I was 12, and although I’d been reading voraciously since I was six, I don’t think it ever occurred to me that there was someone actually telling the stories. Then I read a book called “R is for Rocket,” and before I’d finished, I picked up “S is for Space,” the “The Martian Chronicles” and so it went. Maybe because the books were of short stories, maybe because they were so masterfully crafted, but I suddenly realized that there was an artist there, behind the stories, putting them together, making me grin and shiver with fear and delight, leading me down the path of outrageous imagination to other worlds, times, and consciousnesses.Ray Bradbury made me aware of the art and craft of fiction, and soon thereafter I realized that I wanted to be that guy, the teller of stories. To this day, I will look to his stories for clues for how to better perform my craft. You need go no further than Bradbury’s “The Fog Horn”, about a lonesome sea monster that falls in love with a fog horn see Ray’s direct influence on my work. I read it a dozen times when I was writing The Lust Lizard of Melancholy Cove.The first time of many that I heard Ray speak, at the Santa Barbara Writer’s conference in 1982, he said, “If a writer introduces an idea, then leaves in lying there, doesn’t do anything with it, then it’s yours. It’s yours, to do with what you want!” He had a breathy, conspiratorial way of talking to an audience — a sort of, “isn’t it cool! isn’t it amazing!? aren’t we lucky!?” way of talking about writing.
Yes, Ray, it is. It is! We are!
Thanks for the sea monster, Ray. Thanks for turning on the light so I could write.
Ray Bradbury was bright champion of imagination, an inspiration and an icon. He shall be so ever after.
I loved Ray Bradbury. I read “Something Wicked This Way Comes” about every 3-4 years. I still cannot believe how he turned poetry into horror and horror into poetry. RIP Ray and I’m so happy to still have The AuthorGuy around…live long and write well.
Eloquent and touching, Author Guy. As my favourite authors from my younger days begin to pass (Maurice Sendak and Ray Bradbury in just a few weeks), I’m ever so grateful that I can go back and spend time with them by picking up one of their books. It’s a unique relationship, author and reader, and so often reading an old favourite is like spending time with a good friend — a good friend who inspires you or makes you laugh or scares the bejeebers out of you. It’s a solemn day when they go to that Big Writers’ Conference in the Sky, but aren’t we glad they leave their stories behind?
Thanks for today’s thoughts.
For me, the epiphany that there was a writer behind words came when reading Bradbury’s short story Chrysalis. Can’t quite explain why, either. Thanks for sharing your thoughts. Love Steve, BTW.
Nice. It’s really cool to see an author whose work I enjoy so much write so lovingly and genuinely of his influences.
Along these lines I use a signature quote of his on my story postings over at Baen’s Bar (under the Mark Wolf pen name) It is:
My stories run up and bite me on the leg – I respond by writing down everything that goes on during the bite. When I finish, the idea lets go and runs off.
Ray Bradbury
Thank you for coming along before we lost Ray. I needed to know that ugly beauty would still be alive. Good-bye, Ray. Hello, Chris. A lot of us need you