GalleyCat read all the way to the end of a long interview with Jonathan Lethem and found the kernel of news hidden there: Lethem is involved in an upcoming Library of America book which will collect four of Dick's novels from the '60s. Speculation immediately burst out as to exactly which novels those will be.

The Library of America has previously dipped its toes into our genre waters last year with H.P. Lovecraft: Tales (a welcome sign, but I personally think the book itself is fatally flawed), though they've done a number of mystery books, starting with Raymond Chandler about a decade ago.

This is great news for Dick, though the LoA still hasn't done anything with one of the 19th century's greatest writers, Ambrose Bierce (this is my personal LoA hobbyhorse). And in the history of SF, Dick is a bit of an odd choice (though he is one of the most academically respectable writers we have). The SFF writer I'd expect to see next in LoA is Ray Bradbury -- but what do the rest of you think? Who deserves canonization in exquisitely wonderful little (but fat) blue-bound hardcovers?

Update, Nov. 30 @ 8:24: The Lethem interview led to an article on the AP wire confirming the Philip K. Dick book from Library of America. The LoA page for the book is also up. (I note that this book is entitled "Four Novels of the '60s," which either means that they're still trying to distance the grubby genre stuff from "real" literature by placing it in a pop-culture context, or that there's a chance to get similar PKD books from the '50s and '70s. My money's on the first possibility, though.) The AP article also teases us with the possibility of Bradbury and Le Guin collections, and a "various SF" omnibus along the lines of Crime Novels: American Noir of the '30s and '40s