Philip K. Dick: Exhilaration and Terror of the PostmodernOnce solely the possession of fans and buffs, the SF author Philip K Dick is now finding a much wider audience, as the success of the films Blade Runner and Minority Report shows. The kind of world he predicted in his funny and frightening novels and stories is coming closer to most of us: shifting realities, unstable relations, uncertain moralities. Philip K. Dick: Exhilaration and Terror of the Postmodern examines a wide range of Dick's work, including his short stories and posthumously published realist novels. Christopher Palmer analyzes the puzzling and dazzling effects of Dick's fiction, and argues that at its heart is a clash between exhilarating possibilities of transformation, and a frightening lack of ethical certainties. Dick's work is seen as the inscription of his own historical predicament, the clash between humanism and postmodernism being played out in the complex forms of the fiction. The problem is never resolved, but Dick's ways of imagining it become steadily more ingenious and challenging. |
From inside the book
Results 1-3 of 90
Page 22
This option is not available to Dick ' s characters , although he very often borrows
from the genre . Things are already vitiated in the world of Dick ' s characters ; the
crisis of meaning which overtakes the world and the characters in the course of ...
This option is not available to Dick ' s characters , although he very often borrows
from the genre . Things are already vitiated in the world of Dick ' s characters ; the
crisis of meaning which overtakes the world and the characters in the course of ...
Page 25
In the most frightening parts of Palmer Eldritch , and in Flow My Tears , the main
character is a subject in the drug vision of another , a close but sinister ... The
characters discover that there is something wrong with the coins they are using .
In the most frightening parts of Palmer Eldritch , and in Flow My Tears , the main
character is a subject in the drug vision of another , a close but sinister ... The
characters discover that there is something wrong with the coins they are using .
Page 56
The central episode of the novel is a struggle to get to Des Moines ( chs . 10 – 11
) — the characters think they are going to attend the funeral of the man who
seemed to have died in the explosion on Luna . Here we have a group of
characters ...
The central episode of the novel is a struggle to get to Des Moines ( chs . 10 – 11
) — the characters think they are going to attend the funeral of the man who
seemed to have died in the explosion on Luna . Here we have a group of
characters ...
What people are saying - Write a review
We haven't found any reviews in the usual places.
Contents
Philip K Dick and the Postmodern | 23 |
Complications of Humanism and Postmodernism | 35 |
Static and Kinetic in Dicks Political Unconscious | 44 |
Copyright | |
9 other sections not shown
Other editions - View all
Common terms and phrases
actions actually alien American androids Arnie attempts become begins called Chapter characters child comes concerned condition context culture death define deity depiction Deus Irae Dick Dick's Dick's novels discussion drug effect Eldritch existence experience expresses fact fantasy feelings fiction fifties forces further future given gives going half-life happens High Castle human images imagination important individual instance interesting involves Jack kill kind late later live machines main character Manfred material matter means merely narrative nature novel objects offers ordinary perhaps person Philip political possible postmodern present problem production reader realism reality reason relations Scanner Darkly scene seems seen sense simply situation social society space story suggests Tagomi things Time-Slip tion true turn Ubik usually Valis whole writing
References to this book
Bibliographic information
| Title | Philip K. Dick: Exhilaration and Terror of the Postmodern Liverpool University Press Series Liverpool science fiction texts and studies |
| Author | Christopher Palmer |
| Edition | reprint |
| Publisher | Liverpool University Press, 2003 |
| Original from | the University of Michigan |
| Digitized | 6 Mar 2008 |
| ISBN | 0853236186, 9780853236184 |
| Length | 259 pages |
| Subjects | › Literary Criticism / Science Fiction & Fantasy |
| Export Citation | BiBTeX EndNote RefMan |