American Writers (One Hundred Pages at a Time)

Part one of my review of Philip K. Dick's 1960 novel "Dr. Futurity". It may not be one of his best, but it is rich with ideas, many of which are relevant to us. At the the heart of its concern, the relationship between young people and the systems we hand over to them.

In "War Game," Philip K. Dick considers the ideology of toys. It makes me think a bit about "Mimsy Were the Borogroves".

I humbly give my comments on what I think is one of the greatest works of American literatre, W. E. B. Du Bois' "The Souls of Black Folk".

Although this story was written much earlier in Dick's career, "Fair Game" was not published until 1959. A rather silly tale, but good for a chuckle and a little meditation on the nature of how we respond to those who watch us.

Part two of my review of Du Bois' Ph.D. dissertation on the legal, moral and economic changes that led to the end of the slave trade.

"The Suppression of the Slave Trade" was W. E. B Du Bois' Ph.D. dissertation wirtten in Harvard. It is a solid work of legal history exploring the relationship betwene moral progress, legal justice, and economic change.

In this Philip K. Dick story, "Recall Mechanism", we consider the relationship between mental illness and precognition.

The first of Philip K. Dick's stories from 1959, "Explorers We", considers the possiblities of a very strange alien invasion.

In this episode we say goodbye to Charles W. Chesnutt by looking at a handful of his most important esasys. Next up, W. E. B. Du Bois.    

In this episode, I look at some of the uncollected stories by Charles W. Chesnutt. We have some more stories in the Julius series, including one on Southern geophagia. There are also some of his "northern stories" dealing wtih the color line from a broader national perspective. There are even a few stories were Chesnutt (out of character) took on issues not relating to the color line at all.