tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2184123882936370131.post5767101307760664421..comments2024-03-28T22:32:39.500-07:00Comments on Total Dick-Head: Chapter FourRagle Gummhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13951340313214410331noreply@blogger.comBlogger9125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2184123882936370131.post-80092505961265359992007-08-21T07:27:00.000-07:002007-08-21T07:27:00.000-07:00Chaser, I propose to put this discussion in the fr...Chaser, I propose to put this discussion in the fridge, and then start it again at the end of the reading. We might see things in a very different perspective then.umberto rossihttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01236311555942376404noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2184123882936370131.post-17079257882574570812007-08-13T07:58:00.000-07:002007-08-13T07:58:00.000-07:00Would your perspective also apply to Philip K. Dic...Would your perspective also apply to Philip K. Dick's allusion to the Wub in his novels, The Penultimate Truth (1964) and The Zap Gun (1967)?<BR/><BR/>Or might Bulero wearing a wubfur derby help explain his survival of what Palmer Eldritch does to him?<BR/><BR/>I'm not at all convinced mentioning the Wub is just window dressing for The Three Stigmata Of Palmer Eldritch.FCBertrandJrhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02176510466289100595noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2184123882936370131.post-72599493340106522782007-08-12T23:28:00.000-07:002007-08-12T23:28:00.000-07:00Mr. Chaser's question:"Does his wearing of this wu...Mr. Chaser's question:<BR/><BR/>"Does his wearing of this wubfur derby affect him in any way, such as a higher survival level factor?"<BR/><BR/>No, I don't think it does. However, there's no explicit mention of it in the whole novel. As I have already said, the wub here is no more than a prop, not a functional element of the plot.umberto rossihttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01236311555942376404noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2184123882936370131.post-85644297402548296532007-08-12T08:30:00.000-07:002007-08-12T08:30:00.000-07:00I guess my question wasn't clear enough, because I...I guess my question wasn't clear enough, because I wasn't asking if Philip K. Dick's reference to the Wub in The Three Stigmata Of Palmer Eldritch was a "MacGuffin," or not. Nor was it trying to get at the intentional, pathetic, affective, or premature teleology fallacy.<BR/><BR/>In "Not By Its Cover," the Wub is at one point characterize as "...a Martian animal that looks like a fusion between a hog and a cow." But also, "Wub-fur is rare because a wub very seldom dies. By that I mean, it is next to impossible to slay a wub -- even a sick or old wub. And, even though a wub is killed, the hide lives on."<BR/><BR/>And the owner of the Obelisk bookshop wonders "...if it would impart the same high level of survival factor to anything is was made into."<BR/><BR/>So, in The Three Stigmata Of Palmer Eldritch, Leo Bulero is described as wearing an "expensive hand-fashioned wubfur derby."<BR/><BR/>Does his wearing of this wubfur derby affect him in any way, such as a higher survival level factor?<BR/><BR/>And, Umberto, that's a good photo of you at:<BR/>www.rickmcgrath.com/jgballard/shangai_<BR/>shepperton.html.FCBertrandJrhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02176510466289100595noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2184123882936370131.post-11149362779444990772007-08-09T08:04:00.000-07:002007-08-09T08:04:00.000-07:00Wub is a stage prop, like many s-fnal objects, cre...Wub is a stage prop, like many s-fnal objects, creatures, places that Dick grabbed whenever he needed to and threw in the story or novel he was busy writing at top speed to send the manuscript and get some money. Let's not forget he was a divorced sf pro writer. He had to pay alimony, but he was no Asimov or Heinlein in the 1960s. He wrote an awful lot of novels in an incredibly short period, also using an inordinate amount of amphetamines. So cannibalizing his previous works, be they other sf novels, earlier short stories or unpublished "realistic" works was a survival strategy. He probably remembered the wub from his story of the 1950s (published more than 10 years before!), but he wasn't interested in the properties of wubs in that text. He simply needed something weird to keep his narrative as S-fnal as his publisher liked (we know he always put psi powers in them because of editorial demands; you don't have psi powers in his novels after <I>Flow My Tears...</I>).umberto rossihttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01236311555942376404noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2184123882936370131.post-29584223235081543252007-08-08T08:13:00.000-07:002007-08-08T08:13:00.000-07:00Yes, the "essence" of the Wub does live on, especi...Yes, the "essence" of the Wub does live on, especially in "Beyond Lies The Wub." But what about Captain Franco's essence? <BR/><BR/>After all, the Wub engages in metempsychosis by challenging Captain Franco to look him in the eyes as he shoots him (the eyes are the windows to the soul), thereby enabling his essence to supplant that of Captain Franco.<BR/><BR/>And in "Not By It's Cover," the Wubfur binding changes certain contents of certain books. <BR/><BR/>So, the Wubfur hat Leo Bulero wears in The Three Stigmata Of Palmer Eldritch seems to fall into the latter category, in that it (by "covering" part of Leo) could change certain "contents" of Leo Bulero. And remember that Leo has undergone E-therapy to speed up the evolution of his pre-frontal cortex. As a consequence it's become enlarged, thus the derogatory "bubble head" or bubble dome slang used.<BR/><BR/>Would it be Leo's ability to perceive and think that is most affected, or what?FCBertrandJrhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02176510466289100595noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2184123882936370131.post-59756378054811971512007-08-08T06:36:00.000-07:002007-08-08T06:36:00.000-07:00I assume the human wearing the wub fur would be ch...I assume the human wearing the wub fur would be changed in some way - perhaps similar to Captain Franco in <I>Beyond Lies...</I> but not as rapidly. In both stories the essence of the Wub lives on and changes that which it comes into contact with in a good way - like a benign Palmer Eldritch.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2184123882936370131.post-23382457427814174272007-08-07T17:50:00.000-07:002007-08-07T17:50:00.000-07:00Ah, yes, Thomas M. Disch's characterization of one...Ah, yes, Thomas M. Disch's characterization of one of PKD's narrative ploys would be appropriate. <BR/>Good point, Umberto.<BR/><BR/>But more important, I would suggest, is the wubfur hat that Bulero wears. <BR/>Good footnote Ragel.<BR/><BR/>Wubfur seems to have some amazing properties, and if a human being is wearing some of it, what indeed would happen to them? (One of my all time favorite PKD stories is that first published one, "Beyond Lies The Wub."FCBertrandJrhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02176510466289100595noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2184123882936370131.post-34951686555690929692007-08-07T02:10:00.000-07:002007-08-07T02:10:00.000-07:00These first chapters are just piling up gunpowder ...These first chapters are just piling up gunpowder for the subsequent fireworks. It's like the opening moves in a chess game, only it's a game whose rules are fixed by one of the players (Dick) and will change on the run. It's the Game of the Rat.umberto rossihttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01236311555942376404noreply@blogger.com