Staying Free and Creative

I am my book club’s leader tonight and I picked the book, “The Man in the High Castle” by Philip Dick. Now, this is not an easy read for someone who doesn’t like science fiction or stretching their imagination and thinking of living in a different reality. Written in the 1960′s, this work of fiction is about America after losing WWII to the Germans and the Japanese. The east coast is Nazi territory and the west is Japanese. The book explores what happens to mankind when their individuality and inherent morality is taken away by propaganda and totalitarianism.
Of interest to me, was Mr. Dick’s frequent reference to creativity. Two characters decide to make their own jewelry line(1 character is a Jew) and attempt to sell it to the Japanese people living on the west coast. Making something original is unheard of, something from the US’s deep past. The people who see this creative jewelry don’t know what to make of it because it is pure design, made of silver. It is only form and its’ function is only beauty. Beauty and creativity have been almost erased from this culture. Things have been reduced to stark black and white.

sketch

hazy

Read more at: It’s the little Things.