[ 3 / biz / cgl / ck / diy / fa / ic / jp / lit / sci / vr / vt ] [ index / top / reports ] [ become a patron ] [ status ]

2023-11: Warosu is now out of extended maintenance.

/lit/ - Literature

File: 20 KB, 233x307, 070820_r16504_p233.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google]

Philip K. Dick Anonymous Sat Oct 13 15:50:54 2012 No.3054641 [Reply] [Original]

I've been told by a lot of people that I would really enjoy the work of Philip K. Dick. So...simple question...where should I start?

>>	Anonymous Sat Oct 13 16:01:53 2012 No.3054665 He is a great sci-fi author. Alot of books are major films now. Minority Report and A Scanner Darkly. I suggest to read Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep. Blade Runner is based of that book.

>>	Anonymous Sat Oct 13 16:04:53 2012 No.3054670 >>3054665 > Alot of books are major films now. This is usually a terrible sign. 'A lot' is two words, btw.

>>	Anonymous Sat Oct 13 16:07:54 2012 No.3054677 do androids dream of electric sheep? is the best one to start with. He is a terrible writer but a great idea man

>>	Anonymous Sat Oct 13 16:07:54 2012 No.3054676 His earlier books are more conventional. Near the end of his life, he started having visions, which had a massive impact on his work. A Scanner Darkly is my favorite. Solar Lottery and Friends from Frolix 8 were p. cool as well.

>>	Anonymous Sat Oct 13 16:11:12 2012 No.3054690 >>3054677 For science fiction, he isn't that bad. He had a distinct style, unlike Clarke or Niven.

>>	Anonymous Sat Oct 13 16:22:13 2012 No.3054712 >>3054670 Not always. Most books-to-movies are pretty bad but then again they are pretty far from the books anyway. And occasionally you get a gem like Blade Runner (again, different from the book)

>>	Anonymous Sat Oct 13 16:24:13 2012 No.3054718 >>3054712 A Scanner Darkly was really close to the book. Downey Jr. was great and Keanu Reeves is my favorite actor. Linklater is nice director.

>>	Anonymous Sat Oct 13 16:26:12 2012 No.3054726 >>3054677 Seriously, I love Blade Runner but Electric Sheep is fucking horrible.

>>	Anonymous Sat Oct 13 16:27:12 2012 No.3054728 File: 55 KB, 358x469, fruitsalad.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google] >>3054718 >Keanu was my favorite actor

>>	Anonymous Sat Oct 13 16:30:14 2012 No.3054734 >>3054726 I thought Blade Runner wasn't as good as the book. >>3054728 It's strange, no one else seems to think he's any good. I like his stoic, physical style of acting.

>>	Anonymous Sat Oct 13 16:33:14 2012 No.3054743 >>3054726 The book had a lot more depth in the characters and more interesting story. The movie had pew pew, ford, and tears in rain.

>>	Anonymous Sat Oct 13 16:33:14 2012 No.3054744 File: 183 KB, 430x576, Can't tell if trolling or just stupid.gif [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google] >>3054734 >his stoic, physical style of acting. wat

>>	Anonymous Sat Oct 13 16:36:14 2012 No.3054750 >>3054744 For example, in that ``What does the scanner see?" monologue, the way he carries himself across the room is just amazing. Exactly how I imagined it when I read the book. The part with Bruce was really poignant too.

>>	Anonymous Sat Oct 13 16:44:16 2012 No.3054772 start with Valis. won't regret it

>>	Anonymous Sat Oct 13 16:44:16 2012 No.3054773 File: 102 KB, 450x528, ma1.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google] >>3054734 >I like his stoic, physical style of acting.

>>	Anonymous Sat Oct 13 16:52:15 2012 No.3054804 Reeves can't act for shit but he seems to be a bro. Dustin Hoffman can act but he manages to convey the impression of being an insufferable faggot within 3 seconds of his appearance.

>>	Anonymous Sat Oct 13 17:21:42 2012 No.3054886 >>3054743 >The book had a lot more depth in the characters and more interesting story Oh please, don't even start with the 5deep7u shit. >>3054734 Seriously? I put off watching Blade Runner for years because that book put such a bad taste in my mouth.

βPictoris !NLqByHLcRc Sat Oct 13 17:28:42 2012 No.3054908

>>3054886
>don't even start with the 5deep7u shit.
Do you even know what 'depth' means in that context? He didn't intend to say that it was too confusing or meaningful for you to understand, but that it had more intricate detail.

Irrelevant to that argument, that something went over your head isn't a reasonable cause to dismiss something as shit.
And if you read about as well as you've demonstrated, it might not take much to go over your head.

>>	Anonymous Sat Oct 13 17:59:40 2012 No.3054981 >>3054772 VALIS is great, but don't start with it.

>>	Anonymous Sat Oct 13 18:10:23 2012 No.3055013 >>3054981 what would you suggest?

>>	Anonymous Sat Oct 13 18:11:23 2012 No.3055016 Ubik is a good book to start with. It incorporates a lot of PKD's themes. If you don't like it you probably won't like his other work.

>>	Anonymous Sat Oct 13 18:13:23 2012 No.3055024 >>3054743 While I also think the book is far superior, that "tears in the rain" is so so good. I get misty eyed every time.

Anonymous Sat Oct 13 18:29:24 2012 No.3055065

>>3055013
Probably Do Androids Dream Of Electric Sheep, UBIK, or A Scanner Darkly. They're all good. Do Androids Dream Of Electric Sheep is pretty solid, pretty fun, and fairly standard Dick, so if you're planning on reading much of his other books go for that. UBIK is fun because of the mind-bending twists, but it might be a bit too surreal for some. A Scanner Darkly is probably his best novel, but it's a bit more serious than some of his others.

VALIS is really great but it's definitely not for everyone so I'd only really recommend it to fairly serious fans of Dick or people who are already into that sort of convoluted psychological po-mo stuff.

>>	Anonymous Sat Oct 13 18:33:25 2012 No.3055069 The Man in the High Castle. One of my favorite books. But it might just be because I'm into alternate history and dystopian fiction.

>>	Anonymous Sat Oct 13 18:37:15 2012 No.3055078 >>3055069 This. FUCKING THIS.

>>	Anonymous Sat Oct 13 18:37:44 2012 No.3055081 >>3055069 I read that one when I was a kid. I still love it now, that book never gets the credit it deserves.

>>	Anonymous Sat Oct 13 18:39:44 2012 No.3055086 >>3055081 Philip K. Dick doesn't get a lot of credit because if you don't write like a Modernist schizophrenic then you're a pulp fiction hack.

>>	Anonymous Sat Oct 13 18:44:44 2012 No.3055092 I started with The Man In The High Castle, then I read Do Androids Dream Of Electric Sheep. I very much liked both. Next up is Flow My Tears, The Policeman Said, then Ubik. I've often heard people recommend reading those first as well.

>>	Anonymous Sat Oct 13 18:46:46 2012 No.3055098 >>3055092 >Flow My Tears, The Policeman Said My second favourite of his. His short stories are very good too, I didn't care much for Ubik and Valis, but that's just me.

>>	Anonymous Sat Oct 13 18:47:46 2012 No.3055102 >>3054718 I think the film addaption did a pretty good job

>>	Anonymous Sat Oct 13 18:48:46 2012 No.3055103 >>3055086 But he DOES write like a pulp fiction hack. His ideas are great but his prose not so much.

>>	Anonymous Sat Oct 13 18:48:46 2012 No.3055106 Mr Cock is a really awful writer. The dialogue was embarrassing. Why bother digging the man's ideas out of that turd bowl? Just read philosophy or proven fiction.

Anonymous Sat Oct 13 18:56:46 2012 No.3055121

>>3055106
>Why bother digging the man's ideas out of that turd bowl?
>read philosophy
Reading philosophy is digging ideas out of a turd bowl because, while it might be brilliant, actual philosophical essays are hard work and, frankly, rather boring. Dick presents similarly interesting ideas in a (subjectively) fun way, so I read him and authors like him instead.

Anonymous Sat Oct 13 18:59:46 2012 No.3055128

Valis is the only Dick I've read, but I absolutely adored it. I've heard a lot of people say that it's not really representative, especially when compared to his earlier stuff, which makes me hesitant to try and read more for fear that it won't live up to Valis for me.

>>	Anonymous Sat Oct 13 19:00:48 2012 No.3055131 when your friends said "i bet you'd like dick" i don't think they were talking about the author

>>	Anonymous Sat Oct 13 19:01:48 2012 No.3055135 >>3055128 His other stuff is completely different (except possibly the post-VALIS stuff but I haven't read it). The only one I'd really recommend you try is A Scanner Darkly, which is similarly unrepresentative but in a different way.

>>	Anonymous Sat Oct 13 19:47:37 2012 No.3055266 >>3055103 >>3055106 I think you're mistaking Mr. Dick with Kilgore Trout.

>>	Anonymous Sat Oct 13 20:07:43 2012 No.3055338 >>3055266 Funny you should say that: when I first read SH5 the description of Trout lined up almost perfectly with how I imagined Dick, except that Dick (eventually) became successful.

Anonymous Sat Oct 13 20:20:44 2012 No.3055384

>>3055338
I'd like to imagine that we measure books more on how they elicit things in other people than whether or not their "writing" lives up to the standards inculcated in us by education. I'm sure I would've liked Kilgore Trout's books as well, if only for a larf.

>>	Anonymous Sat Oct 13 20:26:06 2012 No.3055405 No love for The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch? Goddamn I love that book. Really creepy and fun to think about.

>>	Anonymous Sat Oct 13 20:27:06 2012 No.3055409 read The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch if you've ever done psychadelics before

>>	Anonymous Sat Oct 13 20:33:06 2012 No.3055418 >>3055409 That book was hailed as THE LSD book for a long time--even though Dick had not done psychedelics at the time of writing it. He actually only did LSD once and, of course, had an awful paranoid trip.

>>	Anonymous Sat Oct 13 20:43:08 2012 No.3055454 >>3055418 He did read a lot about psychedelics before he wrote it, though. Which was apparently enough because that reading book is the closest thing you can get to tripping without ingesting anything.

>>	Anonymous Sat Oct 13 20:52:11 2012 No.3055480 Flow my Tears, The Policeman Said is fantastic, and a better starting point than I was expecting.

Advanced search
Text to find
Subject [?]Search by post subject. Leave empty for any.
Username [?]Search for user name. Leave empty for any user name.
Tripcode [?]Search for tripcode. Leave empty for any.
Email [?]Search by email. Leave empty for any.
Filename [?]Search by image filename. Leave empty for any.
From Date [?]Enter what date to start searching from. Format is YYYY-MM-DD
To Date [?]Enter what date to start searching until. Format is YYYY-MM-DD
Image hash
Search in	All Posts OPs Only
Deleted posts	Show all posts Show only deleted posts Only show non-deleted posts
Internal posts	Show all posts Show only internal posts Show only archived posts
Order	New posts first Old posts first
Capcode	All Posts Only by Users Only by Mods Only by Admins Only by Developers
Results	Posts Threads
Action	[ Simple ]