Scanners Darkly: Drugs, Media and Schizophrenia in Philip K. Dick's

Total Page:16

File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb

Scanners Darkly: Drugs, Media and Schizophrenia in Philip K. Dick's Scanners Darkly: Drugs, Media and Schizophrenia in Philip K. Dick’s Oeuvre Philip K. Dick’s stories provide a thorough description of how technological instruments and media equipment stimulate and manipulate dreams, memories, and emotions of the human brain. As Anthony Enns outlines, the texts portray a wide range of mechanical and media equipment, creating diverse forms of the “posthuman.” The robot-protagonist in “The Electric Ant” (1969) and the “simulacra” in We Can Build You (1972) are controlled by punched tape memory constructions. The schizoid and autistic characters and their supposedly successful treatment evoke filmic metaphors in Martian Time-Slip (1964). A Scanner Darkly (1977) also utilizes filmic imagery – the psychedelic coma is described as “an endless horror feature film in his head for the remainder of his life” (86) – but the mentally disturbed mind imitates a “closed loop of tape” (66) , becoming similar to a faulty computer that is unable to process new data, “[r]epeating his last instruction” (265). In Valis (1981) and Radio Free Albemuth (1985), the protagonist’s mind joins an “intergalactic communications network,” a “long-abandoned telephone” service (113). My essay analyzes these mechanical images by utilizing media theories of Friedrich A. Kittler, Marshall McLuhan and Christian Metz, thinkers who find the (Lacanian) subject and the stages of media history strictly interrelated. N. Katherine Hayles’ interpretation of the Dickian “schizoid android” suggests that the images of cyborgs and those of mental disorder are intertwined. I deploy, therefore, psychological theories of autism, schizophrenia and brain mapping, drawing on psychologists whom Dick was (possibly) familiar with (Wilder Penfield, James Olds, Eugene Minkowski, Leo Kanner, and so on). The essay concludes with an analysis of the nonlinear textual elements in these stories; following Paul de Man, I interpret these textual deviations as errors in “a text machine,” formal manifestations of the disturbed perceptions of Dick’s posthuman characters. .
Recommended publications
  • Politics and Metaphysics in Three Novels of Philip K. Dick
    EUGÊNIA BARTHELMESS Politics and Metaphysics in Three Novels of Philip K. Dick Dissertação apresentada ao Curso de Pós- Graduação em Letras, Área de Concentra- ção Literaturas de Língua Inglesa, do Setor de Ciências Humanas, Letras e Artes da Universidade Federai do Paraná, como requisito parcial à obtenção do grau de Mestre. Orientadora: Prof.3 Dr.a BRUNILDA REICHMAN LEMOS CURITIBA 19 8 7 OF PHILIP K. DICK ERRATA FOR READ p -;2011 '6:€h|j'column iinesllll^^is'iiearly jfifties (e'jarly i fx|fties') fifties); Jl ' 1 p,.2Ò 6th' column line 16 space race space race (late fifties) p . 33 line 13 1889 1899 i -,;r „ i i ii 31 p .38 line 4 reel."31 reel • p.41 line 21 ninteenth nineteenth p .6 4 line 6 acien ce science p .6 9 line 6 tear tears p. 70 line 21 ' miliion million p .72 line 5 innocence experience p.93 line 24 ROBINSON Robinson p. 9 3 line 26 Robinson ROBINSON! :; 1 i ;.!'M l1 ! ! t i " i î : '1 I fi ' ! • 1 p .9 3 line 27 as deliberate as a deliberate jf ! •! : ji ' i' ! p .96 lin;e , 5! . 1 from form ! ! 1' ' p. 96 line 8 male dis tory maledictory I p .115 line 27 cookedly crookedly / f1 • ' ' p.151 line 32 why this is ' why is this I 1; - . p.151 line 33 Because it'll Because (....) it'll p.189 line 15 mourmtain mountain 1 | p .225 line 13 crete create p.232 line 27 Massachusetts, 1960. Massachusetts, M. I. T.
    [Show full text]
  • Simulacra of Social Desire: Reflection on Collecting and the “Lost Toy Archive”
    SIMON ORPANA siMulacrA oF soCiAl desire: reFleCtion on ColleCtinG And the “lost toy ArChive” In 2009, I started to construct an archive that records traces of the toys I collected and played with as a child. While most of these toys have been lost in various garage sales, moves and purges, I started to search out photographic records of my collections, and used these to evoke reflection regarding the role that toys have played in shaping my memories, identity and modes of relating to the world. Rather than simply amassing images, I started to make drawings of them in a sketchbook. This process was aided by my mother’s unearthing of a family photo album, spanning from the late seventies to the early eighties, which contained the originals of many of the images included in my archive. The act of re-drawing these images into my sketchbook expanded the microsecond of time captured in the photograph into a longer meditation through which details in the photos summoned memories and affect. This exercise challenged the abstract, spectacularized place the toys held in my adult imagination and placed the artifacts back into a context of 211 family, friends and personal history, offering a remedy to the “archive fever” SIMULACRA OF SOCIAL DESIRE that overtook me in early adulthood, when recollecting the physical toys I owned as a child became an obsessive preoccupation. The process by which the mass-produced toys of my youth were translated from mere simulacra into a meaningful personal narrative by employing the same logic of simulation is the general theme this paper explores.
    [Show full text]
  • Panel About Philip K. Dick
    Science Fiction Book Club Interview with Andrew M. Butler and David Hyde July 2018 Andrew M. Butler is a British academic who teaches film, media and cultural studies at Canterbury Christ Church University. His thesis paper for his PhD was titled “Ontology and ethics in the writings of Philip K. Dick.” He has also published “The Pocket essential Philip K. Dick”. He is a former editor of Vector, the Critical Journal of the British Science Fiction Association and was membership secretary of the Science Fiction Foundation. He is a former Arthur C. Clarke Award judge and is now a member of the Serendip Foundation which administers the award. David Hyde, a.k.a. Lord Running Clam, joined the Philip K. Dick Society in 1985 and contributed to its newsletter. When the PKDS was discontinued, he created For Dickheads Only in 1993, a zine that was active until 1997. Since then, his activities include many contributions to and editorial work for the fanzine PKD OTAKU. His book, PINK BEAM: A Philip K. Dick Companion, is a detailed publication history of PKD's novels and short stories. In 2010, David organized the 21st century's first Philip K. Dick Festival in Black Hawk, Colorado. Recently, in partnership with Henri Wintz at Wide Books, he has published two full-color bibliographies of the novels and short stories of Philip K. Dick. In early 2019 Wide Books will publish the French bibliography. On the 35th anniversary of Phil’s passing in 2017 David held a memorial celebration for PKD fans in Ft. Morgan, Colorado, the final resting place of Phil and his twin sister Jane.
    [Show full text]
  • The Simulacra // Philip K. Dick
    The Simulacra // Philip K. Dick 0547601301, 9780547601304 // 224 pages // Philip K. Dick // The Simulacra // 2011 // Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2011 // On a ravaged Earth, fate and circumstances bring together a disparate group of characters, including a fascist with dreams of a coup, a composer who plays his instrument with his mind, a First Lady who calls all the shots, and the world’s last practicing therapist. And they all must contend with an underclass that is beginning to ask a few too many questions, aided by a man called Loony Luke and his very persuasive pet alien. In classic Philip K. Dick fashion, The Simulacra combines time travel, psychotherapy, telekinesis, androids, and Neanderthal-like mutants to create a rousing, mind-bending story where there are conspiracies within conspiracies and nothing is ever what it seems. file download dyguw.pdf Philip K. Dick // May 14, 2010 // ISBN:9780575098312 // 208 pages // A prophetic and unsettling chronicle detailing the rise and fall of a post-nuclear massiah, by the author of BLADE RUNNER and MINORITY REPORT Floyd Jones is sullen, ungainly // Fiction // The World Jones Made The pdf download The Simulacra pdf download Voices From the Street // Nov 13, 2007 // Philip K. Dick // Fiction // 304 pages // Stuart Hadley is a young radio electronics salesman in early 1950s Oakland, California. He has what many would consider the ideal life; a nice house, a pretty wife, a decent // ISBN:9781429920605 The Simulacra pdf 208 pages // Vintage PKD // Dec 18, 2007 // Philip K. Dick // A master of science fiction, a voice of the changing counterculture, and a genuine visionary, Philip K.
    [Show full text]
  • Radio Free Albemuth, Artshub Online, Pp
    This is the published version: Marvell, Leon 2011, Radio free albemuth, ArtsHub online, pp. 1‐1. Available from Deakin Research Online: http://hdl.handle.net/10536/DRO/DU:30049943 Reproduced with the kind permission of the copyright owner. Copyright : 2011, Arts Hub Holdings Australia Radio Free Albemuth By Leon Marvell ArtsHub | Tuesday, August 16, 2011 Print this page Phil K Dick (Shea Whigham) imprisoned in FAP Headquarters, RADIO FREE ALBEMUTH. Philip Kindred Dick was one of the most important writers of the latter half of the 20th century. In fact, if you really want my opinion, he was the most important writer of the second half of the 20th century. It certainly isn’t a majority opinion, but increasingly more and more people are beginning to agree with this assessment. During his lifetime such a notion would have been considered the eccentric opinion of a few literary lunatics, or at the very least, a bunch of nerdy Sci Fi freaks. Yet it seems that genius will eventually have its day, and in the case of Dick, belated recognition has taken the form of a mad scramble to turn his rich oeuvre into a steady stream of Hollywood blockbusters. It began with Ridley Scott’s film Bladerunner (1982), adapted from Dick’s novel Do Androids Dream Electric Sheep? Initially a huge commercial flop in the United States, the film has subsequently became a cult hit everywhere else. Then Paul Verhoeven made Total Recall (1990) from a Dick short story; Christian Duguay made Screamers (1995) from the story ‘Second Variety’ and…well, the list continues, right up to the most recent adaptation, The Adjustment Bureau (Nolfi, 2011).
    [Show full text]
  • Senate Should Be Based on Proportional I Hereby Appoint the Honorable SCOTT H
    E PL UR UM IB N U U S Congressional Record United States th of America PROCEEDINGS AND DEBATES OF THE 116 CONGRESS, FIRST SESSION Vol. 165 WASHINGTON, TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 17, 2019 No. 149 House of Representatives The House met at noon and was to write and ratify a document to unite is demonstrably a miracle is the man- called to order by the Speaker pro tem- them all. ner in which it came about. pore (Mr. PETERS). Our Constitution truly is a miracle. ‘‘During the course of the Conven- tion, every delegate had to give up on f Aside from its genius, its history helps us appreciate the blessing it is. Our some cherished principle. DESIGNATION OF SPEAKER PRO colleague, Congressman CHRIS STEW- ‘‘James Madison, who had come to TEMPORE ART, and Judge Ted Stewart wrote a the Convention more prepared than The SPEAKER pro tempore laid be- wonderful book, ‘‘Seven Miracles That anyone and was primarily responsible fore the House the following commu- Saved America.’’ In it, they offer three for the general outline of the govern- nication from the Speaker: reasons to believe God had a hand in ment established by the Constitution, the crafting of the Constitution. lost on many issues. Most dear to him WASHINGTON, DC, was his belief that the House and the September 17, 2019. For the remainder of my time today Senate should be based on proportional I hereby appoint the Honorable SCOTT H. on Constitution Day, I would like to PETERS to act as Speaker pro tempore on quote them. representation.
    [Show full text]
  • Department of English and American Studies English Language And
    Masaryk University Faculty of Arts Department of English and American Studies English Language and Literature David Uhříček The Theme of Twins in Works of Philip K. Dick Bachelor’s Diploma Thesis Supervisor: Mgr. Filip Krajník, Ph.D. 2019 I declare that I have worked on this thesis independently, using only the primary and secondary sources listed in the bibliography. …………………………………………….. David Uhříček I would like to thank my friends and family for their support and encouragement. Table of Contents Introduction ............................................................................................................................... 1 1. The Life of Philip K. Dick .................................................................................................. 6 2. Jane and the Dark-Haired Girl ...................................................................................... 17 2.1 Philip K. Dick’s Femme Fatale .......................................................................... 18 3. Twins in Philip K. Dick’s Fiction ................................................................................... 32 4. Twin Cosmogonies of VALIS and The Divine Invasion ............................................. 41 Conclusion ................................................................................................................................ 49 Bibliography ............................................................................................................................ 51 Summary .................................................................................................................................
    [Show full text]
  • Media, Drugs, and Schizophrenia in the Works of Philip K. Dick Author(S): Anthony Enns Source: Science Fiction Studies, Vol
    SF-TH Inc Media, Drugs, and Schizophrenia in the Works of Philip K. Dick Author(s): Anthony Enns Source: Science Fiction Studies, Vol. 33, No. 1, Technoculture and Science Fiction (Mar., 2006), pp. 68-88 Published by: SF-TH Inc Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/4241409 Accessed: 12/12/2010 18:23 Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of JSTOR's Terms and Conditions of Use, available at http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp. JSTOR's Terms and Conditions of Use provides, in part, that unless you have obtained prior permission, you may not download an entire issue of a journal or multiple copies of articles, and you may use content in the JSTOR archive only for your personal, non-commercial use. Please contact the publisher regarding any further use of this work. Publisher contact information may be obtained at http://www.jstor.org/action/showPublisher?publisherCode=sfth. Each copy of any part of a JSTOR transmission must contain the same copyright notice that appears on the screen or printed page of such transmission. JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected]. SF-TH Inc is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to Science Fiction Studies. http://www.jstor.org 68 SCIENCE FICTION STUDIES, VOLUME 33 (2006) Anthony Enns Media, Drugs, and Schizophrenia in the Works of Philip K.
    [Show full text]
  • High Definition
    RADIO FREE ALBEMUTH when dp jon felix wanted instant offline files from a viper shoot, technicolor came up with a customised solution he digital workflow requirements for the recent feature ‘Radio Free Albemuth’, starring Alanis Morissette required some careful thought. This was a film adaptation of the Philip K. Dick novel. One of the most intriguing of Dick’s works – this posthumously published novel is set in an alternateT United States and tells the story of two friends and their involvement with an extraterrestrial entity named VALIS. They also become involved in the resistance movement against a fascist style government. Philip K. Dick included himself in the novel as a main character and indeed the story is based on real events. Of course many of Philip K. Dick’s books have been filmed - examples include: Blade Runner, Total Recall, Minority Report, A Scanner Darkly, Next .. to name but a few. It was decided that this film would be shot digitally and having extensively researched the various options (and the associated rental Technicolor developed a real-time colour correction system to prices), I chose the Thomson Viper camera – shooting 4:4:4 RGB support DoPs who are shooting digitally. When we shoot film, we ‘filmstream’ mode and recording onto SRW tape. have a lab in between the production and the post production side and the Technicolor lab takes care of setting the looks with the DoP UNIQUE OFFLINE WORKFLOW for both the dailies and what the final DI should look like. The Viper’s Filmstream picture is roughly analogous to a film negative In the digital domain, well, the lab is missing.
    [Show full text]
  • Nanotechnology in the Age of Posthuman Engineering: Science Fiction As Science
    Nanotechnology in the Age of Posthuman Engineering: Science Fiction as Science Colin Milburn Harvard University Now nanotechnology had made nearly anything possible, and so the cultural role in deciding what should be done with it had become far more important than imagining what could be done with it. —Neal Stephenson, The Diamond Age (1995) Long live the new flesh. —David Cronenberg’s Videodrome (1983) The Technoscapes and Dreamscapes of Nanotechnology K. Eric Drexler, pioneer and popularizer of the emerging science of nanotechnology, has summarized the ultimate goal of his field as “thorough and inexpensive control of the structure of matter.”1 Nano- technology is the practical manipulation of atoms; it is engineering conducted on the molecular scale. Many scientists involved in this ambitious program envision building nanoscopic machines, often called “assemblers” or “nanobots,” that will be used to construct ob- jects on an atom-by-atom basis. Modeled largely after biological “ma- chines” like enzymes, ribosomes, and mitochondria—even the cell — these nanomachines will have specific purposes such as binding two chemical elements together or taking certain compounds apart, and will also be designed to replicate themselves so that the speed and scale of molecular manufacturing may be increased. Several different 1. K. Eric Drexler, “Preface,” in K. Eric Drexler, Chris Peterson, and Gayle Pergamit, Un- bounding the Future: The Nanotechnology Revolution (New York: Morrow, 1991), p. 10. Configurations, 2002, 10:261–295 © 2003 by The Johns Hopkins University Press and the Society for Literature and Science. 261 262 Configurations types of assemblers, or assemblers with multiple functions, will act together to engineer complex objects precise and reproducible down to every atomic variable.
    [Show full text]
  • Simulacra in Science Fiction
    Ars Aeterna – Volume 6/ number 2/ 2014 DOI: 10.2478/aa‐2014‐0011 Simulacra in Science Fiction Filip Lipecký Filip Lipecký completed his studies in Teaching English Language and Literature at The Faculty of Education of Constantine the Philosopher University in Nitra. His fields of interest include, among others, science fiction literature and existential philosophy. He likes to spend his free time in the mountains, with a good book in his backpack. Abstract The paper examines the concept of simulacra, focusing on their employment in contemporary science fiction. It provides examples from literature as well as from popular cinematography, in order to present the topic in a more familiar context. These examples include Wachowski’s The Matrix, Gibson’s Neuromancer and Fassbinder’s Welt am Draht reflected in the light of ideas of theorists such as Baudrillard and Deleuze. The purpose of this paper is to provide the basic notion of the concept in connection with the science fiction genre, while also offerring a wide range of subject-related material. Defining the Term Simulacra are viewed as a tool for negotiating authenticity in a condition of ambiguity. The realization of the inauthentic leads us towards true values. The wide spectrum of the purpose of their use in science fiction ranges from criticism of mass-produced items of consumer culture, up to the main existential questions concerning the nature of knowledge of reality. However, the aparent concept is complicated by simulacra’s own sort of validity and right to existence. There are many descriptions of the simulacrum in terms of content and in terms of extent.
    [Show full text]
  • Media Simulation and Manipulation in Two Novels of Philip K. Dick from the 1960S
    View metadata, citation and similar papers at core.ac.uk brought to you by CORE Damian Podleśny provided by Jagiellonian Univeristy Repository Jagiellonian University, Kraków Media Simulation and Manipulation in Two Novels of Philip K. Dick from the 1960s Elisabeth Kraus (Kraus and Auer 2000: 1) suggests that for some time now we have been cautioned to “put our traditional (Enlightenment) notions of the truth or reality into quotation marks, since our experience of the real is always mediated through an empire of signs, as Roland Barthes put it.” The ever evolving, ever more sophisticated information technologies have offered new powerful means of manipulating data - and in consequence of hacking, warping or even inventing new reality. What becomes increasingly important is the awareness of the manipula­ tion of reality and understanding how and to what extent the mass media have invaded or even colonised our minds, in what way they influence our uncon­ scious, by distorting “not only our fantasies, dreams and desires, but our very concept of reality" (Kraus and Auer 2000: 1). After initial optimism about the role of the media in society in the 1960s1, the persisting attempts of mass media to totally manipulate society are ever-increasingly noticeable. The French soci­ ologist Jean Baudrillard (after Kraus and Auer 2000: 1) claims that the modem visual technologies have created a new culture of images, signs, and codes, which is “impenetrable to old forms of resistance.” Baudrillard points to mass media as one of the most important invaders of our reality, and whatever atti­ tude one may have toward Baudrillard’s thought, which is often ambiguous and unsystematic, it does provide us with an intriguing critique of contemporary, image saturated age.
    [Show full text]