expect to feel pain. Knowledge is torture.

Jeff Noon (Vurt, 1993)

A debut novel by British author and former musician Jeff Noon, Vurt is a kaleidoscopic science fiction trip first published in 1993. A year later, it won the Arthur C. Clarke Award, while Noon would continue expanding its world with Pollen and other novels. Noon’s Vurt stands out for its organicity among many notable works in the cyberpunk subgenre. Instead of relying on complex computer terminology, it blends reality with virtuality in a more visceral, genetic way, making it more comprehensible and, most importantly, a genuinely fascinating story.

In search of Desdemona

Vurt tells the story of Scribble’s journey searching for his sister, Desdemona, who has been lost inside a dangerous Vurt feather. A mix of powerful drugs and virtual reality dream-inducing devices, these colorful feathers are popular in this version of Manchester. People suck on them to enter the Vurt, a virtual reality indicated by the color of the feather: blue ones are safe, pink ones are pornographic, but some are rarer and deadlier, like the Curious Yellow (or “English Voodoo”) feather that Scribble is seeking to find Desdemona.

To help him in the journey are the rest of the Stash Riders: the careless driver Beetle, the shadowgirl Bridget, the newcomer Mandy, and “The Thing From Outer Space”, a creature from the Vurt accidentally swapped for Desdemona. Together, they will search for the precious feather in the streets of Manchester, its nightclubs, and dangerous neighborhoods such as Bottletown. Through encounters with Vurt dealers, cops, and shadowcops, and the all-knowing Game Cat, the guru of the feathers, Scribble will eventually tickle his throat with the Curious Yellow, and try to get back his sister from the Vurt.

A trip of a read

Much like the novel’s world, the pages are filled with weirdness and made-up terms. The cyberpunk nature of the story is concealed beneath flesh and drugs, sensations and mutations, rather than heavy machinery and chips. People in this version of Manchester are not only Human, but sometimes partially Dog, Shadow, Robo, or Vurt. Just like the existence of Vurt, the first book doesn’t explain most of this, making it all the more intriguing and dreamlike. The author (and characters) often refer to something new without bothering to explain what they are talking about to the reader.

The ordinary descriptions are also filled with colors and sexuality, subjective judgments, or distortions of the character’s point of view. Given this, the novel seems to mimic a drug trip, filled with unearthly beings, but the ordinary also appears strangely out of place. Way beyond the apparent correlation with drugs, Vurt is a beautiful hallucination that taps into the full potential of what only the written word can do. It uses the readers’ sensitivity and imagination to fill willingly omitted or imprecise descriptions, decode suggestions, and transport them into their own Vurt.

The Vurt of (our) future

The plot draws from the Orphic myth, with Scribble descending into another world for an incestuous love. Noon also references authors like Lewis Carroll and the archetypes in Joseph Campbell’s The Hero with a Thousand Faces. Despite its deep connections to ancient myths and classic narrative structures, Vurt is avant-garde in style and thematically relevant. It depicts a dystopian world, vibrant yet trapped by addiction to virtual reality and the rapid advance of technology.

Tight laws and violence also govern Vurt’s Manchester. The Stash Riders’ desire to escape into the Vurt and roam with their van resembles a freedom movement. Scribble and Desdemona, themselves, living a taboo relationship, could have chosen to live forever in the Vurt. It is not too different from many of the concerns of our century about the internet and social isolation.

How far the feathers flew

While the following books by Jeff Noon are equally—if not more—brilliant than the first, Vurt remains an iconic trip through an illegally colorful Manchester. The book was eventually adapted into a tabletop role-playing game. Several producers — the latest being Netflix — have tried to bring it to the screen. However, the project never progressed beyond the development phase. Perhaps that’s for the best. With a director’s hand and a fixed visual identity, it would likely lose the Vurtian, hallucinogenic beauty of its prose.

So, expect to feel both pleasure and pain. Expect to feel, in general, as Vurt will capture you with vivid descriptions and mad hallucinations. Like “The Thing From Outer Space”, it is both organic and alien. It’s something worth experiencing, at least once in your lifetime.