Ray Bradbury, 1920-2012

Yet another tribute, but he deserves it.

The past couple of months have been sad ones for readers; first Maurice Sendak, now Bradbury.  We kept seeing him on PBS, kept reading new, insightful articles from him in newspapers and magazines, and somehow began to wonder if he'd found some magic elixir that would help him live forever. It would seem perfect for a writer of speculative fiction to somehow magically become a character in one of his own stories.  

But Bradbury was indeed mortal, but unlike most of us, he left so much insight on beauty and creativity that his words and the images they created will live forever.

First, there's Neil Gaiman's tribute. Imagine reading an author, idolizing him or her, and then becoming an author yourself and ending up not just meeting your idol, but actually becoming friends. Hanging-out, going-for-coffee friends.  

Bradbury had wide-ranging influences.  Something Wicked This Way Comes is dedicated to actor/dancer/director Gene Kelly. An entire treatise on writing was influenced by the character of Snoopy in Charles Schulz's Peanuts comic strip.

So, in an attempt to cobble together some cool stuff without this post turning into a 50,000-word tome, here's just a small sampling. From a program that aired on PBS in 2008:

Love what you do and do what you love. Don’t listen to anyone else who tells you not to do it. You do what you want, what you love. Imagination should be the center of your life.

On reading as a prerequisite for democracy:

If you know how to read, you have a complete education about life, then you know how to vote within a democracy. But if you don’t know how to read, you don’t know how to decide. That’s the great thing about our country — we’re a democracy of readers, and we should keep it that way.

Sadly, this isn't as true as it should be.  Because people a) don't read or b) don't think about what they read, there are all kinds of misconceptions about history and science being perpetuated on social media and in viral e-mails.In the interest of keeping this blog as apolitical as possible, I'll say no more.

On creativity and the myth of the muse, in Zen in the Art of Writing:

That’s the great secret of creativity. You treat ideas like cats: you make them follow you.

 I understand that creating is often an organic process, that sometimes our creation takes on a life of its own or goes in a completely unexpected direction, but I also believe the creative person should always remain in control of his or her creation. To use the excuse "[fictitious character's name] wouldn't let me change [whatever it was about him or her]" is, in my not-so-humble opinion, too often used as a copout or an excuse for sloppiness on the part of the writer.

 The best  conclusion to a Bradbury tribute would be these words from Fahrenheit 451:

Everyone must leave something behind when he dies, my grandfather said. A child or a book or a painting or a house or a wall built or a pair of shoes made. Or a garden planted. Something your hand touched some way so your soul has somewhere to go when you die, and when people look at that tree or that flower you planted, you’re there.

Thanks, Ray, for leaving us so many pieces of your soul.