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#24 A Scanner Darkly by Philip K. Dick


Let’s go back to 1977, when A Scanner Darkly was published, what a brilliant title for a book. The story unfolds, within its own narrative frame, in a dystopian version of California in 1994, with Bob/Fred as the central character. Why two names? Because the protagonist lives a double life.

In order to uncover the origin of the dominant drug, Substance D, Arctor (I’ll use his last name to avoid confusion) infiltrates the underground world, exposing himself to this highly addictive substance. To achieve this and prevent any connection to his fellow officers, he wears a scramble suit, a device that constantly alters his appearance and voice to preserve his anonymity. The problem, however, is that Substance D gradually destroys the brain, separating the two hemispheres and causing severe disorientation for its owner, to the point where Arctor eventually no longer knows who he is. This theme of fractured identity is one Dick explored repeatedly, especially during that period of his life.

The next two paragraphs contain mild spoilers, so if you’d rather not know more, you might want to skip ahead.

At one point, Arctor watches the surveillance recordings from the scanners installed in his house by the police and cannot recognize that the man under observation is himself. As a reading experience, and especially as rendered by Dick, this is one of the most chilling moments in the novel. For me at least, not being the most perceptive reader, it didn’t immediately register as a case of split identity and memory loss; for a while, I genuinely thought the story was following two separate characters. Perhaps I missed a detail, or maybe the author intended this confusion, but either way it fit the narrative perfectly and added to the unease.

Later, Donna enters the story, a woman dealing in Substance D whom Bob falls in love with. But Donna herself is an undercover agent using Bob to gather her own intelligence. As you can imagine, chaos ensues, chaos, despair, and a growing sense of dead-end inevitability.

And because Dick rarely offers mercy, things only get worse for the protagonist. Eventually he’s hospitalized due to complications, and what happens there is far darker, though I won’t spoil that part. Trust me, it’s grim.

There’s also an excellent film adaptation by Richard Linklater, which I can recommend without hesitation, whether you watch it before or after reading the book. Ideally, perhaps, after.

One last note on Philip K. Dick. His anxiety, his concerns about human existence and the gradual erosion of the self under the mechanisms of modern urban life, are all over this novel. Substance D stands as a metaphor for every drug that, instead of helping, drags people deeper into darkness, rendering them powerless and dysfunctional.

Knowing that at the time Dick himself was struggling through the storm of depression and other personal demons, and reading that one edition of the book ends with a dedication to his lost friends, broke my heart. What makes it even more haunting is that he passed away just a few years later, in 1982, from heart failure.

From a certain point onward in his career, Dick’s recurring obsessions were exactly these themes, the loss of identity, the struggle to reclaim the self in a world that is artificial, false, and, tragically, voracious. And what does it devour? You can guess.

Until next time — be well, and keep reading.

It’s important!

 

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