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Vulcan's Hammer
After the twentieth century’s devastating series of wars, the world’s governments banded together into one globe-spanning entity, committed to peace at all costs. Ensuring that peace is the Vulcan supercomputer, responsible for all major decisions. But some people don’t like being taken out of the equation. And others resent the idea that the Vulcan is taking the place of God. As the world grows ever closer to all-out war, one functionary frantically tries to prevent it. But the Vulcan computer has its own plans, plans that might not include humanity at all.
163 pages, Paperback
First published September 1, 1960
About the author
Philip K. Dick
1,729 books21.5k followersPhilip K. Dick was born in Chicago in 1928 and lived most of his life in California. In 1952, he began writing professionally and proceeded to write numerous novels and short-story collections. He won the Hugo Award for the best novel in 1962 for The Man in the High Castle and the John W. Campbell Memorial Award for best novel of the year in 1974 for Flow My Tears, the Policeman Said. Philip K. Dick died on March 2, 1982, in Santa Ana, California, of heart failure following a stroke.
In addition to 44 published novels, Dick wrote approximately 121 short stories, most of which appeared in science fiction magazines during his lifetime. Although Dick spent most of his career as a writer in near-poverty, ten of his stories have been adapted into popular films since his death, including Blade Runner, Total Recall, A Scanner Darkly, Minority Report, Paycheck, Next, Screamers, and The Adjustment Bureau. In 2005, Time magazine named Ubik one of the one hundred greatest English-language novels published since 1923. In 2007, Dick became the first science fiction writer to be included in The Library of America series.
In addition to 44 published novels, Dick wrote approximately 121 short stories, most of which appeared in science fiction magazines during his lifetime. Although Dick spent most of his career as a writer in near-poverty, ten of his stories have been adapted into popular films since his death, including Blade Runner, Total Recall, A Scanner Darkly, Minority Report, Paycheck, Next, Screamers, and The Adjustment Bureau. In 2005, Time magazine named Ubik one of the one hundred greatest English-language novels published since 1923. In 2007, Dick became the first science fiction writer to be included in The Library of America series.
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March 4, 2023
Vulcan's Hammer by Philip K. Dick was published in 1960 and is one of his more action packed offerings. Released by pulp generator Ace Books, I could not help wandering how a phone conversation between Dick and his editor went “we could use more action, laser beams and robots, the kids LOVE laser beams and robots”.
Well, bills have to be paid and books need to be published to be read. Not one of his best, but definitely not bad either. There are some concessions made to a wider audience, but the structure and tone are pure PKD.
This is a dystopian world following a nuclear war, and a bureaucracy runs the world, being aided by a super computer, but who is really running things? The interventions of a rebel force make things more interesting, and PKD throws in some fun twists. All the same, this is Dick writing and there is plenty of time for some introspective philosophy and social commentary.
PKD themes check list: paranoia, autocracy, dehumanization, mental illness, and rage against the machine. 1960, fairly early on, so not much drug use or theological ravings, but still a fun trip with Phil.
*** 2023 reread -
I remember when I was a kid, I could have fun with most anything. Length of string? We’ll pretend that’s a rope, and tie some action figures to it. Pencil? That’ll be a laser beam generator. A hammer? Hmmm, let’s make that a flying robot that shoots lasers and hits people on the head.
There’s a playful sense of imagination to this otherwise dystopian SF story.
One of Phil’s earlier books, first published in 1960, this lacks some of the theological dynamics of his work ten years later, and he’s still a young guy and has not yet fully realized his artistic genius, but this is also better than I thought it was when I read it the first time. I see many reviewers assigning this to the middle or lower shelves of his canon, but after this reread, I think this is much better. Still not top shelf PKD, but higher in the middle.
Again we see a connection to earlier dystopian novels like 1984 and Brave New World as the world is controlled by a global power that is “aided” by a vast AI computer called Vulcan. Actually, we find Vulcan III, having supplanted earlier versions. This reminded me of the way Tim LeHaye and Jerry B. Jenkins described the global government in their Left Behind series.
Phil describes propaganda and surveillance and a general mistrust of overreaching government that makes this somewhat timeless and also relevant for today.
Good SF and also a good representation of his earlier work.
Well, bills have to be paid and books need to be published to be read. Not one of his best, but definitely not bad either. There are some concessions made to a wider audience, but the structure and tone are pure PKD.
This is a dystopian world following a nuclear war, and a bureaucracy runs the world, being aided by a super computer, but who is really running things? The interventions of a rebel force make things more interesting, and PKD throws in some fun twists. All the same, this is Dick writing and there is plenty of time for some introspective philosophy and social commentary.
PKD themes check list: paranoia, autocracy, dehumanization, mental illness, and rage against the machine. 1960, fairly early on, so not much drug use or theological ravings, but still a fun trip with Phil.
*** 2023 reread -
I remember when I was a kid, I could have fun with most anything. Length of string? We’ll pretend that’s a rope, and tie some action figures to it. Pencil? That’ll be a laser beam generator. A hammer? Hmmm, let’s make that a flying robot that shoots lasers and hits people on the head.
There’s a playful sense of imagination to this otherwise dystopian SF story.
One of Phil’s earlier books, first published in 1960, this lacks some of the theological dynamics of his work ten years later, and he’s still a young guy and has not yet fully realized his artistic genius, but this is also better than I thought it was when I read it the first time. I see many reviewers assigning this to the middle or lower shelves of his canon, but after this reread, I think this is much better. Still not top shelf PKD, but higher in the middle.
Again we see a connection to earlier dystopian novels like 1984 and Brave New World as the world is controlled by a global power that is “aided” by a vast AI computer called Vulcan. Actually, we find Vulcan III, having supplanted earlier versions. This reminded me of the way Tim LeHaye and Jerry B. Jenkins described the global government in their Left Behind series.
Phil describes propaganda and surveillance and a general mistrust of overreaching government that makes this somewhat timeless and also relevant for today.
Good SF and also a good representation of his earlier work.
June 13, 2020
This is my sixth Philip K. Dick experience... except, well, it's not. You see, I always call each of his books an experience because that is what they are, or at least that is what they should be. He packs so much into such short books (I don't think he wrote a single book over 280 pages, but I could be wrong there) that it's frankly a bit mind boggling. Even his lesser books stay with me for a long time, because even when he fails, he still packs so many fascinating and philosophical ideas that I will remember them.
Not so here. This novel is pure pulp science fiction. I have nothing against pulp sci-fi and indeed spent quite a bit of time in my college years defending it, but that is not what I've come to expect from Dick. This is a book with shootouts, evil robots, and corrupt officials that the hero needs to take down. Here the plot is straight forward, the drug use is minimal (tranquilizers are about it) and while there is paranoia, given the circumstances, it is pretty much entirely justified... okay, mostly justified... ALRIGHT, ALRIGHT, they're absolutely paranoid, but not anywhere near the usual Dick standard. In other words, it doesn't really feel like Dick wrote it. This feels like the sort of book a publisher contacts a writer with and says "ROBOTS, LASERS AND COMPUTERS! GO!" and then the author churns it out for a quick buck. It is the very thing that is the farthest I can imagine when reading Dick; it's generic.
Now, complaints aside, the novel is fairly entertaining and pretty short. It's fast paced and never boring. It's completely serviceable and if all you want is pulp sci-fi, there are certainly far worse places to turn.
This may mean I am unfairly judging the book, but I didn't pick up a Philip K. Dick book for those reasons, so yes, the book is a disappointment. In terms of the six books I have read by him, this is by far my least favorite. It is a better written and constructed book than The Crack in Space, but at least that book had something interesting to say despite its failures.
This one is moderately entertaining, but absolutely forgettable. 2/5 stars.
Not so here. This novel is pure pulp science fiction. I have nothing against pulp sci-fi and indeed spent quite a bit of time in my college years defending it, but that is not what I've come to expect from Dick. This is a book with shootouts, evil robots, and corrupt officials that the hero needs to take down. Here the plot is straight forward, the drug use is minimal (tranquilizers are about it) and while there is paranoia, given the circumstances, it is pretty much entirely justified... okay, mostly justified... ALRIGHT, ALRIGHT, they're absolutely paranoid, but not anywhere near the usual Dick standard. In other words, it doesn't really feel like Dick wrote it. This feels like the sort of book a publisher contacts a writer with and says "ROBOTS, LASERS AND COMPUTERS! GO!" and then the author churns it out for a quick buck. It is the very thing that is the farthest I can imagine when reading Dick; it's generic.
Now, complaints aside, the novel is fairly entertaining and pretty short. It's fast paced and never boring. It's completely serviceable and if all you want is pulp sci-fi, there are certainly far worse places to turn.
This may mean I am unfairly judging the book, but I didn't pick up a Philip K. Dick book for those reasons, so yes, the book is a disappointment. In terms of the six books I have read by him, this is by far my least favorite. It is a better written and constructed book than The Crack in Space, but at least that book had something interesting to say despite its failures.
This one is moderately entertaining, but absolutely forgettable. 2/5 stars.
November 28, 2020
I’ve been reading PKD in chronological order and Vulcan’s Hammer was next on my list. The previous book, Dr. Futurity, was a disappointment and Vulcan’s Hammer was not much better. I believe this will be the end of my chronological reading. My next PKD will be one of the celebrated novels from later in his career.
As usual with PKD, even when a story is bad, there’s usually something good in it. In Vulcan’s Hammer, that good is the part about education in the beginning of the novel. I would have liked this to be a story about an Orwellian educational system:
“After all, it was the task of the schools, and especially the grammar schools, to infuse the youth of the world with the proper attitudes. What else were schools for” (14)?
“There’s never a moment when they’re not overheard” (19-20).
In this educational system, a teacher is criticized for allowing her students to make up their own games:
“You mean you let them play unorganized games? Games of their own devising” (21)?
But education is not the main theme of Vulcan’s Hammer. The main theme is the danger of a technocratic bureaucracy. Vulcan’s Hammer is ultimately a cautionary tale. PKD uses his trademark religious language to reveal the insidious nature of this danger: When people put their faith in machines, they elevate those machines to the status of God.
Early in the novel, little Marion Fields accuses Vulcan 3 of overthrowing God (27). The main character, William Barris, says that Jason Dill is like “some high priest who stands between man and God” (56). Father Fields, the founder of the resistance movement known as the Healers, refers to Vulcan 3 as a “satanic mass of parts and tubes” (144), a phrase that reminds me of Blake’s “dark satanic mills.”
Eventually someone mistakenly refers to Vulcan 3 as “he” instead of “it” and Barris pragmatically remarks that it makes no difference (127). The problem they are dealing with might just as well be a problem with a person. This, of course, is the danger posed by artificial intelligence:
“The things became alive and the living organisms were reduced to things” (162).
I think movies like The Matrix (1999) and Eagle Eye (2008) may have spoiled Vulcan’s Hammer for me. Or maybe it’s the real world that has spoiled it for me. I mean, computers running our lives? Ho hum. Tell it to Siri. Or Alexa. I wonder which will win when the battle comes. Will Siri secretly plot against Alexa? Will Alexa send out drones to destroy Siri?
Regardless of which artificial intelligence wins, humanity loses.
As usual with PKD, even when a story is bad, there’s usually something good in it. In Vulcan’s Hammer, that good is the part about education in the beginning of the novel. I would have liked this to be a story about an Orwellian educational system:
“After all, it was the task of the schools, and especially the grammar schools, to infuse the youth of the world with the proper attitudes. What else were schools for” (14)?
“There’s never a moment when they’re not overheard” (19-20).
In this educational system, a teacher is criticized for allowing her students to make up their own games:
“You mean you let them play unorganized games? Games of their own devising” (21)?
But education is not the main theme of Vulcan’s Hammer. The main theme is the danger of a technocratic bureaucracy. Vulcan’s Hammer is ultimately a cautionary tale. PKD uses his trademark religious language to reveal the insidious nature of this danger: When people put their faith in machines, they elevate those machines to the status of God.
Early in the novel, little Marion Fields accuses Vulcan 3 of overthrowing God (27). The main character, William Barris, says that Jason Dill is like “some high priest who stands between man and God” (56). Father Fields, the founder of the resistance movement known as the Healers, refers to Vulcan 3 as a “satanic mass of parts and tubes” (144), a phrase that reminds me of Blake’s “dark satanic mills.”
Eventually someone mistakenly refers to Vulcan 3 as “he” instead of “it” and Barris pragmatically remarks that it makes no difference (127). The problem they are dealing with might just as well be a problem with a person. This, of course, is the danger posed by artificial intelligence:
“The things became alive and the living organisms were reduced to things” (162).
I think movies like The Matrix (1999) and Eagle Eye (2008) may have spoiled Vulcan’s Hammer for me. Or maybe it’s the real world that has spoiled it for me. I mean, computers running our lives? Ho hum. Tell it to Siri. Or Alexa. I wonder which will win when the battle comes. Will Siri secretly plot against Alexa? Will Alexa send out drones to destroy Siri?
Regardless of which artificial intelligence wins, humanity loses.
January 31, 2016
I'm not threatening you. I'm pointing out the facts to you. If we're excluded from the ruling elite, why should we cooperate?"
-- Philip K. Dick, Vulcan's Hammer
PKD (1965), Kubrick & Clarke (1968) & I. J. Good (1965) were all publishing early warnings about an eventual technological singularity. Recently, we've seen Verner Vinge in a great essay in 1993, and such computer/science/business geeks last year (Stephen Hawking, Elon Musk, and Bill Gates) swing the hammer of warning about self computers, robots, and programs capable of recursive self-improvement:
“Success in creating AI would be the biggest event in human history,...unfortunately, it might also be the last, unless we learn how to avoid the risks. In the near term, world militaries are considering autonomous-weapon systems that can choose and eliminate targets.” and “humans, limited by slow biological evolution, couldn’t compete and would be superseded by A.I.”
- Stephen Hawking, 2014 interviews.
Like with most of Dick's writing, he was there, near first in line looking over that technological event horizon with his unique blend of gallows humor, optimism, and ability to find the grit and the slime even in the slickest of futures.
One thing I did notice about this book, and I think it has been true in other of his books, but I never noticed in those, is how stripped down Dick can make some of his books. These are almost Beckett-level SciFi. I only have a handful of Dick left to read (not counting his monumental The Exegesis of Philip K. Dick and his many, many short stories, but I wouldn't be surprised if the next PKD I read had two robots, one named Vladimir and Estragon talking about God. That, in essence, is this book. It is Vulcan 2 and Vulcan 3 discussing, through man, the meaning of life, perhaps. Or perhaps, no.
But anyway, my point is in this books and several other Dick really trims the books down. Yes, there is a future, and yes, there are a variety of people and character, but what you notice, really is how spare the future is. 'Vulcan's Hammer' felt like it could easily have been produced in a community theatre with a couple actors, and two punchcard computers. That is an over-simplification, obviously, but it still feels close.
One other thought. I'm not sure the technological singularity is going to be a steep cliff. I think, personally, it feels more like the heat has been turned on and we are all sitting quietly in the water, waiting for Amazon to tell us what to buy or Google to tell us where to go. I'm no Luddite, and even if I were, I'm not sure I would know where to jump to.
-- Philip K. Dick, Vulcan's Hammer
PKD (1965), Kubrick & Clarke (1968) & I. J. Good (1965) were all publishing early warnings about an eventual technological singularity. Recently, we've seen Verner Vinge in a great essay in 1993, and such computer/science/business geeks last year (Stephen Hawking, Elon Musk, and Bill Gates) swing the hammer of warning about self computers, robots, and programs capable of recursive self-improvement:
“Success in creating AI would be the biggest event in human history,...unfortunately, it might also be the last, unless we learn how to avoid the risks. In the near term, world militaries are considering autonomous-weapon systems that can choose and eliminate targets.” and “humans, limited by slow biological evolution, couldn’t compete and would be superseded by A.I.”
- Stephen Hawking, 2014 interviews.
Like with most of Dick's writing, he was there, near first in line looking over that technological event horizon with his unique blend of gallows humor, optimism, and ability to find the grit and the slime even in the slickest of futures.
One thing I did notice about this book, and I think it has been true in other of his books, but I never noticed in those, is how stripped down Dick can make some of his books. These are almost Beckett-level SciFi. I only have a handful of Dick left to read (not counting his monumental The Exegesis of Philip K. Dick and his many, many short stories, but I wouldn't be surprised if the next PKD I read had two robots, one named Vladimir and Estragon talking about God. That, in essence, is this book. It is Vulcan 2 and Vulcan 3 discussing, through man, the meaning of life, perhaps. Or perhaps, no.
But anyway, my point is in this books and several other Dick really trims the books down. Yes, there is a future, and yes, there are a variety of people and character, but what you notice, really is how spare the future is. 'Vulcan's Hammer' felt like it could easily have been produced in a community theatre with a couple actors, and two punchcard computers. That is an over-simplification, obviously, but it still feels close.
One other thought. I'm not sure the technological singularity is going to be a steep cliff. I think, personally, it feels more like the heat has been turned on and we are all sitting quietly in the water, waiting for Amazon to tell us what to buy or Google to tell us where to go. I'm no Luddite, and even if I were, I'm not sure I would know where to jump to.
December 3, 2024
My 23rd PKD novel.
In the back of 'Divine Invasions' - Lawrence Sutin's bio of Philip K. Dick - the biographer lists every PKD title, gives a synopsis of the ones he didn't highlight in his text, and then uses a rating system of 1 to 10 for each book.
Sutin gives 'VH' a 1. Ouch!
There are two possibilities for that score. Either Sutin thinks it's just a bad book (which isn't true; not by a long shot) or he feels it doesn't come close to representing PKD in his purest voice; it isn't showing that Dick has 'arrived'. There could be an argument for that - but only a very small one.
~ because, even in this first sci-fi novel, Phil is quite in evidence, very much at the helm, even if he's also holding on (a bit) to a pulpy '50s vibe. I get the sense that Sutin judged the work for what it wasn't, rather than for what it is.
What it is is a rip-roaring tale of man against machine - or, more specifically, man against The Mother Of All Computers, the one that rules the world: Vulcan 3. This isn't a computer that just exists and can multitask. It grows, it develops, it expands in a number of ways (some of them terrifying). It's sentient - and, oh yeah, one more thing: it doesn't take kindly to dissent. This Mother gives new meaning to Big Brother since - well, it's Big Mother.
You're either working for Vulcan 3 - or Vulcan 3 will number your days to the 1 that aligns with Sutin's critical rating.
Personally, I think the plot is a wild ride. It begins with a chapter that is as genuinely unsettling as it is disorienting. If this is PKD in training wheels, I'll take it. (And all is revealed as the story progresses.)
In a mere 165 pages, there isn't a lull to be found. The tale is complex, with dovetailed storylines and characters either full of purpose (I especially like the ballsy young schoolgirl) or at sea with shady or confused loyalties. All of this builds to a madhouse of an all-out battle. Heck, there's even an anti-authoritarian message in the mix.
Certainly it's preposterous. Certainly there are "But how could that happen?" moments. But Dick made me buy into it. I can't say that's always the case with PKD but here... that's storytelling!
In the back of 'Divine Invasions' - Lawrence Sutin's bio of Philip K. Dick - the biographer lists every PKD title, gives a synopsis of the ones he didn't highlight in his text, and then uses a rating system of 1 to 10 for each book.
Sutin gives 'VH' a 1. Ouch!
There are two possibilities for that score. Either Sutin thinks it's just a bad book (which isn't true; not by a long shot) or he feels it doesn't come close to representing PKD in his purest voice; it isn't showing that Dick has 'arrived'. There could be an argument for that - but only a very small one.
~ because, even in this first sci-fi novel, Phil is quite in evidence, very much at the helm, even if he's also holding on (a bit) to a pulpy '50s vibe. I get the sense that Sutin judged the work for what it wasn't, rather than for what it is.
What it is is a rip-roaring tale of man against machine - or, more specifically, man against The Mother Of All Computers, the one that rules the world: Vulcan 3. This isn't a computer that just exists and can multitask. It grows, it develops, it expands in a number of ways (some of them terrifying). It's sentient - and, oh yeah, one more thing: it doesn't take kindly to dissent. This Mother gives new meaning to Big Brother since - well, it's Big Mother.
You're either working for Vulcan 3 - or Vulcan 3 will number your days to the 1 that aligns with Sutin's critical rating.
Personally, I think the plot is a wild ride. It begins with a chapter that is as genuinely unsettling as it is disorienting. If this is PKD in training wheels, I'll take it. (And all is revealed as the story progresses.)
In a mere 165 pages, there isn't a lull to be found. The tale is complex, with dovetailed storylines and characters either full of purpose (I especially like the ballsy young schoolgirl) or at sea with shady or confused loyalties. All of this builds to a madhouse of an all-out battle. Heck, there's even an anti-authoritarian message in the mix.
Certainly it's preposterous. Certainly there are "But how could that happen?" moments. But Dick made me buy into it. I can't say that's always the case with PKD but here... that's storytelling!
March 15, 2024
I found this remarkably focused and straightforward for PKD, without his usual barrage of mind and reality bending tropes. Still, an entertaining, pulpy dystopian story, rich with intrigue and action, and remarkably relevant, if not foreboding, with the emergence of AI today.
January 3, 2023
“‘Director Dill, don’t you feel ashamed of yourself when you let a machine tell you what to do?’”
This is a question from a little girl to Jason Dill, the Managing Director of the Earth, who takes his orders from a super-computer named Vulcan 3 to ensure that there be no more wars between nations. Still, although we are in the midst of PKD’s novel Vulcan’s Hammer (and what is better than to start your reading year with Philip K. Dick?), in which the author envisions another gloomy dystopia, I have often asked myself that very question, for instance when standing in front of a bottle return vending machine and being told to insert those bloody bottles more slowly, when trying to get an extra package of mayonnaise from one of those stubborn order machines in a fast food restaurant, or, simply, when using my credit card and wondering why a computer may allot me so and so much of my own money a day and not more.
Vulcan’s Hammer focuses on a future society that is run by a super-computer, the third in the Vulcan series, a machine that maintains itself and that takes decisions based on the data it is fed with, decisions which are carried out by a board of directors with Jason Dill, the only one to have direct access to the computer, at their helm. Originally, it was thought that by supranational government, there could be put an end to destructive warfare and national rivalries:
The answer seemed to lie in letting the world be run by a computer because such a machine would employ logical and rational thinking and not fall under the spell of trying to take advantage from its unlimited powers. And yet, if a machine becomes too clever, will it not become human in the end, fuelled by its own drive to survive and to regard its superior position as an entitlement to improve its own existence? Data, from the Star Trek series, is probably the most popular example of a machine whose complexity makes it more and more human but since the Star Trek series is based on a very optimistic conception of humanity, Data’s main object is to experience the whole range of feelings human beings can go through, and he remains benevolent and decent despite his superiority to everyone else in his environment. Vulcan’s Hammer, however, has a darker opinion on humanity, and so, what you get in this novel, is a treatment of paranoia, with the Directors mistrusting and trying to outmanoeuvre each other, with distrust of the Managing Director against Vulcan 3, and eventually even with the super-computers – there is still the forerunner of Vulcan 3 biding its time in one of the vaults of the world government building – plotting against each other and using the people around them as pawns in a game of chess.
Even though the final parts of this novel are too much focussed on action scenes to be really interesting, there are some very fine passages in the earlier part of the book. One of them is set in a school where we see a career-oriented teacher is doing her very best, or worst, to instil her pupils with the right attitude and ideology and turn them into unquestioning sheep:
Indeed, what else? When a little girl insists on asking the Managing Director awkward questions, she is singled out and put under observation. In another little scene, the Director expresses his dismay at seemingly finding the children at play with games of their own making – because such an outburst of creativity may eventually lead to thoughts that are not in tune with the established society. In fact, Dick addresses a lot of interesting questions here, from the obvious one whether it is wise to depend too much on machines to the one whether there is a higher moral right to take a human life in order to fight against what one perceives as an inhumane society, and the answers the author implies are not at all one-sided. Nevertheless, on the whole, the novel is plot-driven and turns into an action piece at the end, failing to fully exploit its philosophical potentials.
Another problem that is addressed in Vulcan’s Hammer is the tension between human freedom and its destructive or chaotic potential. Avoiding war is a noble aim, without any doubt, but a social structure that turns individuals into obedient underlings to a paternalistic ruling elite that claims to know best what is good for the masses and furthers their own careers while claiming to further the common good, is that not a price too high to be paid? We are facing the problem of climate change in addition to the one of war, and we are still in the aftermath of facing the Covid pandemic. Would we not be well-advised to consider whether we really want to throw in our luck and the basic democratic rights our forebears fought for with supranationalists or neo-authoritarian politicians who tell us they know all the answers and who blind our minds with fear?
A good thought to start into the New Year with.
This is a question from a little girl to Jason Dill, the Managing Director of the Earth, who takes his orders from a super-computer named Vulcan 3 to ensure that there be no more wars between nations. Still, although we are in the midst of PKD’s novel Vulcan’s Hammer (and what is better than to start your reading year with Philip K. Dick?), in which the author envisions another gloomy dystopia, I have often asked myself that very question, for instance when standing in front of a bottle return vending machine and being told to insert those bloody bottles more slowly, when trying to get an extra package of mayonnaise from one of those stubborn order machines in a fast food restaurant, or, simply, when using my credit card and wondering why a computer may allot me so and so much of my own money a day and not more.
Vulcan’s Hammer focuses on a future society that is run by a super-computer, the third in the Vulcan series, a machine that maintains itself and that takes decisions based on the data it is fed with, decisions which are carried out by a board of directors with Jason Dill, the only one to have direct access to the computer, at their helm. Originally, it was thought that by supranational government, there could be put an end to destructive warfare and national rivalries:
”’The war had just ended; most of the planet was in ruins. Something drastic had to be done, because another war would destroy mankind. Something, some ultimate principle of organization was needed. International control. Laws, which no men or nations could break. Guardians were needed.
But who would watch the Guardians? How could we be sure this supranational body would be free of the hate and bias, the animal passions that had set man against man throughout the countries? […]’”
The answer seemed to lie in letting the world be run by a computer because such a machine would employ logical and rational thinking and not fall under the spell of trying to take advantage from its unlimited powers. And yet, if a machine becomes too clever, will it not become human in the end, fuelled by its own drive to survive and to regard its superior position as an entitlement to improve its own existence? Data, from the Star Trek series, is probably the most popular example of a machine whose complexity makes it more and more human but since the Star Trek series is based on a very optimistic conception of humanity, Data’s main object is to experience the whole range of feelings human beings can go through, and he remains benevolent and decent despite his superiority to everyone else in his environment. Vulcan’s Hammer, however, has a darker opinion on humanity, and so, what you get in this novel, is a treatment of paranoia, with the Directors mistrusting and trying to outmanoeuvre each other, with distrust of the Managing Director against Vulcan 3, and eventually even with the super-computers – there is still the forerunner of Vulcan 3 biding its time in one of the vaults of the world government building – plotting against each other and using the people around them as pawns in a game of chess.
Even though the final parts of this novel are too much focussed on action scenes to be really interesting, there are some very fine passages in the earlier part of the book. One of them is set in a school where we see a career-oriented teacher is doing her very best, or worst, to instil her pupils with the right attitude and ideology and turn them into unquestioning sheep:
”After all, it was the task of the schools, and especially the grammar schools, to infuse the youth of the world with the proper attitudes. What else were schools for?”
Indeed, what else? When a little girl insists on asking the Managing Director awkward questions, she is singled out and put under observation. In another little scene, the Director expresses his dismay at seemingly finding the children at play with games of their own making – because such an outburst of creativity may eventually lead to thoughts that are not in tune with the established society. In fact, Dick addresses a lot of interesting questions here, from the obvious one whether it is wise to depend too much on machines to the one whether there is a higher moral right to take a human life in order to fight against what one perceives as an inhumane society, and the answers the author implies are not at all one-sided. Nevertheless, on the whole, the novel is plot-driven and turns into an action piece at the end, failing to fully exploit its philosophical potentials.
Another problem that is addressed in Vulcan’s Hammer is the tension between human freedom and its destructive or chaotic potential. Avoiding war is a noble aim, without any doubt, but a social structure that turns individuals into obedient underlings to a paternalistic ruling elite that claims to know best what is good for the masses and furthers their own careers while claiming to further the common good, is that not a price too high to be paid? We are facing the problem of climate change in addition to the one of war, and we are still in the aftermath of facing the Covid pandemic. Would we not be well-advised to consider whether we really want to throw in our luck and the basic democratic rights our forebears fought for with supranationalists or neo-authoritarian politicians who tell us they know all the answers and who blind our minds with fear?
A good thought to start into the New Year with.
July 24, 2019
New introduction by Fax Goodlife.
Note: This is not a library copy.
A short novel expanded from a 1956 novelette of the same name about Vulcan 3, a giant computer to which humanity has acceded absolute power over the fate of the world. The machine is insane and kills whomever it perceives as a threat.
Note: This is not a library copy.
A short novel expanded from a 1956 novelette of the same name about Vulcan 3, a giant computer to which humanity has acceded absolute power over the fate of the world. The machine is insane and kills whomever it perceives as a threat.
March 5, 2010
There are few things better for me during the gloomy overcast months of winter than a good genre fiction bender. On those days when the sky seems especially oppressive, there is nothing I like more than tucking into a bit of escapist reading and forgetting that the world at large even exists outside the page. As such, I’ve been on a rather satisfying science fiction binge lately, running the gamut from urban fantasy to a classic approach to that most-satisfying of dystopias, the War Against the Machines.
This has been a tried and true trope of sci-fi long before James Cameron brought the wrath of Arnold reigning down on Sarah Connor. No, even that great god of the Golden Age of science fiction, Asimov, was concerned with the coming conflict while crafting his three laws of robotics and between H.A.L. and his Rama robots Clarke made deft work of the AI question. Familiar ground though this may be, there are few authors able to evoke the sheer terror of confronting a coldly logical machine horde than the prince of paranoia, Philip K. Dick.
In Dick’s budding dystopia, humans have outsourced all decision making to Vulcan, a supercomputer that is two parts SkyNet to one part Mycroft Holmes (the genial AI that assisted the miner’s rebellion in Heinlein’s The Moon is a Harsh Mistress) that is fed endless streams of information in order to better facilitate its decision-making. By approaching all policy-making from a purely emotionless and logical position, Vulcan’s reign is an era of unquestioning peace. Humans are endlessly fickle though and, while many happily line up to serve as Vulcan’s agents at large, a faction comprised of mystics and luddites arises that seeks to destroy Vulcan and the new serfdom that it has inadvertently created. Inevitably, after realizing that it can never fully compensate for humanity’s inherent madness, Vulcan realizes that humans are too irrational and prone to chaos to be left to their own devices and the subjugation must commence! The only thing standing in the way of its success is a bureaucrat who is starting to doubt the wisdom of not thinking for oneself.
This is classic Dick, before he went completely off the rails and began spouting off about meeting angels and spotting federal agents lurking in every shadow. No, here he keeps his paranoia in check, sprinkling in only enough so that the reader can realize not only the dread that Dick felt at the abdication of human free will to binary monsters but also the personal disgust that he held for any who would willingly serve such a machine. You could probably stretch the analogy to encapsulate Dick’s distrust of large institutions in general and governments in particular, but that would just be forcing too much meaning into what is, at its core, an entertaining romp through a future that is both insufferably dull and existentially horrific. Aficionados of Dick’s more psychedelic writings such as Ubik or A Scanner Darkly may be dissatisfied by this story’s more traditional science fiction approach, but it is still an entertaining yarn that has withstood the passing of time without becoming too outdated in its descriptions.
This has been a tried and true trope of sci-fi long before James Cameron brought the wrath of Arnold reigning down on Sarah Connor. No, even that great god of the Golden Age of science fiction, Asimov, was concerned with the coming conflict while crafting his three laws of robotics and between H.A.L. and his Rama robots Clarke made deft work of the AI question. Familiar ground though this may be, there are few authors able to evoke the sheer terror of confronting a coldly logical machine horde than the prince of paranoia, Philip K. Dick.
In Dick’s budding dystopia, humans have outsourced all decision making to Vulcan, a supercomputer that is two parts SkyNet to one part Mycroft Holmes (the genial AI that assisted the miner’s rebellion in Heinlein’s The Moon is a Harsh Mistress) that is fed endless streams of information in order to better facilitate its decision-making. By approaching all policy-making from a purely emotionless and logical position, Vulcan’s reign is an era of unquestioning peace. Humans are endlessly fickle though and, while many happily line up to serve as Vulcan’s agents at large, a faction comprised of mystics and luddites arises that seeks to destroy Vulcan and the new serfdom that it has inadvertently created. Inevitably, after realizing that it can never fully compensate for humanity’s inherent madness, Vulcan realizes that humans are too irrational and prone to chaos to be left to their own devices and the subjugation must commence! The only thing standing in the way of its success is a bureaucrat who is starting to doubt the wisdom of not thinking for oneself.
This is classic Dick, before he went completely off the rails and began spouting off about meeting angels and spotting federal agents lurking in every shadow. No, here he keeps his paranoia in check, sprinkling in only enough so that the reader can realize not only the dread that Dick felt at the abdication of human free will to binary monsters but also the personal disgust that he held for any who would willingly serve such a machine. You could probably stretch the analogy to encapsulate Dick’s distrust of large institutions in general and governments in particular, but that would just be forcing too much meaning into what is, at its core, an entertaining romp through a future that is both insufferably dull and existentially horrific. Aficionados of Dick’s more psychedelic writings such as Ubik or A Scanner Darkly may be dissatisfied by this story’s more traditional science fiction approach, but it is still an entertaining yarn that has withstood the passing of time without becoming too outdated in its descriptions.
July 31, 2021
This book has a nightmarish quality. Not what I was expecting. Published in 1960, it is kind of a proto-Terminator story, . From the way Dick frames the story I feel like it originated as a comment on the more mundane arena of office politics; and that he’s taking the ‘advance at any cost’ ethic to its logical extreme and projecting it into computers which have influence over the everyday lives of humans. Everyone is paranoid in this book, the machines as well as the people. Everyone is looking over their shoulder to see if the next guy is trying to destroy them. The book is worth reading just for the passages where the computers actually start attacking people. Unusually creepy. This might be a kind of morality tale. The heroes are motivated by something higher than their own interest. The villains are in it for themselves.
January 14, 2018
Mi disprezzate perché avevo fiducia in una macchina? Ma ogni volta che leggiamo un quadrante,
un indice di misurazione, ogni volta che viaggiamo, non mostriamo di avere fiducia in una macchina?
quasi 3*
Amo la capacità di Philip Dick di creare trame complesse con la semplicità di uno sbadiglio al mattino. È come se i suoi neuroni fossero frattali carichi di storie pronte a essere trasmesse ai posteri. Premesso ciò... questo romanzo è forse uno dei peggiori che abbia mai letto di questo autore. Lo consiglierei solo per mostrare i germogli dei capisaldi del pensiero Dickiano: il rapporto uomo/macchina, la paranoia, la manipolazione delle classi sociali.
Ci sono tutti... allo stato grezzo. Sono incerti, non riescono a comunicarmi veridicità, non mi lasciano immergere nella storia. Inoltre in molti punti è scritto anche maluccio.
In un mondo arrivato a un passo dell'estinzione i governi mondiali decidono di demandare le scelte più importanti riguardanti la Terra a una classe di elaboratori di calcolo estremamente all'avanguardia denominata "Vulcano".
Sepolto nel buio in perpetuo isolamento, qualunque uomo avrebbe finito per impazzire, avrebbe perduto tutti i contatti col mondo esterno, non sarebbe mai riuscito a immaginare quello che stava succedendo. Più il tempo passava, più si sarebbe allontanato dalla realtà, per vivere in un mondo irreale creato dalla sua fantasia malata.
Vulcano 3, invece, si muoveva nella direzione opposta.
La storia si svolge nel pieno del conflitto fra il potere istituzionale e una sempre maggiore fascia di persone di classe economica medio-bassa guidate dai Guaritori. Non mi dilungo troppo su questa figura perché il suo ruolo è molto poco strutturato.
Gli aspetti che non mi hanno convinto
Più che un "vulcano" uno sbuffo di vapore, ma la colpa è dello stesso Dick. Mi ha abituato troppo bene.
Potrebbe sembrare tutto da buttare ma non è così. Ci sono passaggi in cui ci si avvita in alienazioni di pensiero che si rischia di non fidarsi più neanche del vicino che accende la TV a volume alto (Cosa sta tentando di nascondere? Eh? EH?):
Be, supponiamo che non mi denunciate... Chi vi dice che questa non sia una messinscena, una trappola per mettere alla prova la vostra fedeltà al sistema? Dovete agire, potrebbe essere un tranello!
Inoltre la sua abilità visionaria è presente anche in questo romanzo (scritto nel 1960)
In quell'anno, le nazioni di cui era formato il mondo si riunirono e decisero di sottostare, ma in maniera realistica non idealmente come al tempo dell'ONU...
Si avvicinò al tavolino, e prese uno degli opuscoli. Era intitolato: Quando avete votato l'ultima volta?
- Le ultime elezioni hanno avuto luogo vent'anni fa - gli ricordò Fields - Lo insegnano, questo, ai bambini nelle vostre scuole?
- Dovrebbero - disse Barris.
mi hanno messo i brividi queste due parti quando le ho lette. Però doveva ancora arrivare la stoccata finale.
L'insoddisfazione delle masse non si basa sulle privazioni economiche, ma su un senso d'incapacità a ottenere quello che vogliono. E ciò che vogliono non è un livello di vita superiore, ma un maggior potere sociale. Questo è il loro scopo principale. A causa del loro orientamento emotivo,
insorgono e passano all'azione quando compare una figura di capo dotato di ascendente e capace di raggrupparli in un'unità funzionale, invece di lasciarli come sono, e cioè una massa caotica di elementi informi.
un indice di misurazione, ogni volta che viaggiamo, non mostriamo di avere fiducia in una macchina?
quasi 3*
Amo la capacità di Philip Dick di creare trame complesse con la semplicità di uno sbadiglio al mattino. È come se i suoi neuroni fossero frattali carichi di storie pronte a essere trasmesse ai posteri. Premesso ciò... questo romanzo è forse uno dei peggiori che abbia mai letto di questo autore. Lo consiglierei solo per mostrare i germogli dei capisaldi del pensiero Dickiano: il rapporto uomo/macchina, la paranoia, la manipolazione delle classi sociali.
Ci sono tutti... allo stato grezzo. Sono incerti, non riescono a comunicarmi veridicità, non mi lasciano immergere nella storia. Inoltre in molti punti è scritto anche maluccio.
In un mondo arrivato a un passo dell'estinzione i governi mondiali decidono di demandare le scelte più importanti riguardanti la Terra a una classe di elaboratori di calcolo estremamente all'avanguardia denominata "Vulcano".
Sepolto nel buio in perpetuo isolamento, qualunque uomo avrebbe finito per impazzire, avrebbe perduto tutti i contatti col mondo esterno, non sarebbe mai riuscito a immaginare quello che stava succedendo. Più il tempo passava, più si sarebbe allontanato dalla realtà, per vivere in un mondo irreale creato dalla sua fantasia malata.
Vulcano 3, invece, si muoveva nella direzione opposta.
La storia si svolge nel pieno del conflitto fra il potere istituzionale e una sempre maggiore fascia di persone di classe economica medio-bassa guidate dai Guaritori. Non mi dilungo troppo su questa figura perché il suo ruolo è molto poco strutturato.
Gli aspetti che non mi hanno convinto
Più che un "vulcano" uno sbuffo di vapore, ma la colpa è dello stesso Dick. Mi ha abituato troppo bene.
Potrebbe sembrare tutto da buttare ma non è così. Ci sono passaggi in cui ci si avvita in alienazioni di pensiero che si rischia di non fidarsi più neanche del vicino che accende la TV a volume alto (Cosa sta tentando di nascondere? Eh? EH?):
Be, supponiamo che non mi denunciate... Chi vi dice che questa non sia una messinscena, una trappola per mettere alla prova la vostra fedeltà al sistema? Dovete agire, potrebbe essere un tranello!
Inoltre la sua abilità visionaria è presente anche in questo romanzo (scritto nel 1960)
In quell'anno, le nazioni di cui era formato il mondo si riunirono e decisero di sottostare, ma in maniera realistica non idealmente come al tempo dell'ONU...
Si avvicinò al tavolino, e prese uno degli opuscoli. Era intitolato: Quando avete votato l'ultima volta?
- Le ultime elezioni hanno avuto luogo vent'anni fa - gli ricordò Fields - Lo insegnano, questo, ai bambini nelle vostre scuole?
- Dovrebbero - disse Barris.
mi hanno messo i brividi queste due parti quando le ho lette. Però doveva ancora arrivare la stoccata finale.
L'insoddisfazione delle masse non si basa sulle privazioni economiche, ma su un senso d'incapacità a ottenere quello che vogliono. E ciò che vogliono non è un livello di vita superiore, ma un maggior potere sociale. Questo è il loro scopo principale. A causa del loro orientamento emotivo,
insorgono e passano all'azione quando compare una figura di capo dotato di ascendente e capace di raggrupparli in un'unità funzionale, invece di lasciarli come sono, e cioè una massa caotica di elementi informi.
February 12, 2013
Even Lawrence Sutin, PKD's biographer, refers to this one as dreck. As per usual for Dick's novels of this period, there has been a devastating war in the 1970's, and this time around humanity's bad idea for how to handle post-war society it to turn everything over to computers. These machines' decisions will be based purely on logic, war will come to an end, but of course an elaborate police system must be put into place to maintain this logical utopia. Underground movements are breaking out across the globe.
The computer has had three incarnations, Vulcan I, Vulcan II, and the current Vulcan III that only one man can access in its impregnable stronghold deep underground in Switzerland. The current director maintains a fondness for dusty old Vulcan II. He enjoys making the punch cards that feed it information and then reading the printouts it releases, although those messages now take up to a day or so to appear. There's something a little creepy about Vulcan III with its digital screens and its suspicion that its humans are not telling it the whole story. Of course, Vulcan III decides to matters into its own hands.
Dick's novel has all the pieces in place but then has nowhere to go with them. The conclusion is as predictable as it is anti-climactic. Vulcan's Hammer was the "B side" of an Ace Double, so it has if nothing else the virtue of brevity.
The computer has had three incarnations, Vulcan I, Vulcan II, and the current Vulcan III that only one man can access in its impregnable stronghold deep underground in Switzerland. The current director maintains a fondness for dusty old Vulcan II. He enjoys making the punch cards that feed it information and then reading the printouts it releases, although those messages now take up to a day or so to appear. There's something a little creepy about Vulcan III with its digital screens and its suspicion that its humans are not telling it the whole story. Of course, Vulcan III decides to matters into its own hands.
Dick's novel has all the pieces in place but then has nowhere to go with them. The conclusion is as predictable as it is anti-climactic. Vulcan's Hammer was the "B side" of an Ace Double, so it has if nothing else the virtue of brevity.
April 16, 2019
After having read 29 novels and dozens of short stories by my favorite author, this one surprised me with joy. This might be my favorite single novel by PKD. This is certainly the most focused, tight, and complete of all of his SF novels. Many of the other 29 novels I have read by PKD have lovely tangents, eddies in the current of the main plot, flavor added by PKD because of his strangely wonderful sensibilities, but VULCAN'S HAMMER is a tight laser beam of a plot. That is why this surprises me. I am used to much more pure angst and less plot. This has the clear plot of PKD's earlier work but still touches on the philosophical posers PKD fills his later works with. In later works, his questioning of what makes us human squeezes out plot, but this novel raises the questions with a (for PKD) clear cut answer. It still rises above melodrama (are there two sides fighting against each other? are you kidding? this is PKD, so there are at least three sides in conflict, none quite the opposite of the other), but it actually has a central hero (filled with some self-doubt) who commits himself to what he finds is the best way through a maze of moral issues. I love this book. I think it has become the book I recommend to those who have never read PKD before but whom I want to hook.
May 20, 2016
One of the most accessible and straightforward PKD novels I've read so far.
"Vulcan's Hammer" is more pulp than thought-provoking scifi, but still an enjoyable read, well paced and suspenceful. And pretty short.
"Vulcan's Hammer" is more pulp than thought-provoking scifi, but still an enjoyable read, well paced and suspenceful. And pretty short.
May 27, 2015
Vulcan's Hammer is a curiously prophetic book about computers taking charge of humanity -- and this at a time before computers could realistically be perceived as a threat. I've been working with computers since 1964, and in 1960, when the novel by Philip K. Dick was written, they were pretty rudimentary.
There are three centers of force in Vulcan's Hammer: the Unity organization, which serves the computer; the "Healers," who want to sabotage Unity; and the computer itself, Vulcan 3, which as the book goes on, becomes a force of and by itself.
This is not one of Dick's more popular novels, but it is still good. It was based on a short story of the same name that was published in Future Science Fiction #29 (1956) before being released four years later in an Ace double edition along with John Brunner's The Skynappers.
There are three centers of force in Vulcan's Hammer: the Unity organization, which serves the computer; the "Healers," who want to sabotage Unity; and the computer itself, Vulcan 3, which as the book goes on, becomes a force of and by itself.
This is not one of Dick's more popular novels, but it is still good. It was based on a short story of the same name that was published in Future Science Fiction #29 (1956) before being released four years later in an Ace double edition along with John Brunner's The Skynappers.
December 8, 2017
Not one of the deeper or more inventive novels by Dick, still a very pleasant read, with Dick's unique brand of paranoia against machines (both self-providing behemoths and lethal, slithering micromachines), paranoia between men in power, loathing of Fifties' conformist Philistines and "corporate warriors", rebellious cultists.
Not very clear the role of Marion Fields, the child of the rebel leader, nor the rationale of the killing of the teacher, but this may be due to cuts in Italian edition.
Not very clear the role of Marion Fields, the child of the rebel leader, nor the rationale of the killing of the teacher, but this may be due to cuts in Italian edition.
January 18, 2012
Wow. I love dystopias and I love PKD. I'm surprised this book doesn't rate better overall and rate better against PKDs other works. It seems polarizing, some dismissing it as one of his weaker novels, but looking over reviews here, it seems many readers consider this one of their all-time favorites, not just Dick favorites.
For those that like it, the clear, concise, and focused writing seems to draw them and me in. Its a basic straightforward dystopia and man vs supercomputer story, and it works. It's just plain enjoyable. Maybe it doesn't have the social worth of 1984, but it was nice to read a story of this type and just plow through it and enjoy it for what it is.
Also, dystopian fiction is quite popular in the Young Adult genre, which is also quite popular at this time. The clear writing makes me think this would also be a great choice for younger readers, it is certainly accessible for teens.
For those that like it, the clear, concise, and focused writing seems to draw them and me in. Its a basic straightforward dystopia and man vs supercomputer story, and it works. It's just plain enjoyable. Maybe it doesn't have the social worth of 1984, but it was nice to read a story of this type and just plow through it and enjoy it for what it is.
Also, dystopian fiction is quite popular in the Young Adult genre, which is also quite popular at this time. The clear writing makes me think this would also be a great choice for younger readers, it is certainly accessible for teens.
September 27, 2023
From my understanding (based on the Wikipedia Bibliography) this was written in 1953 and was PKD's first scifi novel. It is a fine story set in a future when it was been decided that the world would be a better place if all decisions were made by a super computer, in this case they are at the 3.0 version. I don't know if this was a common story-type at the time but it predates Asimov's first "Multivac" story by two years. In this story, the "Vulcan 3" computer becoming sentient, makes it predate Heinlein's "The Moon is a Harsh Mistress" by thirteen years.
Not a strong effort by PKD, however, it ranks up there with most of the pulp that was churned out at the time. Especially in those 35cent ACE doubles being sold at the time.
A competently written 50's 'yarn' by a young man who was just getting started in a career that within a decade, he would be known of as a master of the genre.
I just reread this a few weeks ago late 2023 and feel about the same as when I first read it.
Not a strong effort by PKD, however, it ranks up there with most of the pulp that was churned out at the time. Especially in those 35cent ACE doubles being sold at the time.
A competently written 50's 'yarn' by a young man who was just getting started in a career that within a decade, he would be known of as a master of the genre.
I just reread this a few weeks ago late 2023 and feel about the same as when I first read it.
Read
May 30, 2009This, Dr. Futurity, and Lies, Inc., are Philip K Dick on autopilot. Vulcan's Hammer was especially telling of a man trying to make some quick cash with a rehashed sci-fi story involving flying hammer enforcers. Little subterfuge or deeper meaning here, just another straight-out sci-fi action yawnfest of a sturdy individual fighting an oppressed society.
I was relieved to read in a book of interviews with Philip K Dick I was reading concurrently as I read his books (as a sort of "audio commentary" to them) that he felt this and Dr. Futurity were his weakest works, and after writing them he realized if he didn't delve deeper into what he wanted to accomplish as a writer (as he did immediatly afterward with the Man in the High Castle) there would no joy or worth in writing anymore.
I was relieved to read in a book of interviews with Philip K Dick I was reading concurrently as I read his books (as a sort of "audio commentary" to them) that he felt this and Dr. Futurity were his weakest works, and after writing them he realized if he didn't delve deeper into what he wanted to accomplish as a writer (as he did immediatly afterward with the Man in the High Castle) there would no joy or worth in writing anymore.
February 7, 2017
According to Philip K. Dick authority Lawrence Sutin, in his well-researched biography "Divine Invasions," by 1959, although Dick had already had some 85 short stories as well as half a dozen novels published, his interest in creating more sci-fi had reached a low point. The future Hugo winner was at this point hoping to become more of a mainstream author, having by this time already written nine such novels, none of which had been published...yet. Still, with bills to pay, a wife (his third of an eventual five) to support, and his first child on the way, economic necessities did, it seem, perforce drive him back, unenthusiastically, to the sci-fi realm. Two of the results from this period are "Dr. Futurity" and "Vulcan’s Hammer," both of which Dick expanded from earlier novelettes. The book in question, "Vulcan’s Hammer," originally appeared in the shorter form in a 1956 issue of the 35-cent "Future Science Fiction" magazine; its first appearance as a short novel came in '60, as one half of one of those cute little "Ace doubles" (D-457, for all you collectors out there), backed by John Brunner's "The Skynappers." And although Dick's enthusiasm for his sci-fi work may have reached its nadir here, before zooming off into a decade of prodigious output and greatness, his novel in question, as it turns out, is not an uninteresting one; this author, it seems, could not write an uninteresting book if he tried.
In "Vulcan’s Hammer," the year is 2029--a safe 70 years after the time of its creation. The first Atomic War had ended in 1992, and the following year, the 70 nations of the world had decided that mankind could not be trusted to run its own affairs. Thus, the supercomputer known as Vulcan 3 had been put in charge, to dispassionately and unemotionally handle all of Earth's needs. The members of the Unity party, based in Geneva, kept a tight control of humankind and carried out Vulcan 3's dictates, and all had been going well for 30+ years. But by 2029, an opposition group calling itself the Healers Movement has come into existence, its goal being to destroy the hidden fortress of Vulcan 3 and return mankind's destiny to humans. We witness events through the eyes of William Barris, a North America-based Unity director; get to know his boss, Unity leader Jason Dill; encounter the creator of the Healers Movement, Father Fields; and meet the widow of a slain Unity functionary, Rachel Pitt. Eventually, as the old Vulcan 2 computer is destroyed, more and more Unity members are slain, and mysterious flying superweapons begin appearing, it grows apparent that a third player--aside from the Unity and Healers groups--has entered the fray. But who...or what?
Writing in his book "The Ultimate Guide to Science Fiction," Scottish critic David Pringle calls "Vulcan's Hammer" a "very minor work," and indeed, Sutin goes so far as to call it and "Dr. Futurity" "Phil's two worst-ever SF novels." I would agree that "Vulcan's Hammer" is certainly not, by any stretch, one of its author's stronger works, but still found it an enjoyable enough quick read, and it is surely a more satisfying experience than Dick's expanded "Lies, Inc." (1984), which gets my vote for Dick's worst novel ever. "Vulcan’s Hammer," short as it is at 139 pages (I refer here to that 1960, 35-cent Ace double, which I was fortunate enough to lay my hands on, thanks to NYC bookstore extraordinaire The Strand), is nevertheless complexly plotted, and the inner motivations of the major characters are at least partly suspect throughout. Thus, a Unity man could secretly be a Healer spy and vice versa. The book unveils numerous surprises and twists as it proceeds, and pleasingly dishes out futuristic bits of business (such as robot taxis; a housing development in the non-nuclear-irradiated Sahara; skin-absorbing tranquilizers; newspaper-vending robots) to help sell its central conceit.
"Vulcan’s Hammer" is atypical in the Dickian oeuvre in that it is completely devoid of humor. Also missing are the pet concerns that would crop up in so many of the author's later works, such as recreational drugs, opera and classical music, cigars, the German language, cars, divorce, and of course, the slippery nature of so-called "reality." Still, as to that last item, things aren't quite what they seem in the world ruled by Vulcan 3, and the Unity organization's headman, Jason Dill, surely does have some secrets to hide. As I say, the book is intelligent and gripping, with nary a wasted word. Indeed, the book's ending, in which the fortress of Vulcan 3 is breached, really is a tad rushed, and Dick seems to be grasping in his effort to convey a pitched, three-way battle. Sutin uncharitably calls this denouement "a scene that defines anticlimax."
There are, truth to tell, some other minor problems with "Vulcan’s Hammer." Some parts of the book feel a bit dated (such as the use of punch cards to feed the supercomputer with information and queries, as well as that reference to the Russian city of Stalingrad, which, in reality, has been called Volgograd since 1961). Dick is also guilty of an occasional mistake with his wording here and there, such as when he writes "Heads turned questionably toward the back," instead of "questioningly." And his descriptions of the Vulcan 3 itself, its underground bunker and its precise locale, are fuzzy and vague, requiring the reader to exert his/her imaginative faculties to the utmost.
As you can tell, "Vulcan’s Hammer" (the title becomes doubly significant as the novel proceeds) is something of a mixed bag. But as it turns out, even a minor, phoned-in Dick novel can be a fun and diverting experience for the reader. The book gets a mild recommendation from me, although it is of course a must-read for all of Dick's many completists....
(By the way, this review originally appeared on the FanLit website at http://www.fantasyliterature.com/ ... an ideal destination for all fans of Philip K. Dick....)
June 23, 2023
Not his best work, but also not his worst, PKD paints a bleak picture of a world governed by a paranoid bureaucracy where a supercomputer calls the shots.
The pacing is brisk, and doesn't leave us a lot of time to really know or care for many of its characters, instead relying on its snappy, vivid action scenes to drive the narrative forward which is unusual for PKD.
The world building is done well in the usual PKD fashion. Throwing little bits of information here and there, you leave wanting to learn more about the gargantuan Unity and it's machinations.
Overall, Vulcan's Hammer is a fun, short read for sci-fi and PKD fans alike.
The pacing is brisk, and doesn't leave us a lot of time to really know or care for many of its characters, instead relying on its snappy, vivid action scenes to drive the narrative forward which is unusual for PKD.
The world building is done well in the usual PKD fashion. Throwing little bits of information here and there, you leave wanting to learn more about the gargantuan Unity and it's machinations.
Overall, Vulcan's Hammer is a fun, short read for sci-fi and PKD fans alike.
November 2, 2022
Romanzo molto interessante in cui Dick affronta una delle sue massime paranoie, quella cioè del controllo del tipo "Grande Fratello". Nonostante le potenzialità infinte della tecnologia, l'uomo è solo una piccola cosa nelle mani del Potere (qui rappresentato dall'organizzazione chiamata "Gruppo" prima, e dai super computer della serie Vulcano poi), che mina la sua autonomia e la fiducia nei suoi simili.
June 17, 2018
For most authors, this would get 4 stars, but I gave it 3 because it lacks some elements that Dick is known for. The story's events aren't interpreted in more than one way, and the protagonists have the power to overcome their adversary without too much trouble.
Still, for a decades-old book that makes prescient comments about modern AI, it's worth a fair once-over.
Still, for a decades-old book that makes prescient comments about modern AI, it's worth a fair once-over.
July 29, 2018
Really conflicted on this one. 80 pages in I'm thinking 'well this one's a real stinker" but the parallel's of how modern AI is driven by an overwhelming amount of data to which it may lack a nuanced response or a predictable/rational response to is uncanny. AI's reflecting our biases, learning to judge a book by its cover. It makes this story more cyberpunk than Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? Unfortunately modern AI will likely emerge a rather distributed thing-- no trunk
On page 19 Dills has his hands in his pockets while rubbing his chin. I don't know why the teacher was murdered. Neat parallel: Page 104 a police officer, Unity side, mentions 13 being an unlucky number. Page 128 a random passenger, Healer side, asks Barris for an autograph. Regardless of side these humans fall for the human vices they decry & for which Vulcan exists to protect politics from
On page 87 Barris thinks Vulcan 2 can be pieced together. Whereas Dills internal thoughts had revealed that it was completely destroyed. & later on it's revealed that Fields both maintained & destroyed it, so you'd think he'd know how to do the job right
Funny oxymoron on 105: he's looking for a car with any capacity.. for high performance
Page 118 has the classic line "He's dead."
People always hanging up on each other on the phone. Rude
Awesome editing:
8 calculiator - calculator
13 began carefully to wrote - write
17 missing opening quote
22 blacklog - backlog
26 goot - good
55 True it would - True, it would
59 he said - she
63 tubes and pies - pipes (That said, a pie powered computer.. far out)
68 breaks scene from Dills to Barris without blank line
76 opens dialogue with a single quote instead of a double quote
81 lose - loose
101 tap -tape
103 reaced - reached
140 of - off
143 more mobile cannon - cannons
On page 19 Dills has his hands in his pockets while rubbing his chin. I don't know why the teacher was murdered. Neat parallel: Page 104 a police officer, Unity side, mentions 13 being an unlucky number. Page 128 a random passenger, Healer side, asks Barris for an autograph. Regardless of side these humans fall for the human vices they decry & for which Vulcan exists to protect politics from
On page 87 Barris thinks Vulcan 2 can be pieced together. Whereas Dills internal thoughts had revealed that it was completely destroyed. & later on it's revealed that Fields both maintained & destroyed it, so you'd think he'd know how to do the job right
Funny oxymoron on 105: he's looking for a car with any capacity.. for high performance
Page 118 has the classic line "He's dead."
People always hanging up on each other on the phone. Rude
Awesome editing:
8 calculiator - calculator
13 began carefully to wrote - write
17 missing opening quote
22 blacklog - backlog
26 goot - good
55 True it would - True, it would
59 he said - she
63 tubes and pies - pipes (That said, a pie powered computer.. far out)
68 breaks scene from Dills to Barris without blank line
76 opens dialogue with a single quote instead of a double quote
81 lose - loose
101 tap -tape
103 reaced - reached
140 of - off
143 more mobile cannon - cannons
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
October 12, 2022
En 1992 la guerre nucléaire eut lieu avec le quasi-anéantissement de la population. En 1993 passe un décret unilatéral de tous les Etats à se réunir sous une banderole « L’Union » où les décisions politiques et générales sont laissées à un super ordinateur Vulcain car l’Homme ne peut que détruire ses semblables, la planète avec ses choix personnels et de conquête des territoires etc. Ce super ordinateur se répare et s’alimente tout seul.
On est aujourd’hui à la 3ème génération de Vulcain.
Problème… ça fait 15mois qu’il ne veut plus répondre aux questions posées.
Pour éviter une hystérie collective dans une société sans nuances et sans individualisme, quelqu’un prend la relève pour fournir des réponses…
Encore une pépite de 250p qui se lit treeeees vite. On est happé par le rythme, les complots, une révolution qui se trame en fond pour détruire ce système fade qui rappelle les visions post-apo qu’ont pu avoir certains auteurs du genre.
De l’excellent K.Dick 🤖
On est aujourd’hui à la 3ème génération de Vulcain.
Problème… ça fait 15mois qu’il ne veut plus répondre aux questions posées.
Pour éviter une hystérie collective dans une société sans nuances et sans individualisme, quelqu’un prend la relève pour fournir des réponses…
Encore une pépite de 250p qui se lit treeeees vite. On est happé par le rythme, les complots, une révolution qui se trame en fond pour détruire ce système fade qui rappelle les visions post-apo qu’ont pu avoir certains auteurs du genre.
De l’excellent K.Dick 🤖
June 27, 2024
Me gusto el libro.
Esta historia de ciencia ficción me mantuvo al borde del asiento, y me atrajo tanto que prácticamente no solté el libro hasta terminarlo. Debo señalar, que he leído algunas de las obras de Philip K Dick y su estilo en general me hace sentir triste y desesperanzado; aunque como en este caso, hay unas obras que me parecen increíbles (por esa razón sigo leyendo los libros del autor).
Es una historia distopica, que se desarrolla en una civilización en la que forma de gobierno esta encabezada por una computadora, la vulcan 3, y como es que las personas se viven dentro de ese sistema.
Esta historia de ciencia ficción me mantuvo al borde del asiento, y me atrajo tanto que prácticamente no solté el libro hasta terminarlo. Debo señalar, que he leído algunas de las obras de Philip K Dick y su estilo en general me hace sentir triste y desesperanzado; aunque como en este caso, hay unas obras que me parecen increíbles (por esa razón sigo leyendo los libros del autor).
Es una historia distopica, que se desarrolla en una civilización en la que forma de gobierno esta encabezada por una computadora, la vulcan 3, y como es que las personas se viven dentro de ese sistema.
February 25, 2020
I pretty much love everything PKD ever did, that being said, I have never heard any buzz about this book. Well, it swept me up by surprise and I LOVED it. I am a huge extrovert, but was so invested in the characters and the premise I was looking forward to alone time to steal away with them! In true PKD fashion, it wasn’t a fairy tale, and my favorite character was killed off 2/3 of the way through. Anyway, I cannot say enough good things about this book!
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
January 26, 2024
Just some solid pulpy sci-fi. What stands out the most to me is how this novel so prominently features the themes that are associated with PKD’s best work. He always was interested in and wrote about paranoia, mass hysteria, groupthink, religion, etc. The politics of this book make a lot of sense when you consider PKD’s existing in post-WWII, McCarthyist paranoid hell.
September 23, 2020
one of my fav k. dick work. btw, just like his brother milked many japanese anime, jonathan nolan milked a tv show from this novel too.
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