Dexter Palmer
Autor de Version Control
Sobre El Autor
Dexter Palmer is a science fiction author. His novels include The Dream of Perpetual Motion and Version Control. (Bowker Author Biography)
Créditos de la imagen: Photo credit: Bill Wadman
Obras de Dexter Palmer
Obras relacionadas
Etiquetado
Conocimiento común
- Otros nombres
- Palmer, Dexter Clarence
- Fecha de nacimiento
- 1974-09-21
- Género
- male
- Nacionalidad
- USA
- Lugares de residencia
- Princeton, New Jersey, USA
- Educación
- Princeton University (PhD|English Literature)
- Organizaciones
- Educational Testing Service
- Agente
- Susan Golomb
Miembros
Reseñas
Listas
Premios
También Puede Gustarte
Autores relacionados
Estadísticas
- Obras
- 3
- También por
- 3
- Miembros
- 1,403
- Popularidad
- #18,302
- Valoración
- 3.7
- Reseñas
- 101
- ISBNs
- 25
- Idiomas
- 1
- Favorito
- 4
Writing a novel around the 18th Century historical case of Mary Toft, hoaxer and alleged birther of rabbits, Palmer has written a timeless examination of human nature, and an outstanding literary achievement.
Palmer sets out his intentions in the first pages, where we see provincial physician John Howard struggling to read English philosopher John Locke’s masterpiece “An Essay Concerning Human Understanding.” Palmer’s going to be concerned, while writing an entertaining story, with the question of ‘How do humans come to understand what they regard as truth?’ Is truth an objective reality, existing outside of the human mind, not subject to the realm of human passions? Or is truth an agreed upon conjecture shared between human minds, and thus changeable, and malleable, and open to manipulation by forces that do not mean well? “I am led to consider that the latter possibility may be the case,” says Howard, “that our world has some secret horror that I cannot fathom if so, controlling the minds of men though it is impossible to perceive with our senses alone.”
But to quote Leonard Cohen, you want it darker. So Palmer retells the fable of the king and the invisible cloak but changes the ending; no longer is the king exposed by the solitary truth teller, enabling the crowd to admit and see the truth for themselves. In this telling, a father brings his young son out to see the procession and when the king passes by and his son utters the infamous line "but he's naked", the father knows what he must do - break his son's neck, thus sacrificing what should be most dear to him to protect his, and the crowd's, illusions. After murdering his son as the king's procession stops in shock at the child's words, the father feels no shame, no guilt. On the contrary:
I mean, that is dark.
Who can dismiss that fear, reading human history or just looking around oneself? Palmer somewhat lessens the bleakness of this appraisal by writing with great humanity and empathy for his characters: the hoaxers, the educated dupes, the uneducated dupes the educated ones look down on, the ones who take advantage where they can. Everyone perhaps but the rich elite, represented here as utterly amoral Lords whose wealth warps their characters and destroys their humanity.
Philosophy and literary fiction make excellent bedfellows in skilled hands like Palmer’s.… (más)