People's Topical Library

 New Topic  |  Go to Top  |  Go to Topic  |  Search  |  Log In   Newer Topic  |  Older Topic 
 DO ANDROIDS DREAM OF ELECTRIC SHEEP?
Author: MALCOLM XERXES™ 
Date:   01-29-04 15:18

This was the first novel by MR. PHILIP K. DICK that I ever read, & I also think it the funniest SF book I have ever read, in terms of its Black Comedy.
The various exchanges between DECKARD & his wife about the sheep are like classic Vaudeville™ routines, while the Replicants’™ interactions with animals are worth the price of admission, in & of themselves.

I am astonished @ how readily others have “borrowed” from MR. DICK’S concepts, over the decades.
When viewing the current “reimagining” of BATTLESTAR GALACTICA™, I could not help but draw parallels between the Model #6/Cylon™ character & the Replicants™, most especially PRIS as characterised by MS. DARYL HANNAH.

The next book scripted by MR. DICK I read was THE MAN IN THE HIGH CASTLE™, the tone of which was so thoroughly different from DO ANDROIDS DREAM… that I wondered whether the same man had been responsible for both novels.
Clearly, the man’s craft was/is artful.

I anticipate with eagerness the experience of reading the remainder of of his bibliography!

"...Be seeing you!"
MALCOLM XERXES
Stuntman/Actor
FINNEGAN’S SQUAD™
http://www.malcolmxerxes.com

Reply To This Message
 
 Re: DO ANDROIDS DREAM OF ELECTRIC SHEEP?
Author: Peeps 
Date:   01-31-04 00:01

Congratulations Malcolm. I recently discovered his books as well and I have been very impressed. I just finished Valis, which is much different in tone than his earlier novels, in fact he narrates this one as a schizophrenic. It really highlights the recurring themes of all of his work, the artificiality of life in this world and the nature of salvation, and it's the most moving of his novels that I've read as of yet.
For anyone who has read Valis, and I am anxious to read its sequels: Wasn't Kevin ultimately responsible for his cat and therefore wasn't Sophia absolutely right? If man is god, than man is responsible for any animals they domesticate. If my cat runs out of my door, on to Ridge St. and is mangled by a car, then I am responsible for the life of that cat. I guess that's the true source of Kevin's guilt and, as a result, his cynicism. Honestly, I didn't know what to think of Valis until its conclusion. Now it seems a lot less like the rantings of a mad man (I wasn't sure until tonight) and more like the honest confessions of a human being. I was startled by how similar we think.
Oh, and Malcolm - you're absolutely right. Everyone who does respectable sci fi steals from Dick. I look at it as a compliment, but I think the borrowers should acknowledge his contributions a little bit more. The matrix was lifted straight out of his modern musings in his final trilogy. However, Dick believed that god and wisdom manifested itself in strange ways. Dick is getting a huge amount of publicity right now partially because of the similarity of The Da Vinci Files to the ideas he embraced in his works, I don't think we want Philip K. Dick to become a Mercer-type human god.

Keep posting - this area of the forum has been too dry lately.

Reply To This Message
 
 Re: DO ANDROIDS DREAM OF ELECTRIC SHEEP?
Author: tass 
Date:   02-11-04 14:49

one question concerning chapter 21: how come rick fuses with wilbur mercer? what does it mean? that mercer is alive and not fake as buster friendly said on tv? he says it felt different from the empathy box as he experienced climbing up the hill alone. does this make him decide getting on with his bounty hunting job?

Reply To This Message
 
 Da Vinci and Hudson Hawk
Author: Time's Arrow 
Date:   02-13-04 11:15

It's schizoid, not schizophrenic! Schizoid is the separation of the psyche into two distinct personas ( in the book, that would be Phil and Horse ), schizophrenic is waaaay different from something as simple as that.

Ronnie Laing - he is the most correct about schizophrenia.

PKD writes amazingly about schizophrenia in Martian Time-Slip, the way Jack Bohlen's character is written is spot-on. Nothing to do with the two-personas, altho' there's a part when it is explained how such a split can come about.
Plus the way Arnie Kott starts to go schizophrenic is just so very accurate - the part when he is trying to answer the phone and he is thinking so fast that he cannot do it right -

well I bet that most mental health types still don't have the awareness of such thought processes, they just use drugs to slow them down because this is a world built (recently, over the real world) for idiots hiding from their crimes against God and Nature, and no I don't mean 23-me*



You might be interested in one or more of the following :-


Schrodinger's Cat in the box experiment,

(the observer effect on reality outcomes),



the film Black Box Germany,

(drop the debt, b4 the Berlin Wall came down),



and something I read somewhere long ago about a man called Jack Parsons who had to do with the space programme and did entertain a lot of sci-fi writers at his house in California.




*no, not the Con Air 23, and not the Smiley Face in The Crow either, the real acid house Smiley face, and Sirius 23.

Reply To This Message
 
 Re: DO ANDROIDS DREAM OF ELECTRIC SHEEP?
Author: Janez 
Date:   08-05-04 15:06

Do Androids dream... was my first PKD book too. Actually, it was my first sci-fi book in the first place. PKD basically hooked me up into the book world. I'll forever be thankful to him. Blade Runner adaptation is not bad, yet so altered from what PKD had tried to tell. PKD really inspired me for literature, especially for modernism with surrealistic elements. He always surprises you, no matter how many precautions you take. Sometimes you have to take a magnifying glass to capture the hidden word that opens the key to understanding one of his works. PKD teaches you to look beyond the superficial, seek the hidden essence of things and find the hidden patterns.

I always think deeply for about an hour when I finish each book of his. Sometimes I can't even sleep.

Reply To This Message
 
 Re: DO ANDROIDS DREAM OF ELECTRIC SHEEP?
Author: Ken Eakins 
Date:   09-07-04 07:22

"Be Seeing you..." hmmm i sense a Prisoner fan here!

A Scanner Darkley
Escanner Darkley
Escanner
escanna
kenscanna

Reply To This Message
 
 Re: DO ANDROIDS DREAM OF ELECTRIC SHEEP?
Author: trevize 
Date:   03-26-05 07:04

it was my first book of P. K. Dick too. my very first sf book was o. s. card*s enders game. i was about 13 then... i miss those times

Reply To This Message
 
 Re: DO ANDROIDS DREAM OF ELECTRIC SHEEP?
Author: gimpapocalypse 
Date:   07-16-05 21:32

About 25 pages in. It's growing on me. this is my PKD book. I'm very interested in the mood organ device

Reply To This Message
 Forum List  |  Threaded View   Newer Topic  |  Older Topic