Philip K. Dick - Author of "Blade Runner," "The Man in the High Castle"

 

"The basic tool for the manipulation of reality is the manipulation of words.  If you can control the meaning of words, you can control the people who must use the words."

Philip Kindred Dick and his twin sister Jane were born in Chicago, Illinois on December 16, 1928.  The twins were six weeks premature, which contributed to Jane's death just one month later. 

Dick's parents divorced when he was just five years old, and his mother won custody.  They moved to Washington, DC and then later to Berkeley, California.  He briefly attended the University of California, but ultimately dropped out after just one semester.

By 1951, Dick was already drafting science fiction stories.  He sold his first one that year and soon became a regular contributor to the pulp magazines of the day, including Galaxy Science Fiction and Science Fiction Quarterly.  His first novel, Solar Lottery, was published in 1955.

Over the next thirty years, Dick published a number of stories that would later inspire feature films.  The most famous of these is his 1968 novel Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?, which Hollywood adapted into the iconic film Blade Runner in 1982.  The film version launched the popular tech-noir and cyberpunk film genres in Hollywood.  Some of his other adapted works include We Can Remember it for You Wholesale, which became Total Recall (1966), Minority Report (1956), and The Man in the High Castle (1962).

As production on Blade Runner began in late 1981, Dick's health was already in decline.  There are conflicting reports as to whether he was able to view any of the completed work, but he wouldn't survive to see opening day.  He died of a stroke on March 2, 1982.  He was just 53 years old.

Dick was cremated.  His father took the ashes to Riverside Cemetery in Fort Morgan, Colorado and buried them with his long-dead twin sister.

Location: Section K, Block #1, Lot #56

Rest in peace.

Trivia

• If you want to learn more about Philip K. Dick, take a voyage to your public library or Amazon.  Its all in books.  His novels are also worth your time.
  
  
• To date, the films based on Dick's novels have grossed more than $1 billion worldwide.  Dick himself saw little to none of this money, having passed away before earning any royalties.  Ironically, he died in relative squalor.
  
  
• Inspired by his twin sister's premature death, Dick often infused the idea of a "phantom twin" into many of his works.
  
  
• In 1979, Dick sat down for an interview with fellow sci-fi author Charles Platt.  You can listen to this exceptional two-hour conversation on YouTube.
  
  
• Dick served as a mentor to many up and coming sci-fi authors, including K.W. Jeter, who authored three Blade Runner sequel novels in the late 1990s.
  
  
• In 2021, artist Brennan Roach designed a utility box dedicated to Dick in his hometown of Santa Ana.  It was one in a series of such projects designed to beautify the city.  Check out its official website.