i hope that your services will be available, should i ever need psychiatric care.
i've read 'do androids' close to 100 times, just as brilliant, just as unique as anything kurt vonnegut wrote.
i was very disappointed with the first version of blade runner, i've come to accept it over time. but it clearly doesn't inhabit the same space as the book.
anyone ever read the amber series (zelazny)?
Yes, but it was a long time ago. It reminded me in some ways of the World of Tiers series by Philip José Farmer . Zelazny has acknowledged that the Nine Princes in Amber was drawn from World of Tiers. World of Teirs is often thought to have drawn from William Blake & other early cosmological ideas and mythologies.
I found Philip José Farmer and the Makers of the Universe excellent. Have you read any of his books yet? In some ways his writting is similiar to Philip K. Dick & Vonnegut
For me, PKD was a latter day visionary, perhaps a saint. I think his ideas, not his writing style, are truly mind expanding.
i hope that your services will be available, should i ever need psychiatric care.
i've read 'do androids' close to 100 times, just as brilliant, just as unique as anything kurt vonnegut wrote.
i was very disappointed with the first version of blade runner, i've come to accept it over time. but it clearly doesn't inhabit the same space as the book.
I recently reread about 10 of his books, all speed-read, one after another. Couple I had never read. Definitely like tripping with just enough coffee for my old ass to feel like "On The Road Again." There, combined the references. And I gotta say, up front, redgiff, if you don't get the buzz from reading PKD and you think Kerouac was overrated, then I don't think years of therapy is gonna help yer lame ass at this point. Cause if you don't already know enough to understand WHY you should dig it, then as much as I wish you could, you prolly won't. Sad. True.
Second point, art ISN'T SUBJECTIVE!! Not in the post modern analyze to fucking cultural relativistic death way, like so many new agey liberal types think (the ONLY valid criticism conservatives have of liberals, every thing else conservatives are wrong about, but liberals are afraid to be right). That doesn't mean you can't evaluate it, assess it for relative meaning. Eye of the beholder can mean some people's eyes are better than others and there's a way to assess what better means. There's a heirarchy of meaning that can be discussed by reasonable people. This is a radical thought for post-modern people who are victims of the performative contradiction. It goes like this: Post modern folks believe there are no truths, just interpretations (woozurbuddy). Well, if that's true, then that logic applied to itself means that it is not true, therefore it's false. Think about it. Then ask yourself what meaning is? This is a question that you have to keep asking yourself for a really long time. And not in a narcissistic way. Cause, like Plato's categories, if you choose, you choose for all humanity. (I guess unless you're Mary Kay Letourneau) Clue: it's not simple, but essentially, the value to compare to is life/quality of life. Ultimately, it's a hedonic scale because life is essentially about eros and evolution is about the increasing capacity for experiencing pleasure. And the last two datapoints on that scale are Acknowledged Altruism and Unacknowledged Altruism. In other words there is no such thing as SELFISH pleasure, only an evolution toward experiencing giving as more and more pleasurable. In other other words the more UNSELFISH you are, the more pleasure you get. But it's a stage theory, so we all have to go through puny egoic needs at some level to get to the higher levels. Read Abe Maslow and his heirarchy of needs.
Anyway, all that said, I read Electric Sheep, which I agree, kicks Bladerunner's ass. Of course, I absolutely loved Bladerunner anyway. I took 5 different women to see that in the theatres when it first came out. Estranged wife, previous mistress, new gf, new new gf, etc.
We Can Get It For You Wholesale is even betterer than Total Recall. There's an extra twist at the end I won't ruin. Makes you wonder if the producers and Ahnold could be so stupid not to have added it. Prolly thought folks like redgiff wouldn't have understood it.
Maybe his best single work, The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldrich, if there's any one of his books more than another I wish would be produced, it's this one. but I want it to be produced in a cultural time where it could really be done right, not with all the censorship bullshit we have now. Kind of like Lord of the Rings had to wait for technology, this one I hope waits for consciousness to catch up. I'm reaching
But best of all, I reread the Trilogy, his last work: Valis, The Transmigration of Timothy Archer and Divine Invasion. Inspired by a Mystical Experience/Synchronicity (and 5 or 6 other no doubt apt descriptions) he had in 1974. I was struck first by the difference in the books from what I remember of them. Really struck. Like, the differences in me allowed me to have a completely different experience of the books from way back when (early 80s). Like I was 'below' them then and now I'm 'above' them, in terms of my level of consciousness. The best part was, I have since read a lot of material that he must have sourced then, especially the material about Christ consciousness and psychedelic mushrooms. Which, of course, I've sourced in a couple of ways.
Particularly Transmigration seems to me to be fundamentally about that. While it was scary and radical then, it now just seems to be simply so. And more than that, it is where the evolution of humanity is going. E.G. toward Enlightenment or at least for now, the increasing capability of people to experience non-duality. Too bad PKD did so much speed and no yoga, leading to his head exploding. He was so close to the truth of the direction of human evolution. Course, the paranoid schizophrenia made it all fun!
Other references here go to William Gibson's Neuromancer series and Neal Stephenson's Snow Crash. Both books have that marvelous capability to alter your consciousness by their very writing style. Again, sorry redgiff.
In summary;
Ledoc: you are spot on, you totally rock!
Manbirdexperiment: you are also correct, sir!
Hairfarmer: thanks for starting the post, but get the courage to stand up to willful ignorance. It's okay, you're right, just own it.
Woozurbuddy: you musta did something right, since you're daughter has surpassed your post modern thinking (Comparative Analysis?). Start reading Ken Wilbur, esp The Marriage of Sense and Soul, and more recently Integral Spirituality.
Redgiff: I wish I could help, I really do, but I'm guessing you wouldn't want me to, by now you hate me and are trying to think of ways to hurt me. Trust me, that's not going to help you. PM me if you wish, I will do whatever I can... Maybe you could start with A Waking Life and What the Bleep are We? BTW, weed or shrooms would be a better adjunct to PDK than alcohol, another signal of error.
And, finally, get it right: it's A Scanner Darkly!!!!
Blade Runner is one of my favorite films, although Dick's Do Androids Dream Of Electric Sheep kicked its ass, again IMHO.
Exactly. So it turns out that with a bit of rewriting and editing Dick makes for a far better screen writer than actual author. His Ideas are kick ass his writing sucks.
However the last one , the animated "To Scanner Darkly" , was not that good. And why did To Scanner Darkly suck...because it tried too hard to hue to the books literary style. This fucked up the story beyond all human belief turning the film into the portage that Dick's books can become without a HEAVY editorial hand. SO, of course, it was a flop. And justly so.
Who can forget Arnold in "Total Recall" :- ) Awesome
For my part, I believe that Phillip K. Dick was not only way ahead of his time as a novelist, let alone as a science fiction writer, but still is to this day.
I think the jury is in on Jack K. as well.
Art is, in my humble opinion, extremely subjective, being in the eye of the beholder, so no offense intended to anyone else's equally valid opinions.
I'm also quite proud of my daughter, who, after I introduced her to P.K. Dick's work, wrote her Sophomore year English Honor's class thesis on his work (which was quite well received) by showing the development of some of his key themes through comparitive analysis of examples of Dick's work from the 50's, 60's, and 70's....which has nothing to do with him really, but I couldn't resist putting in a plug for my girl!
That's what dad's are for, John. Well done. (Well done to the daughter for the English Honors work, too.)
"Surrealist science fiction author Philip K. Dick's birthday is December 16. In celebration. Total Dick-Head blogger Dave Gill will be doing a two-hour radio tribute tonight, from 10pm-midnight PT, on Pirate Cat Radio. Tune in to 87.9 FM in the San Francisco Bay Area or listen online."
Having tried to read most of Dick's works...I have to say. THE DUDE CAN NOT WRITE FOR SHIT. Talk about interesting ideas sure. But it is the most convoluted clap trap I have ever tried to wade through. I highly suggest waders and a flask of strong whiskey to anyone who tries.
Probably the only other miserable writer that enjoys more undeserved acclaim is Jack Kerouac. On the Road was pointless half baked badly written drivel.
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