Philip K. Dick

Philip K. Dick
A black-and-white photo of Dick seated
Dick in the 1960s
BornPhilip Kindred Dick
(1928-12-16)December 16, 1928
Chicago, Illinois, U.S.
DiedMarch 2, 1982(1982-03-02) (aged 53)
Santa Ana, California, U.S.
Pen name
  • Richard Phillipps
  • Jack Dowland
OccupationNovelist, short story writer, essayist
Period1951–1982
GenreScience fiction, paranoid fiction, philosophical fiction
Literary movementPostmodernism
Notable works
Spouse
  • Jeanette Marlin
    ​
    ​
    (m. 1948; div. 1948)​
  • Kleo Apostolides
    ​
    ​
    (m. 1950; div. 1959)​
  • Anne Williams Rubinstein
    ​
    ​
    (m. 1959; div. 1965)​
  • Nancy Hackett
    ​
    ​
    (m. 1966; div. 1972)​
  • Leslie "Tessa" Busby
    ​
    ​
    (m. 1973; div. 1977)​
Children3, including Isa
Signature

Philip Kindred Dick (December 16, 1928 – March 2, 1982), often referred to by his initials PKD, was an American science fiction writer and novelist.[1] He wrote 44 novels and about 121 short stories, most of which appeared in science fiction magazines during his lifetime.[2] His fiction explored varied philosophical and social questions such as the nature of reality, perception, human nature, and identity, and commonly featured characters struggling against elements such as alternate realities, illusory environments, monopolistic corporations, drug abuse, authoritarian governments, and altered states of consciousness.[3][4] He is considered one of the most important figures in 20th-century science fiction.[5]

Born in Chicago, Dick moved to the San Francisco Bay Area with his family at a young age. He began publishing science fiction stories in 1952, at age 23. He found little commercial success[6] until his alternative history novel The Man in the High Castle (1962) earned him acclaim, including a Hugo Award for Best Novel, when he was 33.[7] He followed with science fiction novels such as Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? (1968) and Ubik (1969). His 1974 novel Flow My Tears, the Policeman Said won the John W. Campbell Memorial Award for Best Science Fiction Novel.[8]

Following years of drug abuse and a series of mystical experiences in 1974, Dick's work engaged more explicitly with issues of theology, metaphysics, and the nature of reality, as in novels A Scanner Darkly (1977), VALIS (1981), and The Transmigration of Timothy Archer (1982).[9] A collection of his speculative nonfiction writing on these themes was published posthumously as The Exegesis of Philip K. Dick (2011). He died in 1982 in Santa Ana, California, at the age of 53, due to complications from a stroke.[10] Following his death, he became "widely regarded as a master of imaginative, paranoid fiction in the vein of Franz Kafka and Thomas Pynchon".[11]

Dick's posthumous influence has been widespread, extending beyond literary circles into Hollywood filmmaking.[12] Popular films based on his works include Blade Runner (1982), Total Recall (adapted twice: in 1990 and in 2012), Screamers (1995), Minority Report (2002), A Scanner Darkly (2006), The Adjustment Bureau (2011), and Radio Free Albemuth (2010). Beginning in 2015, Amazon Prime Video produced the multi-season television adaptation The Man in the High Castle, based on Dick's 1962 novel; and in 2017 Channel 4 produced the anthology series Electric Dreams, based on various Dick stories.

In 2005, Time named Ubik (1969) one of the hundred greatest English-language novels published since 1923.[13] In 2007, Dick became the first science fiction writer included in The Library of America series.[14][15][16]

  1. ^ Young, Molly (October 26, 2022). "The Essential Philip K. Dick - A nuclear-strength imagination powered his stupendous output. Here's where to start". The New York Times. Archived from the original on October 26, 2022. Retrieved October 26, 2022.
  2. ^ Kimbell, Keith. "Ranked: Movies Based on Philip K. Dick Stories". Metacritic. Archived from the original on March 8, 2013. Retrieved November 20, 2013.
  3. ^ O'Reilly, Seamus (October 7, 2017). "Just because you're paranoid ... Philip K Dick's troubled life". The Irish Times. Archived from the original on August 9, 2019. Retrieved January 24, 2020.
  4. ^ Dancey-Downs, Katie (July 23, 2022). "8 facts about Philip K. Dick". Salon.com. Archived from the original on July 23, 2022. Retrieved July 23, 2022.
  5. ^ "Philip K. Dick". Museum of Pop Culture. Archived from the original on July 14, 2023. Retrieved October 31, 2023.
  6. ^ Liukkonen, Petri. "Philip K. Dick". Books and Writers (kirjasto.sci.fi). Finland: Kuusankoski Public Library. Archived from the original on April 25, 2007.
  7. ^ "1963 Award Winners & Nominees". Worlds Without End. Archived from the original on July 30, 2012. Retrieved June 26, 2009.
  8. ^ "1975 Award Winners & Nominees". Worlds Without End. Archived from the original on April 18, 2012. Retrieved June 26, 2009.
  9. ^ Behrens, Richard; Allen B. Ruch (March 21, 2003). "Philip K. Dick". The Scriptorium. The Modern Word. Archived from the original on April 12, 2008. Retrieved April 14, 2008.
  10. ^ Boucher, Geoff (September 15, 2007). "The future keepers". Los Angeles Times. Archived from the original on October 29, 2021. Retrieved October 15, 2021.
  11. ^ "Philip K. Dick - Biography, Books, & Facts". Britannica. Archived from the original on April 29, 2021. Retrieved November 14, 2021.
  12. ^ Chi Hyun Park, Jane (2010). Yellow Future: Oriental Style in Hollywood Cinema. University of Minnesota Press. p. 54.
  13. ^ Grossman, Lev (October 16, 2005). "ALL-TIME 100 Novels". Time. Archived from the original on April 6, 2020. Retrieved April 14, 2008.
  14. ^ Stoffman, Judy "A milestone in literary heritage" Toronto Star (February 10, 2007) Archived October 6, 2012, at the Wayback Machine
  15. ^ Library of America Philip K. Dick: Four Novels of the 1960s Archived April 15, 2008, at the Wayback Machine
  16. ^ Associated Press "Library of America to issue volume of Philip K. Dick" Archived January 13, 2012, at the Wayback Machine USA Today (November 28, 2006)