Author profile

Philip K. Dick was born in Chicago in 1928. At around the age of 12, Dick read his first science-fiction magazine, which led to a lifelong engagement with the genre. After a brief stint at the University of Berkeley in 1949, he worked in a record store, Art Music Company. He wrote full-time from 1951, when he sold his first short story, and went on to produce 44 novels and five collections of short stories. Dick struggled to achieve mainstream success – his non-science-fiction novels being returned by his agent in 1963 – but received enormous acclaim in the science-fiction world for his works exploring metaphysics, theology and politics. His best-known novels include The Man in the High Castle  (1962; Folio Society, 2015), which won the Hugo Award in 1963; Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? (1968; Folio Society, 2017); and  Ubik (1969; Folio Society, 2019). Folio's collections of his short stories include The Complete Short Stories (Folio Society, 2021) and Selected Short Stories (Folio Society, 2022). Married five times, Dick died in 1982.