Philip K. Dick

PKD goes ‘Puttering About in a Small Land’ (1985) to observe human nature

One of the paradoxes of Philip K. Dick’s career is that he wrote his most robust and mature observations about human behavior at the sputtering

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‘Eye in the Sky’ (1957) among PKD’s best early SF works

“Eye in the Sky” (1957) is one of Philip K. Dick’s most influential novels – or at least prophetic of what future authors would explore

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PKD adds humor to rigid future of ‘Man Who Japed’ (1956)

Philip K. Dick is known for wild ideas, so sometimes I anticipate them from the title. Before reading “The Man Who Japed” (1956), I would’ve

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‘Penultimate Truth’ (1964) is like a PKD greatest hits album

For “The Penultimate Truth” (1964), Philip K. Dick pieces together some of the greatest hits among his short stories into a grand statement about governments

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‘Zap Gun’ (1967) among PKD’s most prophetic 21st century previews

Even by Philip K. Dick standards, “The Zap Gun” (1967) is particularly prophetic of the 21st century, but it’s also one of the harder novels

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Calling ‘Impostor’ (2002) ‘padded’ is a fair statement

“Impostor” (2002) is one of those PKD adaptations that turns an idea-driven short story into an action movie, but unlike some others, it doesn’t abandon

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‘Total Recall’ (1990) is vintage Verhoeven

Broadly speaking, there are three kinds of Philip K. Dick adaptations: Those that are faithful to his themes while switching the medium to movies (“Blade

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PKD goes mainstream in ‘Confessions of a Crap Artist’ (1975)

“Confessions of a Crap Artist” (1975) was the public’s introduction to Philip K. Dick’s non-science-fiction novels. Even though he wrote it in 1959 – along

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Sci-fi masters meet for engrossing ‘Minority Report’ (2002)

Director Steven Spielberg’s “Minority Report” (2002) isn’t the most by-the-book adaptation of a Philip K. Dick story (most agree that’s “A Scanner Darkly”). But it

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PKD digs into religious questions in ‘VALIS’ (1981)

Philip K. Dick reworks the themes from “Radio Free Albemuth” (written in 1976, published in 1985) in “VALIS” (1978, 1981), after “RFA” was initially nixed

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