The Short Happy Life of the Brown Oxford and Other Classic Stories
( The Collected Stories of Philip K. Dick - 1 )
Philip Kindred Dick
This collection includes all of the writer’s earliest short and medium-length fiction (including some previously unpublished stories) covering the years 1952-1955. These fascinating stories include “Beyond Lies the Wub”, “The Short Happy Life of the Brown Oxford”, “The Variable Man”, and 22 others.
The Short Happy Life of the Brown Oxford
and Other Classic Stories
by Philip K. Dick
In Memory of Philip K. Dick (1928-1982)
Preface by Philip K. Dick
I will define science fiction, first, by saying what sf is not. It cannot be defined as “a story (or novel or play) set in the future,” since there exists such a thing as space adventure, which is set in the future but is not sf: it is just that: adventures, fights and wars in the future in space involving super-advanced technology. Why, then, is it not science fiction? It would seem to be, and Doris Lessing (e.g.) supposes that it is. However, space adventure lacks the distinct new idea that is the essential ingredient. Also, there can be science fiction set in the present: the alternate world story or novel. So if we separate sf from the future and also from ultra-advanced technology, what then do we have that can be called sf?
We have a fictitious world; that is the first step: it is a society that does not in fact exist, but is predicated on our known society; that is, our known society acts as a jumping-off point for it; the society advances out of our own in some way, perhaps orthogonally, as with the alternate world story or novel. It is our world dislocated by some kind of mental effort on the part of the author, our world transformed into that which it is not or not yet. This world must differ from the given in at least one way, and this one way must be sufficient to give rise to events that could not occur in our society—or in any known society present or past. There must be a coherent idea involved in this dislocation; that is, the dislocation must be a conceptual one, not merely a trivial or bizarre one—this is the essence of science fiction, the conceptual dislocation within the society so that as a result a new society is generated in the author’s mind, transferred to paper, and from paper it occurs as a convulsive shock in the reader’s mind, the shock of dysrecognition. He knows that it is not his actual world that he is reading about.
Now, to separate science fiction from fantasy. This is impossible to do, and a moment’s thought will show why. Take psionics; take mutants such as we find in Ted Sturgeon’s wonderful MORE THAN HUMAN. If the reader believes that such mutants could exist, then he will view Sturgeon’s novel as science fiction. If, however, he believes that such mutants are, like wizards and dragons, not possible, nor will ever be possible, then he is reading a fantasy novel. Fantasy involves that which general opinion regards as impossible; science fiction involves that which general opinion regards as possible under the right circumstances. This is in essence a judgment-call, since what is possible and what is not possible is not objectively known but is, rather, a subjective belief on the part of the author and of the reader.
Now to define good science fiction. The conceptual dislocation—the new idea, in other words—must be truly new (or a new variation on an old one) and it must be intellectually stimulating to the reader; it must invade his mind and wake it up to the possibility of something he had not up to then thought of. Thus “good science fiction” is a value term, not an objective thing, and yet, I think, there really is such a thing, objectively, as good science fiction.
I think Dr. Willis McNelly at the California State University at Fullerton put it best when he said that the true protagonist of an sf story or novel is an idea and not a person. If it is good sf the idea is new, it is stimulating, and, probably most important of all, it sets off a chain-reaction of ramification-ideas in the mind of the reader; it so-to-speak unlocks the reader’s mind so that that mind, like the author’s, begins to create. Thus sf is creative and it inspires creativity, which mainstream fiction by-and-large does not do. We who read sf (I am speaking as a reader now, not a writer) read it because we love to experience this chain-reaction of ideas being set off in our minds by something we read, something with a new idea in it; hence the very best science fiction ultimately winds up being a collaboration between author and reader, in which both create—and enjoy doing it: joy is the essential and final ingredient of science fiction, the joy of discovery of newness.
(in a letter) May 14, 1981
Foreword by Steven Owen Godersky
There is a current coin-of-phrase that touts Philip K. Dick as the greatest science fiction mind on any planet. Well, that and a trajectory to Lagrange-5 are hyperbolic. The returns simply are not all in. The best is a tale that has yet to be written.
There are some things, though, that might make us feel a little more secure about Phil Dick’s contribution to this planet, not that his reputation needs any particular help today. The scope, the integrity and the intellectual magnificence of Phil’s work are internationally revered. He is regarded by many as the most “serious” of the modern science fiction authors, and the interest in his works has continued to mount since his untimely death in 1982. His reputation has been further enhanced by a growing body of scholarly criticism. If we take a measured look at his accomplishments there are three powerful themes that permeate almost every novel and story.
The first and most prominent theme today, can be seen in Phil’s watershed work on the question of what divides humanity from all the intricacies of its creations. This is part of the central preoccupation of all consequential writers. But Phil rephrased the question What does it mean to be human? to What is it like not to be human? He posed the problem intellectually, after his fashion, but then he made us feel his answers. In the best and really highest tradition of Mary Shelley he struck on empathy as the difference; in his own word, caritas. I do not have to be a futurist to predict that both his search and his discovery will become ever more important to us as we rush along the strange road that science calls progress.
Phil’s second theme is one of perspective; what I have come to think of as the care and feeding of scale-model gods. Though the arena of his ideas was so very large, what he trusted was, he once wrote, “very small.” In a literary era of superstars and superheroes Phil reminds us that our aspirations and abilities are not so different from, and not less important than, those of the great and powerful.
Think of Tung Chien in Faith of Our Fathers, and Ragel Gumm in Time Out of Joint. Their prosaic drudgery proves central to the fate of their worlds. Recall Herb Ellis in Prominent Author, an ordinary guy rewrites the Old Testament for inch-tall goatherds. Reflect on the significance of Herb Sousa’s gumballs in Holy Quarrel; on the moral influence of wub-fur, in NotBy Its Cover, and the battle with the sentient pinball machine in Return Match. Small is written large. Large is written small. Shop clerks and storekeepers are just as likely as warlords and messiahs to be at Dick’s ontological foci. Old Mrs. Berthelsen, in Captive Market, possesses the ultimate secret of time and space, and uses it to sell vegetables out of a wagon.
When reading Dick you don’t much see mile-long spaceships flaming into the sun. What you do see is one broken-down robot in a ditch. Or, more frightening, one butterfly trapped in a time warp. In Phil Dick’s stories, we see that everything, human or otherwise, is connected, everyone is important; what causes pain to one causes pain to all. As John Brunner points out, it certainly caused pain t
o Phil himself.
Phil Dick’s third major theme is his fascination with war and his fear and hatred of it. One hardly sees critical mention of it, yet it is as integral to his body of work as oxygen is to water.
Perhaps Dick, who began his writing career in Berkeley, California, absorbed the sensibilities of a town that had a carefully nurtured liberal commitment. Perhaps Joe McCarthy and the Korean War sensitized a beginning writer’s imagination. We know little of his juvenile years during the Second World War. But we can identify, early and consistently, a mistrust of the military mentality, a fear of what he had seen of the total war machine on either side. He had a great disinclination to accept the slogans of the period that supported the ends over the means. Victory at all cost for Democracy, for Freedom, for the Flag are hollow aphorisms when the price of victory is totalitarian submission to a heartless military bureaucracy: Phil feared this particular future for all of us.
From Phil’s earliest stories, The Defenders, The Variable Man, A Surface Raid and To Serve the Master, to his later fiction, such as Faith of Our Fathers, and The Exit Door Leads In, the winners and the losers show their humanity largely in their rejection of warfare and aggression. For Dick, the only acceptable struggle was against the evil he recognized as “the forces of dissolution.” Phil Dick was anti-military long before it became fashionable in the Sixties. He continued, through his whole career, to value humanity and its foibles, no matter how small and vulnerable, over the organized terror of the modern state, no matter how expedient.
So here it is; a look into an eclectic and vigorous mind. This indispensable collection of Phil Dick’s less than novel-length fiction may disturb you. It may frighten you, because some of Phil’s people live very close to home. But these stories will not leave you unchanged. A strange wind may blow through your door late at night, and the shadows of familiar objects may quiver in the light. Is some Palmer Eldritch figure hurrying now to approach our world? Even if you’re not a pre-cog, don’t say you weren’t warned.
Introduction by Roger Zelazny
When I was approached to write this introduction I declined. It had nothing to do with my attitude toward Phil Dick’s work. It was, rather, because I felt that I had already said everything I had to say on the subject. It was then pointed out to me that I had said these things in a variety of different places. Even if I had nothing to add, a judicious rehashing in a place such as this might do a service for readers who, in all likelihood, hadn’t seen or heard it all before.
So I thought about it. I also looked at some of the things I had written earlier. What might be worth repeating, what worth adding, after this time? I had only met Phil on a few occasions, in California and in France; and it had almost been by accident that we had once fallen into collaborating on a book. During our collaboration we had exchanged letters and spoken often on the telephone. I liked him and I was very impressed by his work. His sense of humor generally came through in our phone conversations. I remember once when he mentioned some royalty statements he’d just received. He’d said, “I’ve gotten so-and-so many hundred in France, so-and-so many hundred in Germany, so-and-so many hundred in Spain… Gee! this sounds like the catalog aria from Don Giovanni!” It was always a more immediate form of verbal wit than the cosmic ironies he played with in his fiction.
I’d said something about his humor before. I’d also remarked on the games he played with consensus reality. I’d even generalized a bit about his characters. But why paraphrase when after all these years I’ve finally found a legitimate reason for quoting myself?
These characters are often victims, prisoners, manipulated men and women. It is generally doubtful whether they will leave the world with less evil in it than they found there. But you never know. They try. They are usually at bat in the last half of the ninth inning with the tying run on base, two men out, two strikes and three balls riding, with the game being called on account of rain at any second. But then, what is rain? Or a ballpark?
The worlds through which Phil Dick’s characters move are subject to cancellation or revision without notice. Reality is approximately as dependable as a politician’s promise. Whether it is a drug, a time-warp, a machine or an alien entity responsible for the bewildering shifting of situations about his people, the result is the same: Reality, of the capital “R” variety, has become as relative a thing as the dryness of our respective Martinis. Yet the struggle goes on, the fight continues. Against what? Ultimately, Powers, Principalities, Thrones, and Dominations, often contained in hosts who are themselves victims, prisoners, manipulated men and women.
All of which sounds like grimly serious fare. Wrong. Strike the “grimly,” add a comma and the following: but one of the marks of Phil Dick’s mastery lies in the tone of his work. He is possessed of a sense of humor for which I am unable to locate an appropriate adjective. Wry, grotesque, slapstick, satirical, ironic… None of them quite fits to the point of generality, though all may be found without looking too far. His characters take pratfalls at the most serious moments; pathetic irony may invade the most comic scene. It is a rare and estimable quality to direct such a show successfully.
I’d said that in PHILIP K. DICK: ELECTRIC SHEPHERD (edited by Bruce Gillespie, Norstrilia Press, 1975), and I still agree with it.
It is good now to see that Phil is finally getting some of the attention he deserved, both critically and at the popular level. My main regret is that it comes so late. He was often broke when I knew him, past the struggling author age but still struggling to make ends meet. I was heartened that for his last year or so he finally enjoyed financial security and even a measure of affluence. The last time I saw him he actually seemed happy and looked a bit relaxed. This was back when Bladerunner was being filmed, and we spent dinner and a long evening just talking, joking, reminiscing.
Much has been made of his later mysticism. I can’t speak with firsthand knowledge of everything he might have believed, partly because it seemed to keep changing and partly because it was often difficult to know when he was kidding and when he was serious. My main impression from a number of conversations, though, was that he played at theology the way other people might play at chess problems, that he liked asking the classic science fiction writer’s question—”What if?”—of anything he came across in the way of religious and philosophical notions. It was obviously a dimension of his work, and I’ve often wondered where another ten years would have taken his thinking. Impossible to guess now, really.
I recall that, like James Blish, he was fascinated by the problem of evil, and its juxtaposition with the sometime sweetness of life. I’m sure he wouldn’t mind my quoting from the last letter I received from him (dated 10 April 1981):
Two items were presented to me for my inspection within a period of fifteen minutes: first, a copy of WIND IN THE WILLOWS, which I had never read… A moment after I looked it over someone showed me a two-page photograph in the current Time of the attempted assassination of the President. There the wounded, there the Secret Service man with the Uzi machine gun, there all of them on the assassin. My brain had to try to correlate WIND IN THE WILLOWS and that photograph. It could not. It never will be able to. I brought the Grahame book home and sat reading it while they tried to get the Columbia to lift off, in vain, as you know. This morning when I woke up I could not think at all; not even weird thoughts, such as assail one upon rising—no thoughts, just a blank. As if my own computers had, in my brain, ceased speaking to one another, like at the Cape. It is hard to believe that the scene of the attempted assassination and WIND IN THE WILLOWS are part of the same universe. Surely one of them is not real. Mr. Toad sculling a little boat down the stream, and the man with the Uzi… It is futile to try to make the universe add up. But I guess we must go on anyhow.
I felt at the time I received it that that tension, that moral bafflement, was a capsule version of a feeling which informed much of his writing. It is not a thing that was ever actually resolved for him; he seemed too sophisticate
d to trust any pat answer. He’d said a lot of things in a lot of places over the years, but the statement I most remember, which most fits the man I used to talk with, is one I quoted in my foreword to Greg Rickman’s first interview volume, PHILIP K. DICK: IN HIS OWN WORDS (Fragments West/Valentine Press, 1984). It was from a 1970 letter Phil had written to SF Commentary:
I know only one thing about my novels. In them, again and again, this minor man asserts himself in all his hasty, sweaty strength. In the ruins of Earth’s cities he is busily constructing a little factory that turns out cigars or imitation artifacts that say, “Welcome to Miami, the pleasure center of the world.” In A. Lincoln, Simulacrum he operates a little business that produces corny electronic organs—and, later on, human-like robots which ultimately become more of an irritation than a threat. Everything is on a small scale. Collapse is enormous; the positive little figure outlined against the universal rubble is, like Tagomi, Runciter, Molinari, gnat-sized in scope, finite in what he can do… and yet in some sense great. I really do not know why. I simply believe in him and I love him. He will prevail. There is nothing else. At least nothing else that matters. That we should be concerned about. Because if he is there, like a tiny father-figure, everything is all right.
Some reviewers have found “bitterness” in my writing. I am surprised, because my mood is one of trust. Perhaps they are bothered by the fact that what I trust is so very small. They want something vaster. I have news for them: there is nothing vaster. Nothing more, I should say. But really, how much do we have to have? Isn’t Mr. Tagomi enough? I know it counts. I am satisfied.
The Short Happy Life of the Brown Oxford and Other Classic Stories tcsopkd-1 Page 1