The Big U (1984) is Neal Stephenson's first published novel, a satire of campus life. The story follows the misadventures of a socially inept Arab engineering student, a pair of brilliant lesbians, a hardcore war gaming club, and other misfits through a series of escalating events that culminate with a full scale civil war raging on the campus. The book attacks and makes fun of just about every conceivable group at university, jocks as well as nerds and anything in between, even though the portraits of the nerds/computer scientists/role players tend to be a bit more detailed than those of factions probably further removed from the author's experience. The events take place at a fictitious big university consisting of a single building (a central complex with four towers containing student housing), making the university an enclosed universe of its own. Stephenson uses this fact to take what starts as a mostly realistic satire and move it further and further into the realms of fantasy, including near-intelligent rats and alternate realities merging with ours. Even though the characterizations are mostly unfinished and the plotting is uneven to say the least, "The Big U" still manages to captivate and has many hilarious and entertaining passages.

Stephenson has said he is not proud of this book. By the time Snow Crash was published "The Big U" was out print and Stephenson was content to leave it that way. However, when original editions began selling on eBay for hundreds of dollars he relented and allowed it to be republished, saying that the only thing worse than people reading the book was paying that much to read it.

The book was written while Stephenson was at Boston University. The fictional campus' design is based on a BU dormitory, Warren Towers. Located at 700 Commonwealth Ave in Boston, Massachusetts, it is one of the largest, and some would say ugliest, dorms in the US. The character of president Krupp shares a number of similarities with then BU President John Silber. The neon Big Wheel sign plays the part of the Citgo sign just East of the BU campus in Kenmore Square. The Big U's financial crisis and the lost library catalog are based on actual events.