22 pages • 44 minutes read
Philip K. DickThe Eyes Have It
Fiction | Short Story | Adult | Published in 1953A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Symbols & Motifs
The Book
Philip K. Dick’s characters are, by and large, readers, and a book is one of the central symbols in “The Eyes Have It.” As a symbol, a book represents technology. Until the digital era, books were some of the most advanced and dependable technologies for conveying information. Yet the context of the book within this story complicates a straightforward interpretation of its role. The book is a discarded paperback novel, not a weighty philosophical tome elucidating esoteric ideas. It is almost certainly a “pulp fiction” book, the kind that Dick himself consumed regularly.
The physical descriptions of the characters that the narrator/the reader selects are not unique in their use of language; they are, rather, trite, filled with an everyday vernacular that is easily understood. He misreads the book, however, treating a novel not as a literary work but as a literal reflection of reality. The character finds extraordinary knowledge within such a mundane book. Nevertheless, the narrator/the reader is incapable of handling this revelation, and he closes the book and tosses it aside in a literal and figurative rejection of the “ideas” contained therein.
Withdrawal and Isolation
Much like Dick’s own creative process, the narrator/the reader here engages with knowing reality in isolation. Though he is in the presence of his family while reading, he does not engage them. Instead, he remains trapped in his own interpretive cycle. When he discovers something startling, he moves to an isolated part of the house: the garage. This withdrawal from society is part of what keeps him from understanding reality properly.
Whether his reengagement with family at the story’s end is a kind of reconciliation is overshadowed by his willful withholding of his discovery. Knowledge again isolates the narrator/the reader, and despite his efforts to enjoy a simple board game with his family, he is unable to bring himself into the shared moment.
Reading and Interpreting
Reading and interpreting form the story’s most prominent motif, showcasing Dick’s thematic focus on epistemology, or knowing and types of knowledge. Throughout the story, almost everything the narrator/the reader does is read and interpret. Though there is some physical movement and action in the text, it simply takes him to a place where reading and interpreting can happen without the distractions of domestic life.
Though the question of how long the narrator/the reader spends with his book is not answered, his own process of interpretation expands the motif to ask whether all experience can be conveyed in both literal and figurative language, and whether one of these options is sufficient for understanding reality.
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