Philip K Dick

Philip K Dick is all over the place these days in that many of his stories have now become big budget movies seen by millions. Unlike many science fiction authors of the past his work seems to be more and more relevant. Like most science fiction authors he was writing about his present as he saw it but it has taken the world a good few years to catch up with his vision. Here is a quote from a 1978 essay. "We live in a society in which spurious realities are manufactured by the media, by governments, by big corporations, by religious groups, political groups. I ask, in my writing, What is real? Because unceasingly we are bombarded with pseudorealities manufactured by very sophisticated people using very sophisticated electronic mechanisms. I do not distrust their motives. I distrust their power. It is an astonishing power: that of creating whole universes, universes of the mind. I ought to know. I do the same thing."

Photo courtesy of the Philip K Dick trust.