Home · Book Reports · 2018 · Valis

designates my notes. / designates important.

Thoughts

The first part, up to chapter 9, seems totally random to me, with no real story, told in a 1st AND 3rd person view. If nothing else it developed the characters.

You can’t really be sure where it is heading, but it feels like it is going somewhere. The rambling nature seemed to give a feel of schizophrenia, the “insanity” of Horselover Fat.

There is tons of theology, quotes from all kind of ancient texts, an off the wall exegesis, and generally more insanity feeling beliefs bandied about. While there is a heavy emphasis on Christianity, it is mixed judiciously with Eastern concepts; something we see prevalent in the New Age movements promotion of Buddhism , Hinduism, and like ilk. This comes in front of a backdrop of suicide, depression, and cancer. At this point the whole thing really began to feel quite tedious.

Interestingly enough, there is a line where it is shown that The Grateful Dead got Gloria (who commits suicide) to use drugs as well as an honorable mention of Tim Leary. If Phillip K. Dick wasn’t “in on it” (Changing Images of Man etc) then he surely had his finger on the pulse of what was happening.

The promotion of drugs and pseudo religion/philosophical absurdities makes me think he was part of the cultural change that started, in earnest, in the sixties.

It begins to pick up, the story starts coming together in chapter 9, where VALIS is introduced. Well, “come together” might be too strong a statement. It simply makes the insanity of the background, the characters, more sensible, if any of it can be called sensible.

!! SPOILER ALERT !!

VALIS is some kind of god/technology that controls minds. There is a movie, produced by musicians, that alludes to subliminal messages being deployed via media. Of course it is couched in science fiction, with pink laser beams transmitting data into your head, giving you cancer, but it doesn’t seem a stretch to see it as a fictionalized MK Ultra.

It was interesting to see that a young child (2 years old) was a “vessel” for VALIS. Was this to show that the mind control is being targeted toward children?

While it is not even concluded, there are ample discussions of time disruptions and the fact that the world is made up of only information; what appears before us is merely a hologram. This is consistent with the holographic universe theory (nonsense IMHO) of today.

The end was more interested than the beginning, it moved faster, but still, I did not really like the rambling nature of the story, although I can see the effect, insanity, it was trying to produce. The narrator, Horselover Fat in the 3rd person and Phil in the 1st, was insane. Really this wasn’t very hidden, there are less than subtle hints in the first half that make it a foregone conclusion in my mind.

!! END SPOILERS !!

In my opinion it was not a great story, but at least it was better than the last Dick novel I read, Simulacra. If you are knowledgeable when it comes to MKUltra and similar programs it will be interesting to read, otherwise, if you are only looking for a sci-fi story, skip it.

“Glora [sic] was not even committing her irrational act rationally. Thank you, Tim Leary, Fat thought. You and your promotion of the joy of expanded consciousness through dope."

"‘But that’s why I started on drugs,’ Gloria said. ‘Because of the Grateful Dead?’"

“How much else is there in VALIS that we didn’t pick up on? Pick up on consciously. There’s no telling what it’s doing to our unconscious minds; the goddam film may be—’ Kevin grimaced. ‘Firing all kinds of information at us, visually and auditorily. I’ve got to make a tape of the sound track of that flick;"

Table of Contents

• Chapter 01
• Chapter 02
• Chapter 03
• Chapter 04
• Chapter 05
• Chapter 06
• Chapter 07
• Chapter 08
• Chapter 09
• Chapter 10
• Chapter 11
• Chapter 12
• Chapter 13
• Chapter 14

• Pages numbers from the pdf.

· Chapter 01

page 2:

• It was obvious that the acid, since he had last heard from her six months ago, had wrecked her mind.

• Glora [sic] was not even committing her irrational act rationally. Thank you, Tim Leary, Fat thought. You and your promotion of the joy of expanded consciousness through dope.

page 5:

• “But that’s why I started on drugs,” Gloria said. “Because of the Grateful Dead?”

page 7:

• Bob Langley

· Chapter 02

· Chapter 03

· Chapter 04

page 32:

• “You started seeing colors. Floating colors.” Kevin had begun to shout again in excitement; when his cynicism vanished he became manic. “That’s described in The Tibetan Book of the Dead; that’s the trip across to the next world. You were mentally dying! From stress and fear! That’s how it’s done—reaching into the next reality! The dream-time!”

· Chapter 05

· Chapter 06

· Chapter 07

page 84:

• seeing ancient Rome superimposed over California 1974.

· Chapter 08

· Chapter 09

page 130:

• How much else is there in VALIS that we didn’t pick up on? Pick up on consciously. There’s no telling what it’s doing to our unconscious minds; the goddam film may be—” Kevin grimaced. “Firing all kinds of information at us, visually and auditorily. I’ve got to make a tape of the sound track of that flick;

· chapter 10

· chapter 11

page 147:

• It’s a trans-Christian mysticism in which man can reach beyond God, or merges with God…

page 153:

• You worship a god and then he pays you back by taking you over. This is called “enthousiasmos” in Greek, literally “to be possessed by the god.” Of all the Greek gods the one most likely to do this was Dionysos. And, unfortunately, Dionysos was insane.

• Put another way-stated backward—if your god takes you over, it is likely that no matter what name he goes by he is actually a form of the mad god Dionysos. He was also the god of intoxication, which may mean, literally, to take in toxins; that is to say, to take a poison. The danger is there.

• If you sense this, you try to run. But if you run he has you anyhow, for the demigod Pan was the basis of panic which is the uncontrollable urge to flee, and Pan is a subform of Dionysos. So in trying to flee from Dionysos you are taken over anyhow.

• What happened at Jonestown was the mass running of panic, inspired by the mad god—panic leading into death, the logical outcome of the mad god’s thrust.

• For them no way out existed. You must be taken over by the mad god to understand this, that once it happens there is no way out, because the mad god is everywhere.

• It is not reasonable for nine hundred people to collude in their own deaths and the deaths of little children, but the mad god is not logical, not as we understand the term.

page 159:

• Robert Anton Wilson says…

page 164:

“Everything is taped,” Mini said. “Sophia is surrounded by audio and video recording equipment that automatically monitors her constantly. Not for her protection, of course; VALIS protects her

· chapter 12

page 172:

• “Meaning microwave transmissions and such like,” Kevin said.

• “Yes,” I said.

• “A purely technological phenomenon,” Kevin said. “A major technological breakthrough.”

• “Using the human mind as the transducer," I said. “Without an electronic interface.”

· chapter 13

· chapter 14