Clue

Passage from John Milton’s Paradise Lost (Book I: 61-69)
A Dungeon horrible, on all sides round
As on great Furnace flam’d, yet from those flames
No light, but rather darkness visible
Serv’d only to discover sights of woe,
Regions of sorrow, doleful shades, where peace
And rest can never dwell, hope never comes
That comes at all, but torture without end
Still urges, and a fiery Deluge, fed
With ever-burning
Sulphur unconsumed

This excerpt related to the film in more ways than one. Film Noir is very dark, of course, as well as the whole LA atmosphere. Torture without end relates to Rick Deckard, the androids, and Sebastion. Deckard is constantly tortured by confusion: mostly about his identity. The androids are constantly tortured by living in fear and also by the fact that humans will not listen to them when they can see the world in omniscience. Hope never comes for the androids because they do not have time to speak of what they know before they are murdered. Sulphur unconsumed can relate to the masses of old unused "kipple" left on earth, while earth is a fiery Deluge: Hell on Earth.

13 and 14

Pris Stratton is lil miss attitude. She needs to cut the tude (Pris=Prissy/snobby!)...I don't like it one bit. Sweet J.R. gets his wine out of his deposit box (or whatever it is) at the bank just for Pris. Cute! Miss Prissy gets offended when J.R. thinks he figures out why she's so upset: because she doesn't have any friends. Oh no he did not go there! She has seven! Haha...anyway...she tells him that she thinks they're all dead and now there are people that are after her. I found out in these chapters, that "specials" can't know what bounty hunters are. I think that's stupid. Why can't they know what bounty hunters are? It's not like they can stop them. OR maybe they CAN. Shortly after explaining some of this to J.R., there's a knock on the door and Pris freaks. J.R. answers it and it's Pris's two friends, Irmgard and Roy Baty. They are going to stay in the apartment building and set up an alarm system so that if the hunters come, they can warn one another. Pris is suggested by Roy to move in with Isidore and Pris calls J.R. a chickenhead and is then told to shut it. And she does, thank goodness. She moves in with Isidore and all three androids have a little conversation.

This chapter makes me even more confused about Pris Stratton's situation. She asks J.R. if she's just crazy, but she already knows what's happening because she met Rick Deckard. So when her friends say they don't know who the other bounty hunter is, I don't understand why Pris Stratton doesn't immediately speak up and say that it's Rick. She even offered to help him kill the other androids. Maybe she's NOT really friends with Roy and Irmgard and is going to turn them in.

Chapter 12

The Scream: Androids feel the same way that this creature does in the painting. The silent scream is painful to look at, but symbolic in the way that humans don't really hear the androids scream because they won't listen. Androids want to fit in; not be hunted.

Puberty: I would think that Luba Luft admires this painting because it represents a part of a female's life that she never exprerienced. She also has a great appreciation of art in all forms (at least that's what I think.)

Rick and Phil go to the opera house to find that Luba has left. She told the stagehand that she was going to the museum so the two bounty hunters check it out. They find her there and capture her. She mouths off to Phil, telling him that he is no more human than she, and he gets angry and retires her.
Also, in this chapter, Phil starts to think that he really is an andy and asks Rick some questions about the normal activities of an android. He tells Rick that he has a squirrel that he loves. Phil is a very sweet guy: he reminds me a lot of Isidore. He offers Rick his squirrel if the test proves that he is an andy. However, the test proves he is NOT an andy.
Rick finds out in this chapter that he is attracted to female andys and then Phil says some disturbing things: sleep with the android, and then kill her/it. A little sexist if I do say so myself...

Chapter 11

Rick is most likely scared out of his mind. Garland tells him that the police station is full of androids, including himself and Phil Resch. Phil Resch does not know yet, though. When the bone marrow results showed that Polokov was an android, and Garland was the next on Rick's list, Resch runs upstairs to get his Boneli test to use on Garland. When he's upstairs, that's when Garland spills the beans. After he comes back downstairs, things begin to happen very quickly. I was confused as to whether Garland pointed the laser tube at Resch-or if it was just his hand. Anyway, after he points whatever he points, Rick and Phil Resch hit the floor and Resch retires Garland. Resch says that he pretty much knew the whole time that Garland was an android. Rick is probably very relieved that another bounty hunter was in the room. I think that the turning point for Rick is coming soon in the novel. I predict that Rick is going to see that an android, Resch, is human-like and should be treated as a human.

Chapter 10

Things get a little tricky in this chapter. Is Rick out of his mind or is this alternate police station completely fake? Or have they just not had any contact with one another until now. Either way, Rick is pretty much trapped. He can't get in touch with Bryant or his wife and his Voight-Kampff test means nothing to Garland. Garland had never even heard of it. At least Rick has some reassurance: finding out that Polokov was really an android. Too bad for Rick that Luba Luft got away!

Chapter 9

Now I know that Rick is somewhat of a theatre geek, I like him more. I want to talk about Luba Luft, but after reading ch. 10 and a little bit of 11, I changed my mind about her. This is my assumption about Miss Luft before reading ahead: not an android, lovely, and humorous. I love her because she is so charismatic (by this I mean enthusiastic, charming, and assertive). She is quick to turn the tables and try to persuade Rick to be tested. Luba Luft caused Rick to be discomposed. I'm almost certain that she is purposely over-analyzing every question that Rick asked to get to the point. Maybe Rick was right about her being an android and not knowing it. This chapter was a quick read for me because it was kind of funny and fast-paced. I suppose that if I was in Luba's situation, I would call the cops as well. His questions were, as she said, "suggestive", in a way. It surprised me when Luba said, "Then, you must be an andriod" after Rick described a characteristic of one. It shocked Rick, too.
I do not like the name, "harness bull" for a cop. Officer Crams is his name, which gives me a headache and makes me think of kipple, which may be ironic-I'm not sure. I think that Crams is an android, but I didn't think he was going to kill Rick because he probably would have done that already, unless he wants to find out something from him first. When Crams says, "That girl's quite a looker.." and goes on to talk about her figure, it grosses me out. Ew. Why would he say that if the whole point of him taking Rick away was to prevent him from making a move on Luba? Can androids be attracted to one another?

Chapter Eight

I think that Bryant secretly wants Rick to fail or get killed. He won't let him talk to Dave and seems not to trust Rick anyway. I knew that Polokov was going to come out of nowhere! It just happened so fast that I didn't really understand what was going on. All of a sudden "Kadalyi" admits he's Polokov and Rick shoots him. It seems like Bryant knew that the Soviet police officer was really an android. The most confusing part of this chapter is when Rick says "You're not Polokov, you're Kadalyi!" I think that he just messed up his sentence but I don't know why K. Dick would even put this in the chapter if there was no significance. Obviously there's a lot the reader does not know.
Rachael Rosen wants to help Rick "retire" the rest of the andys. She thinks that he could use her help in both identifying and tricking the andys. She had an interesting timing to her call, too. She called just before Polokov attacked. I think it was a warning and I'm pretty sure Rick thought so, too. I think that later on in the book, Rick will accept Rachael's offer and they will team up together.