Comments on: "I hear voices from another star."

"I hear voices from another star."

fearfulsymmetry — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 04:40:45 -0800

A Day In The Afterlife of Philip K Dick - An Arena documentary first broadcast by the BBC in 1994 (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6)

By: jouke

jouke — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 05:07:50 -0800

Great. Thank you.

By: DU

DU — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 05:42:36 -0800

When I was a kid, I didn't "get" any Dick (OK OK, settle down). I thought he was just pointless and psychedelic. Recently I tried some audiobooks of his. They weren't all great, but nothing compares to hearing A Scanner Darkly read by Paul Giamatti. Holy crap.

By: Liquidwolf

Liquidwolf — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 06:43:16 -0800

He's the heaviest.

By: saulgoodman

saulgoodman — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 06:45:44 -0800

As much as I hate to say it (on a couple different levels), I like Dick. His stuff is pulp fiction, sure--you can probably get through any one of his books in less than a day, with no interruptions. But it's thinking man's pulp fiction. Dick's books are always chock full of interesting ideas and oddball philosophical perspectives. The first book of his I ever read was "The Divine Invasion," then later I read "Ubik" and "Valis" (collectively known as "The Valis Trilogy"); I've since read about 20 of his titles. I wasn't a big reader of Science Fiction at all before Dick. Now I've moved beyond Dick to the hardcore SciFi stuff like Herbert and Heinlein. He's a gateway drug. Thanks for this!

By: elfgirl

elfgirl — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 07:07:46 -0800

The first 'A' I received in college was for a paper I wrote for an Intro to Film class comparing the religious symbolism in Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep and Blade Runner. Come to think of it, picking apart Phillip K. Dick's and Ridley Scott's symbol- and metaphor-rich storytelling for that paper probably helped lead me towards eventually majoring in Religion and Anthropology.

By: rusty

rusty — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 07:10:45 -0800

Thanks for this. I just read The Man in the High Castle, The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch and Ubik in quick succession and my mind remains largely blown.

By: a robot made out of meat

a robot made out of meat — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 07:35:33 -0800

I agree; I sometimes wish that I could run into Giamatti on the street and say how much I liked A Scanner Darkly, because I'm sure that he doesn't hear that enough.

By: miss lynnster

miss lynnster — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 07:43:25 -0800

As long as it's not "A Day in the Life of Andy Dick." 'Cuz that's a documentary I just really really don't want to see.

By: DU

DU — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 07:44:18 -0800

Was that sarcastic? Did I make a SciFauxPas?

By: miss lynnster

miss lynnster — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 07:49:33 -0800

(Oooops, forgot the explanatory link!)

By: BigBrooklyn

BigBrooklyn — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 07:58:09 -0800

Anyone want to hazard a guess as to how long it takes for the BBC to pull this content from Youtube? What is the half life of copyrighted material these days?

By: Artw

Artw — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 08:16:16 -0800

Now with Ubik!

By: Liquidwolf

Liquidwolf — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 09:32:12 -0800

BBC's stuff is all over Google video, they don't pull it. I heard something about Paul Giamatti playing Phil Dick in an upcoming film??? I don't know, doesnt really look like him......

By: saulgoodman

saulgoodman — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 09:53:58 -0800

On a note related to this comment upthread: Speaking of that other Dick, Andy Dick crashed my old band's first headlining show in Tallahassee (he'd basically just gotten booed off the stage at an FSU homecoming event that was going on the same night and he wandered into the club where we were playing, drunk). He just took over the stage right after our set was done, and started singing these incoherent, funny(?) songs. The crowd of course ate it up. At the conclusion of his set, at the apex of a tuneless song dedicated to that anatomical member that shares his patronym, he whipped it out. And that's about all the (Andy) Dick I'll ever need to see. /tangent

By: saulgoodman

saulgoodman — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 09:55:03 -0800

Now with Ubik! Man, I loved that one. So creepy.

By: kozad

kozad — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 10:06:49 -0800

I am pretty much obsessed with anyone whose last name is four letters long. Dick, Beck, Monk. (My wife's last name has four letters, and when you type her name into Google you get lots of articles about an active man-turned-woman in Illinois.)

By: kozad

kozad — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 10:07:55 -0800

I'm on part 3. Thanks for the link.

By: comadreja

comadreja — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 10:09:35 -0800

then later I read "Ubik" and "Valis" (collectively known as "The Valis Trilogy") "Ubik" is not part of the "VALIS Trilogy". PKD planned a third novel to go with "Divine Invasion" and "VALIS" but did not complete it. "The Transmigration of Timothy Archer", his last novel, gets lumped in as the third book. "Transmigration" is one of my favorites, partly because it is strangely non sci-fi for PKD.

By: Liquidwolf

Liquidwolf — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 10:17:22 -0800

Radio Free Albemuth can be considered part of the Valis Trilogy series. It fits more than Timothy Archer.

By: saulgoodman

saulgoodman — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 10:23:21 -0800

Ah--thanks for the correction, comadreja. I've read "Transmigration...", too, but got confused about what belonged where in the Trilogy (there are so many recurring motifs in Dick's stuff, it all just becomes a sort of psychedelic fog after a while)... Is "Transmigration" the one where the guy's passing through his hometown only to find everything's somehow changed completely (even his own past) and that he can't escape? No, wait--that was a different one...? Damn, can't keep 'em all straight anymore. I recall really liking Radio Free Albemuth, too.

By: comadreja

comadreja — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 10:31:09 -0800

Radio Free Albemuth fits in because it is basically the first version of VALIS. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VALIS_trilogy http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radio_Free_Albemuth

By: bardic

bardic — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 12:14:17 -0800

Awesome. Hope I can find the time to watch all of this. I also tried Dick in high school (ahem) and didn't really get it, or into it for that matter. But over the past year I've read about half of his novels (I find them all to be quick reads, even the "heavier" later books) and I just can't say enough about them. It's unfortunate that people (myself included, previously) make so many assumptions about his work before they actually wade through some of it. Sure, there's tons of drug use, but he does something really interesting stuff with it, almost to the point where it becomes a metaphor for everything else (just read The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch if you don't believe me). And people also tend to forget that A Scanner Darkly is a powerful anti-drug statement. But what really got to me about his work after I gave it a healthy college try and put aside my prejudices? His major theme is religion. And he writes about it in so many different ways, brilliantly. And not just in the final novels, which are overtly about the subject (Transmigration of Timothy Archer, VALIS). And fun tidbit -- AFAIK, he pretty much predicted global warming in Three Stigmata. Not sure he's ever been given official credit for it. Rich people can afford to live underground, while everyone else has to suffer above ground. It's actually funny as hell and incredibly depressing at the same time, which is typical of the man and his work. Oh, and Blade Runner was a cool movie and all but misses out on so much of the humor of Electric Sheep -- all the men left on earth are wearing huge, lead-lined codpieces to protect their junk from radiation. That just wouldn't jibe with Ridley Scott's sense of "aura," I guess. Which is a shame.

By: Liquidwolf

Liquidwolf — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 13:11:53 -0800

Sure, there's tons of drug use, but he does something really interesting stuff with it, almost to the point where it becomes a metaphor for everything else (just read The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch if you don't believe me). And people also tend to forget that A Scanner Darkly is a powerful anti-drug statement. What's the problem with drug use and references? His writing is manages to capture drug states both paranoid and psychedelic incredibly well.

By: CCBC

CCBC — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 13:39:47 -0800

Thanks for this. I just watched the whole thing. Very good -- at least for us fans. Timothy Archer is based on Bishop Pike, head of the California Episcpal Church, who died in the Israeli desert while seeking to commune with his dead son. Dick's book is one version of that story. One thing about BladeRunner that is seldom mentioned is that Scott offered Dick a very large sum to do a movie adaptation of the novel. Dick refused and insisted that Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? stand as the movie tie-in, though he did allow the word(s) "BladeRunner" to be larger than his title on the movie edition. The "drug group" mentioned in the docu was X-Kalay, a Vancouver program run by ex-cons. Therapy consisted of group talk sessions based on Synanon-style theory. Dick recognized the problems with this -- the ego-crushing bullying, group attacks on individuals, cult-style brainwashing, and so on -- yet his writing about it expesses a kind of exhilaration as though he really enjoyed playing head games at that level.

By: Artw

Artw — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 13:48:44 -0800

Oh, and Blade Runner was a cool movie and all but misses out on so much of the humor of Electric Sheep -- all the men left on earth are wearing huge, lead-lined codpieces to protect their junk from radiation. There's lots, lot's more than that of course. Like the real and fake animals, and Deckards desire to replace the fake sheep of the title with a real one. Or the competing TV ideologies of Buster Friendly and Mercerism, or the Empathy Box that adherants of Mercerism use. Or the fake policestation. The walk in the desert at the end is rather wonderful as well.

By: lilnemo

lilnemo — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 14:51:51 -0800

You can't have a PKD thread without a link to the R. Crumb illustrated "Religious Experience of Philip K. Dick" from Weirdo #17.

By: contraption

contraption — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 17:22:23 -0800

saulgoodman: actually the VALIS trilogy is "VALIS," "The Divine Invasion," and "The Transmigration of Timothy Archer." "UBIK" is a separate work. I don't blame you for getting them confused, though, the books of the trilogy are only thematically related, and "UBIK" really seems to fit better than TTOTA.

By: crataegus

crataegus — Sat, 07 Jun 2008 00:05:34 -0800

I've been on a Dick kick (well, actually, a harder scifi kick) recently, and I am so happy you posted this.

By: whir

whir — Sat, 07 Jun 2008 09:55:43 -0800

Fans of PKD will find a lot of interest at the (really badly named) blog Total Dick-Head. Among other things I've seen linked from there is this interview with one of Dick's daughters, who has written a memoir which has supposedly been blocked due to legal threats from the Dick estate; it also has some information about the upcoming Ubik movie and the unauthorized biopic about "William J Frick". I am loath to post this before I mine it for excellent PKD-related links to use in future posts, but it really is an excellent resource for rabid fans like myself.

By: CCBC

CCBC — Sat, 07 Jun 2008 14:40:34 -0800

whir: those are really good links, but the interview is not with one of Dick's daughters, but rather the daughter of his second wife, Kleo, (fathered by a man Dick introduced her to). Although, he did act as a father to this girl and clearly helped form the woman she became.

By: saulgoodman

saulgoodman — Sat, 07 Jun 2008 20:24:05 -0800

I think it was Cosmic Puppets I was thinking of, btw... And thanks again for this fpp. Now that I've had a chance to watch all of the segments of the documentary, I'm just that much more psyched about it. Lot's of good stuff (and cool to see that Elvis Costello cameo; big fan of his, too).