But language is not always logical, and so on….

Anna, following the progression you set up, I think what you mean to say is “Literature is language, and language is grammar.” But nevertheless the proposition is a solecism.

Thanks so much for stopping by and commenting! Yeah, there’s much to be said about consumerism in Dick’s works, including the two works that I cite–Ubik and Do Androids Dream. I’ve written a short paper on Ubik that I might present next year, after some revision, but it has to do more with what Joanna Russ calls “the image of women in SF” than consumerism. However, I can see how that aspect could be connected to my argument in a longer treatment. Unfortunately, between professional work, teaching, and having a life, there’s never enough time to cover all the bases on a single blog post.

I’ve heard about PKD’s The Owl in Daylight, but I didn’t know that part of it was available. From the description on the amazon page linked from your website, it sounds like there’s something there that I should consider in my Ubik paper.

Best.

-Jason

I hardly have to defend my shooting from the hip blogging to you, but I will indulge your haute grok of language.

My choice of the word medium was a shorthand for the type of work that each author does. It can be “an agency or means of doing something,” as well as a “substantial” or material substance to which you refer. In this case, SF and non-fiction are the respective means that Dick and Wallace employ for their forms of critique.

Their critiques are delivered with the postmodern formulation of transgressive parody rather than parody. For a more elaborate explanation of transgressive parody, read Novotny’s essay, or go to his source, Linda Hutcheon’s A Theory of Parody: The Teachings of Twentieth-Century Art Forms (1985). I would have thought a dictioneer such as yourself would have referenced a dictionary in regard to parody, which is defined as “the imitation of style…with deliberate exaggeration for comic effect.” Dick and Wallace are not going for “funny haha” in their respective parodic engagement of the styles in which they work. That’s what makes theirs, and postmodern, parody transgressive.

As far as the grammar is concerned, I’m sure that most folks who read my blog can understand the content regardless of inconsequential grammatical errors contained in a blog post. The questions are, of course, my rephrasing of Mack’s questions. And yes, if this were a paper submitted to a journal, I would have carefully considered all aspects of my writing including grammar. But, for a snivelling grammarian to attack my ideas, because of slight grammatical oversights, is beyond my threshold of comprehension.

Yes, Anna–Dick and Wallace do transgress the aesthetic and representational norms of the SF and non-fiction essay writing. Need I spell it out? Actually, I did in my post that you apparently were incapable of reading, because you’re stuck in surface reading mode. Disengage the grammar check, and throw out the clutch on your American Heritage Dictionary, and take a moment to read what I wrote instead of the way that I wrote it.

-Jason

You do show some insight into PKD’s work, but I do wish that you would pay some attentoin to his criticism of mass marketing and mass merchandising.

~~ Tessa Dick
~~~

Second, parody is always transgressive; that’s its defining objective. Without transgression, parody would simply be mimicry or comedy. Therefore, the phrase “transgressive parody” is redundant, which is probably why the Novotny quote Mark provided doesn’t use it.

And please remind Mark that a chapter is never to a book. A chapter is in a book, or sometimes of or from a book, but never to it.

Literature is language, and language is logic. When illogical usage indicates that a speaker doesn’t grok the language system, we have to question the speaker’s grasp of literature, as well.

Toward that end, let me point out that although both Dick and DFW rely on parody as a rhetorical mode, and although both authors incorporate what can be described as postmodern perspectives and techniques, I don’t recall either author attempting to transgress the aesthetic and representational norms Novotny refers to. Parody and postmodernism you’ll find, as you mentioned. But parody in the postmodern aesthetic? In other words, postmodern parody, per se? No.