WYMHM: Jonathan Lethem on Philip K. Dick & what the weird technology known as the novel demands of us

We talked about what makes Dick so compelling and personal — what made us each take him so personally when we discovered his work. And in some ways, those are elements that are innate to this very strange technology — this gigantic pile of sentences stuck between two hard covers, that someone makes this incredible commitment to read. It‘s a bizarre commitment, very unusual the first few times you make it — to just sit and follow, in order, each of these sentences and make the artificial reality come to life yourself by reading. It‘s a crazy technology, very specific and weird. Now may not be the time to take it for granted. Instead, maybe we should point out that by doing this, you do achieve a kind of weird mind meld.