The Prologue to Fire is extraordinary. Lots of SF plots (eg SG Atlantis, Star Trek Organians) talk about ‘transcending’. Vernor describes what it’s actually like to transcend.
Have you read Vinge’s short works which also describe the experience of transcendence - I’m particularly thinking of “True Names.”
(a non-Vinge example of this theme that I think was done well was Marc Stiegler’s “The Gentle Seduction”)
Not yet
In addition to touching on transhumanism and hints of a Singularity, Vinge’s True Names had one of (if not the first) detailed VR/Cyberspace setting, and predicted the vital role and some of the issues raised by anonymity on the internet. Keep in mind that it was published in 1981, three years before Neuromancer.
I read Marooned in Realtime a few decades ago when it was serialized in Analog, and liked it a lot. I re-read it just last year after getting it on Kindle, and also finally got around to reading the prequel The Peace War.
I liked both of these a lot, so maybe I’ll check out A Fire Upon The Deep.
P.S. I read a short story by Vernor Vinge when I was a young teenager that I also liked a lot: Long Shot. It’s one of my all-time favorite short stories.
There’s also a novella set between Peace War and Marooned - it’s called “The Ungoverned”