Philip Dick

Philip Kindred Dick (English: Philip Kindred Dick, December 16, 1928 - March 2, 1982), often referred to as PKD, was an American science fiction writer. Dick compiled a total of 44 novels and approximately 121 short stories during his lifetime. In addition to the 38 books that are still in circulation, he also wrote some short stories and a handful of works published in cheap magazines. At least seven of his novels were adapted into movies. Most of Dick's novels explore various psychological and sociological issues, such as ontology, perception, human nature, and personal identity. Most novels revolve around the protagonist's struggle against parallel universes, hallucinations, monopoly capitalism, drug abuse, authoritarianism and other factors. Dick was born in Chicago and moved to the San Francisco Bay Area with his parents when he was a child. Dick began writing science fiction in 1952, when he was 23 years old. A series of Dick's early works were not commercially successful. Until 1962, Dick published the fictional historical novel "The Man in the High Castle," which won him a series of accolades, including the Hugo Award for Best Novel. Dick went on to create Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? " (1968), "Ubik" (1969) and a series of science fiction novels. In 1974, Dick published "Cry My Tears," which won him the John W. Campbell Memorial Award for Best Science Fiction Novel. After years of drug abuse and a series of mystical experiences in 1974, Dick's works more explicitly dealt with theology, metaphysics, and the nature of reality, such as "The Mind Scan." A collection of his speculative nonfiction on these topics was published in 2011 as a memorial collection, Philip K. Dick Interpreted. Dick died in Santa Ana, California, in 1982 from complications from a stroke. Although he was praised by well-known science fiction writers Stanislaw Lem and Robert Heine during his lifetime, Dick gradually became known to people after his death. Dick is widely regarded as "a master of paranoid fiction with a rich imagination like Franz Kafka and Thomas Pynchon." Dick's influence was widespread even after his death, extending beyond literary circles into Hollywood films. Popular movies adapted from his works include "Blade Runner", "Minority Report", "Scan", "The Planned Machine", etc. In 2005, Time magazine named Ubik