This is the English translation edition of the French release L’Altération des mondes. Versions de Philip K. Dick by David Lapoujade
Yet another David to add to the third Variety of PKD scholars. This book had just been released before the last PKD fest. At the festival, I heard several people talking about this recently translated book, as being one of the best non-fiction texts on the philosophical ideas of Philip K. Dick. It generated a lot of buzz at the fest, and I wrote it off at first, assuming that it would be a massively expensive academic textbook. While I finally looked it up, there was a reasonable paperback I was excited to get into it.
I personally read this in two sittings, which included a flight to San Francisco, and a BART ride from SFO to the SF public library to appear on a panel about Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep.
As prolific a writer as Philip K. Dick was, I think he would have been astonished to learn just how many books about him and his writing exist. There are genres even in Philip K. Dick studies, Biographies, Timelines, Religious studies, and deep dives into the philosophy by philosophers trying to parse his ideas is also another.
Being that this is translated, I wonder how much is jumbled around, but the translation by Erick Berannek is very good. Lapoujade’s survey of the PKD canon is extensive, and unlike Rossi’s The Twisted Worlds of Philip K. Dick, it doesn’t mess around. It makes the points it needs to quickly and effectively. Not repeating itself, never overdoing the examples. I like Rossi's book very much, but I love that this is shorter and more to the point.
The book is divided into 11 chapters that address a wide range of philosophical ideas and themes that recur throughout the PKD oeuvre. There is excellent stuff to be found throughout, but the three chapters that stand out are Chapter 5, Entropy and Regression, 7, Artificial Worlds, 8, The Digital Human.
Chapter 5 is important, and any conversation about entropy will of course talk about UBIK and Androids, but one thing is for sure, DL uses his PKD, and he can provide multiple examples, quote relevant letters and essays without bogging the text down. This chapter also has some great comments on David Lynch and how his camera creates a Dickian second world, and the very New Wave way JG Ballard’s The Crystal World comments on similar themes.
DL devoted some effective time to PKD and his character's use of drugs. “There are no soft drugs in Dick.” The connection between mind-altering drugs, and the secondary reality of Three Stigmata was one of my favorite topics in this book’s treatment.
Of course, no discussion of PKD is complete without talking about the role of Empathy in the themes of his many classics “Empathy, on the other hand, which Dick sometimes lumps together with sympathy or compassion, is what allows one to circulate between worlds. Despite the profound difference between worlds…”
The chapter on the digital human is, of course, one that requires intense due diligence. I just did a paper at a conference on the topic, and I, of course, found myself wanting to update that talk.
While this review is short, it should not diminish how important it is. I think this is a must-read for serious Dickheads and for non-Dick SF scholars to understand why we dig the guy so much, and I certainly will be quoting this in articles and podcasts for years to come.
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