<< 1 >>
Rating: 
Summary: FUZZY BIO OF PKD
Review: Carrere's bio of Dick didn't quite come up to snuff. Thankfully he acknowledged Sutin's DIVINE INVASIONS, published a couple years before his own. Sutin was crisp, with accurate, detailed quotes while Carrere dove off into the fuzzy depths. Sutin describes Dick's women and friends while Carrere only mentions them in passing. IAA&YAD was written on the fuzzy premise that Dick "abolished the difference between life and literature." How amusing it was to hear that Phil confused himself with some of his daffy characters. To imply that Dick thought he was a Ragel Gumm, tricked into writing by some demiurge was ridiculous. Sure, Dick's characters threw off the trappings of everyday life and had no problem falling in love with human, android dolls, but Dick created them; he didn't have to use them as models for his personal life. In short, PKD loved rejection, mocked recognition but found he could only escape it by pulling the plug on his own life. Obviously, even that didn't work.
The end result of this "journey into PKD's mind" was a terribly distorted picture of this mind. True, Dick didn't stay incarcerated for thirty years behind a white picket fence. True, his shack ups only lasted for five years or less. Those were the wild '60's and '70's. What would one expect from someone who mocked marriage counselors and psychiatrists? Dick had no qualms about crucifying cultural mores. BFD. True, most American males only dream of living in sin with a gal half their age. But to imply that Dick spent his 52 years wondering if he were alive or dead, trying to decide on which side of Alice's mirror he lived, and dwelling on the illusion of his own beliefs is pure nonsense. Mixing Dick's state of mind with his stories adds nothing to either. The story must speak for itself!
Rating: 
Summary: Connecting the life of a writer and his works
Review: If you are looking for a definitive biography of Philip K. Dick, then look further. If you are a fan of his diverse catalogue of stories, themes, ideologies, and fears then this book is a gold mine. This is the first time I've ever come across something that ties the work of an author with his actual life, ties the characters in his fiction with the characters in his life. Most of us have gotten to know more about PKD through his books than we have ever guessed.
How does a writer go from "Confessions of a Crap Artist" to "A Scanner Darkly" to "The Transmigration of Timothy Archer"? Emmanuel Carrere has done a fantastic job in taking us on the journey of Phillip K Dick's life. How much is real and how much is speculative fiction by Carrere? I think the answer is "What's the difference?" After reading the book, I'm sure you will agree. Emmanuel Carrere never spares Philip K. Dick the man. He shows the many facets, complexities, and weaknesses that were his inspiration.
Rating: 
Summary: Much Flash, Little Substance
Review: My first problem with this "biography" is that the author spends time relating the plots of some of Dick's novels, including their endings. This is annoying, as I have not read all of Dick's works. Therefore, I had to skip the parts where the synopses were inserted. Secondly, the author states that he read too many books to mention. That's funny, as most biographers have no problem citing their sources. We could at least have had a bibliography here. Third, the author injects a LOT of speculation about Dick's state of mind, which is interesting but not in any way reliable as biographical material. I did, though, enjoy the philosophical explanations of some of Dick's theories, especially the discussion of The Man in the High Castle, Dick's masterwork. Read this one with a grain of salt.
Rating:
Summary: Much a do about nothing
Review: The author spends most of the book talking about PKD drug taking and makes it look like none of his books could have been written without drugs, as if books so fantasic can only be explained by them being drug enduced.
AND, as all PKD fans know that have read his interviews, PKD found out later in life that he had an ultra effecient liver that had filtered out the speed he took before it could enter his bloodstream fully, hence the "drug enduced" book writing was actually non-existent. He was not truly under the influence of speed when writing, even if PKD thought he was at the time, so all the wild ideas, etc in his books are purely from his creative mind, not the drugs.
This being the case, the author's main focus in this book thusly does not have a leg to stand on, and it is very suprising that the author didn't do enough research to find out this commonly known thing about PKD.
OR did he leave this fact out so that he could fabricate this book that basically says "PKD wrote cool stuff cause he was high, man."
Rating:
Summary: Fanciful
Review: The latest manifestation of my obsession with PKD ends in disappointment. The author seems to care more about pretentious writing and fanciful extrapolations of events in his subject's life, rather than responsibly unravelling the man and his madness. To be sure, there's some fairly solid biographical info in places, but the amount of ponderous crap I had to wade through to get to it left me very unsatisfied.
Rating:
Summary: Biography or speculation?
Review: This is a fairly interesting book on Dick. It does explore the connections between his life and work, which illuminates some of the otherwise confounding conclusions to some of his novels. I think the author goes into too much detail in summarizing some of Dick's work, though, so that if you had't read Time Out of Joint, for example, or the Alphane Clans, the author pretty much spoils the ending of those books for you. The summaries could have been replaced with more details of Dick's actual life, which is kind of scanty.My biggest complaint, though, is that the book contains absolutely no documentation whatsoever. No endnotes, nothing. Where does Carrere get his information? There's no way of knowing! I couldn't tell what was documented fact and what was the author's speculation. I could have passed on this book. This is not the definitive biography of Philip K. Dick.
<< 1 >>
|
