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. |
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Page 39
... ( 1959 ) is a good example of this . 19 The Author ' s Note to A Maze of Death (
1970 ) explains how he worked out the religious system that prevails in the
society of the novel with the help of Bishop James Pike ; it is interesting that an
incident ...
... ( 1959 ) is a good example of this . 19 The Author ' s Note to A Maze of Death (
1970 ) explains how he worked out the religious system that prevails in the
society of the novel with the help of Bishop James Pike ; it is interesting that an
incident ...
Page 100
... s father was having a bad day , not ' being himself ' very well . ) Charlie arrests
the process of infiltration in an interesting way : he calls upon two of his peers ,
one the local bully and tough guy , Tony Peretti , the other Bobby Daniels , the ...
... s father was having a bad day , not ' being himself ' very well . ) Charlie arrests
the process of infiltration in an interesting way : he calls upon two of his peers ,
one the local bully and tough guy , Tony Peretti , the other Bobby Daniels , the ...
Page 205
( Clearly , this is an interesting speculation in itself , and one that we can
envisage the narrative following up . ) Meanwhile , an opening into an apparently
empty para - earth is discovered — this too is an interesting prospect , narratively
and ...
( Clearly , this is an interesting speculation in itself , and one that we can
envisage the narrative following up . ) Meanwhile , an opening into an apparently
empty para - earth is discovered — this too is an interesting prospect , narratively
and ...
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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
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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 |