Look what just arrived…
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The Exegesis of Philip K. Dick – 944 pages of drug-induced metaphysical psychosis.
I’m still reading Ubik, which PKD felt was important to his interpretation of what happened to him in February and March of 1974, so I haven’t started it yet. But from the introduction, the structure looks intriguing – the editors have included every letter and note from the immediate aftermath, then become more selective when PKD’s explorations become more voluminous, tangential and repetitive.
What happened to PKD? I’ll pass you over to Robert Crumb…
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David, I have just finished reading Francis Wheen’s Strange Days Indeed, which is about Britain in the 1970s, and which is an extended meditation on ‘the paranoid style in politics’. It occurred to me that it is a book that you would very much enjoy (Don and I also loved his earlier How Mumbo Jumbo Conquered the World. Sometimes it worries me that reading all this conspiracist stuff might make you crazy (more than you already are, of course!!) But it’s undeniably fascinating. Enjoy the Philip K. Dick
Thanks, Carole, I’ll try and get hold of it. I’ll be starting on the historical chapter of the PhD after Christmas, charting UFOs, conspiracism and alternative spirituality from 1947 to the late 1980s, and it sounds like good background. UFOs and conspiracism were taken up by the counter-culture in the 60s, but the milieu soured through the 70s and by the mid 80s, people were coming up with reasons why the New Age hadn’t come about, and the growth of the “paranoid style” was a big part of that.
I shall ignore your crazy comment. It takes someone as transcendentally sane as myself to be able to stare into the abyss for so long without it becoming me. Of course, to be sane in this world puts one in the minority anyway.
Thanks for the book – it must have cost a fortune to post! It’s creating quite a stir on the interwebs already. Kripal is one of the scholars who added footnotes, I was surprised to notice.