tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2184123882936370131.post1955956659083284885..comments2024-03-28T22:32:39.500-07:00Comments on Total Dick-Head: PKD's Postmodern Thoughts About GenreRagle Gummhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13951340313214410331noreply@blogger.comBlogger9125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2184123882936370131.post-40309805249843224872011-12-07T13:59:25.973-08:002011-12-07T13:59:25.973-08:00Was Hume a postmodernist?
Don't be silly. Why...Was Hume a postmodernist?<br /><br />Don't be silly. <b>Why are you anti-pomo folks so silly?</b> Silly is a pomo thing. Leave that to us.<br /><br />Sometimes it all just makes a kind of sense :)annakhttp://afreakshow.comnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2184123882936370131.post-53208740823211700862011-07-26T21:02:47.360-07:002011-07-26T21:02:47.360-07:00As I see it, the big, obvious difference between P...As I see it, the big, obvious difference between PKD and the pomo crowd is not his "humanism" but his faith.<br />People of faith and humanists are alike in some ways if you contrast them to materialists but there's a difference, not just a distinction!<br />Maybe some of you live too close to California to see it but there's a strong new age streak in much of his work.<br />Dick seemed to love metanarratives, just not materialist ones. PKD's characters are not intellectuals criticizing consensual reality. They experience an esoteric reality.<br /><br />The argument according to which "The nature of power and authority are of central concern to postmodern political thinking." is really, really weak.<br />If modernity to you basically reduces to fascism and bolshevism, yeah. But that's not all there is to modernism! Or are you going to argue that classical anarchists were precursors of postmodernism for instance?<br />Academics who have been schooled by debates between Marxists would do well to broaden their horizons:<br />http://libcom.org/history/1919-1950-the-politics-of-surrealismAnonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2184123882936370131.post-7784601678484485452011-07-24T19:29:16.109-07:002011-07-24T19:29:16.109-07:00I'm surprised no one in this conversation (her...I'm surprised no one in this conversation (here or on Facebook) has pointed out Lyotard's description of postmodernism as an incredulity toward metanarratives. I can't think of a more succinct characterization of Dick's fundamental mode of operation. <br /><br />I would also argue that Dick's interest in labor and commodification dovetail particularly well with that group of postmodern theorists who also employ a Marxist perspective. Though Dick does not appear to have delved into postmodern thinkers such as Derrida, Baudrillard, or Lyotard, he nonetheless seems to examine what is very obviously a postmodern condition. The strong humanist strain in his work saves him from some of the cold (or frivolously playful) aspects of some of the novelists who emerged from postmodern thought, but he takes as his basis a fundamental uncertainty shared with postmodern thinkers. He offers one way to "construct" after what seems to me a culturally important shared "deconstruction."<br /><br />(Of course, I could just be touchy because my thesis relies heavily on postmodern thinkers and I'd like to think that it hits on at least some cylinders).<br /><br />:)Joshua Lindhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12753059301464292348noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2184123882936370131.post-65149750335724094742011-07-24T10:08:56.209-07:002011-07-24T10:08:56.209-07:00No, Mr. Gill, I can't believe no one is paying...No, Mr. Gill, I can't believe no one is paying you for this. It's all gold.Lucidus Valentinehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09073512132074430229noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2184123882936370131.post-91004738514313747812011-07-24T06:22:08.072-07:002011-07-24T06:22:08.072-07:00NOTHING is a better tool for rhetoric OR a better ...NOTHING is a better tool for rhetoric OR a better character reference than Dinosaur Comics.Nathaniel K. Millerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05865030640753109578noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2184123882936370131.post-61249371127182422652011-07-23T23:26:03.714-07:002011-07-23T23:26:03.714-07:00Didn't Dick get his philosophical and lit-crit...<i>Didn't Dick get his philosophical and lit-critical training by falling in love with classical and enlightenment figures?</i><br /><br />Read point #1 about Modernism. "That movement did however inform PKD's education and early work" - "That movement" being modernism, which in fact informed most postmodernist artists, writers, thinkers, etc. That's why their <i>post</i>modern.<br /><br /><i>Was Hume a postmodernist?</i><br /><br />Don't be silly. Why are you anti-pomo folks so silly? Silly is a pomo thing. Leave that to us.<br /><br /><i>I really don't see the label as applied to Dick holding up under scrutiny.</i><br /><br />Keep watching.<br /><br /><i>If there was no defensiveness about this precious label of postmodernism, which I really don't understand the need for, there would be no reason to apply the theory to Dick's books.</i><br /><br />Mr. Hand, you strike me as far more "defensive" than any of us pomo contenders. We're making our case, providing our descriptions of postmodernism and why we think they apply to PKD's thinking and his work. I'm trying to understand your objections to this, but find it difficult.<br /><br /><i>His issues with objectivity were around a long time before the period of postmodern literature started and they remain with us now that it's over.</i><br /><br />The period of postmodern literature started around the time World War II ended. PKD was 17 or 18 then. I'm not aware of any evidence he was considering these ideas then, but even if he were it would still place him and his writing squarely within the period.<br /><br /><i>His heroes were Plato, Kant and Hume, not Jameson, Baudrillard and Lyotard. </i><br /><br />Pynchon is clearly a postmodernist - you wouldn't argue that - but his heroes weren't Jameson, Baudriallard, Lyotard. PKD referred to Jameson as "genius" - maybe that doesn't make Fred a PKDian hero, but it's a start.<br /><br /><i>His product may look like "postmodern" literature if you use fuzzy enough categories </i><br /><br />My categories aren't fuzzy; they're quite exact.<br /><br />Your arguments, however, are very vague and fuzzy, and aren't based in PKD's writing as much as your opinion of what he thought.Cal Godothttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11822149941361325037noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2184123882936370131.post-66828096081502117392011-07-23T22:08:16.875-07:002011-07-23T22:08:16.875-07:00Ted, I hear ya, man. I see where you're coming...Ted, I hear ya, man. I see where you're coming from and I agree that Dick's favorite thinkers certainly weren't pomos. I guess when I look at the stuff I think Dick was doing that I consider postmodern (inserting himself as a character in the text, questioning objective truth, exploring the instability of meaning) I see him pursuing some of the same ends as the postmodernists - to suggest that there's more than meets the eye, that perception is trickier and more complex that it at first appears, and that what we think of as stable, even foundational, may have no substance other than that with which we imbue it.Ragle Gummhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13951340313214410331noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2184123882936370131.post-41945849968996868002011-07-23T21:29:56.579-07:002011-07-23T21:29:56.579-07:00Let me try another way of explaining my problem (I...Let me try another way of explaining my problem (I'm not going to claim it as a phildickian reworking but I will be happy to admit a similar flaw of repetitiveness.) One of my biggest issues with this "Dick is a postmodernist" claim is the prioritizing of "postmodern uncertainty" as if it was Dick's main idea. I used to think that Dick was a novelist of "reality breakdown,"<br />but the more I read and understand what Dick is doing the less enthusiastic I become about this notion of <br />uncertainty as the ultimate key to reading PKD. His main purpose in writing was neither to persuade his reader to adopt postmodern ideas nor to portray the state of postmodern capitalism. I'm aware that I don't<br />sound very hip when I say this, but isn't it possible that maybe Dick was a little more subtle than that? Rather than seeing Dick as trying to push a postmodern view in the way Dave eloquently models above, I see Dick as doing something quite different. Of course he's working with the postmodern world that he was thrown into (no need to abandon all the Heidegger jargon) but for different purposes than his truly "postmodern lit"<br />-erary peers.Mr. Handhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00308380761257083577noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2184123882936370131.post-27832806481667015542011-07-23T20:59:11.368-07:002011-07-23T20:59:11.368-07:00I don't see how this is an "incredibly po...I don't see how this is an "incredibly postmodernist" idea about genre. It's actually quite obvious, and it can be stated in ordinary language. There's no need to employ post-structuralism or deconstruction to figure out how genre works. And I don't mean to be tendentious, but there's a big difference between claiming that Dick (like Pynchon or Borges) falls into the "postmodern literature" time period, and claiming that Dick was a [card-carrying] "postmodernIST." Didn't Dick get his philosophical and lit-critical training by falling in love with classical and enlightenment figures? Was Hume a postmodernist? I can understand why somebody would want to call his conclusions postmodern, but the problems that bringing in that particular term involve go a lot further than "labels are reductive." I'm fully aware that there are plenty of people who decide what articles get published who don't have a problem with "postmodern literature," as a label, but I really don't see the label as applied to Dick holding up under scrutiny. If there was no defensiveness about this precious label of postmodernism, which I really don't understand the need for, there would be no reason to apply the theory to Dick's books. His issues with objectivity were around a long time before the period of postmodern literature started and they remain with us now that it's over. The reason that I'm belaboring this point is not that I'm anti-pomo (I wouldn't continue spending so much effort researching and writing about postmodernism if that was the case--I think there's plenty of interest although much of it is indeed silly BS) but rather because I think that if postmodernism is properly understood we can understand why it doesn't apply properly to Dick. He came to his conclusions about objectivity etc. based on a classical+enlightenment philosophical training. His heroes were Plato, Kant and Hume, not Jameson, Baudrillard and Lyotard. What we miss when we apply "postmodernism" uncritically to Dick is the profound differences between his approach and the "postmodern" approach. His product may look like "postmodern" literature if you use fuzzy enough categories (labels reduce is part of it), but the "blurring" that he achieved is of a different quality than that of the postmodernists.<br /><br />I have argued in the FB thread that Dick's quest for humanity is the place where we can see the difference between his literature and that of more-properly postmodernist writers like Pynchon. Dick doesn't see humanism or the human as the enemy as postmodernists do. He wants to rescue and/or redeem the human, while postmodernists want to get rid of it.Mr. Handhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00308380761257083577noreply@blogger.com