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kerry_handscomb 's review for:
The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch
by Philip K. Dick
adventurous
challenging
dark
reflective
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
Complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch is a book by Philip K. Dick published in 1965. I read the edition with cover art by Peter Gudynas, published in 1978, which is perhaps my favourite cover from the many editions of this novel.
PKD presents an Earth which climate change has rendered largely uninhabitable without heat protection. Humans are moving to other colonies in the solar system, on Mars or Ganymede, say, and living in "hovels." These "hovelists" need an escape provided by drugs to make their lives bearable.
Into this typically Dickian future world steps Palmer Eldritch, newly returned from Proxima Centauri with Chew-Z, a new and much more powerful drug. Those who use Chew-Z are transported to a hallucinatory other world, seemingly as solid as the "real world." They may stay in the other world for an hour or for centuries, but then, when they emerge again into the "real world," no time has passed. According to Eldritch, "I did not find God in the Prox system. But I found something better. God promises eternal life. I can do better; I can deliver it" (p. 80, original emphasis).
The problem is, Eldritch himself is effectively a god in whichever world to which the Chew-Z users go. Indeed, Eldritch has a steel arm, steel teeth, and artificial eyes, which somehow recall the stigmata associated with the Passion of Christ. Moreover, when a Chew-Z user apparently returns to the real world, are they really back or are they inhabiting just another layer of Eldritch's hallucinatory universe? Is there ever any escape from Palmer Eldritch?
PKD is following the same inspiration behind The Man in the High Castle: what is real? While the earlier book is a relatively tame investigation of the nature of reality, The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch is wild and confusing. The message, perhaps, is that nothing is real, and all events and people in the book have been bent to Eldritch's twisted imagination—or rather to the twisted imagination of the alien who has taken over Eldritch somewhere between Prox and Earth. Or could it be indeed, as PKD sometimes suggests, a strange invasion by the aliens from Prox? Nowhere in the book can one point to anything as the foundation of reality.
While The Man in the High Castle is tight, closely argued, and enlightening, I found The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch to be baffling. Perhaps PKD himself had been taking too many mind-altering substances while writing it. It looks forward, perhaps, to the absurdity of his later work in The VALIS Trilogy and The Exegesis of Philp K. Dick. The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch may well be a great book, though I preferred the more sedate style of The Man in the High Castle. But nevertheless, the genius of Philip K. Dick is that he has the courage to question the meaning of God in a science fiction setting.
PKD presents an Earth which climate change has rendered largely uninhabitable without heat protection. Humans are moving to other colonies in the solar system, on Mars or Ganymede, say, and living in "hovels." These "hovelists" need an escape provided by drugs to make their lives bearable.
Into this typically Dickian future world steps Palmer Eldritch, newly returned from Proxima Centauri with Chew-Z, a new and much more powerful drug. Those who use Chew-Z are transported to a hallucinatory other world, seemingly as solid as the "real world." They may stay in the other world for an hour or for centuries, but then, when they emerge again into the "real world," no time has passed. According to Eldritch, "I did not find God in the Prox system. But I found something better. God promises eternal life. I can do better; I can deliver it" (p. 80, original emphasis).
The problem is, Eldritch himself is effectively a god in whichever world to which the Chew-Z users go. Indeed, Eldritch has a steel arm, steel teeth, and artificial eyes, which somehow recall the stigmata associated with the Passion of Christ. Moreover, when a Chew-Z user apparently returns to the real world, are they really back or are they inhabiting just another layer of Eldritch's hallucinatory universe? Is there ever any escape from Palmer Eldritch?
PKD is following the same inspiration behind The Man in the High Castle: what is real? While the earlier book is a relatively tame investigation of the nature of reality, The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch is wild and confusing. The message, perhaps, is that nothing is real, and all events and people in the book have been bent to Eldritch's twisted imagination—or rather to the twisted imagination of the alien who has taken over Eldritch somewhere between Prox and Earth. Or could it be indeed, as PKD sometimes suggests, a strange invasion by the aliens from Prox? Nowhere in the book can one point to anything as the foundation of reality.
While The Man in the High Castle is tight, closely argued, and enlightening, I found The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch to be baffling. Perhaps PKD himself had been taking too many mind-altering substances while writing it. It looks forward, perhaps, to the absurdity of his later work in The VALIS Trilogy and The Exegesis of Philp K. Dick. The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch may well be a great book, though I preferred the more sedate style of The Man in the High Castle. But nevertheless, the genius of Philip K. Dick is that he has the courage to question the meaning of God in a science fiction setting.