I have only posted a couple of times but have been reading RB's fiction and have been profoundly affected by him since childhood.
It occurred to me that science fiction and fantasy writers should qualify as subjects for the PBS series _American Masters_ and I put in a request for three via the WNET staff: Ray Bradbury, Isaac Asimov, and Shirley Jackson.
Ray Bradbury topped the list because I teach college writing in Tucson, Arizona, and have a feeling of resonance with the colonizing culture and the old indigenous culture. Whether it is too topical to link these feelings to our current flap about "Illegals" in Arizona, I think that an _American Masters_ segment might bring out the humanity that informed the Mars that Ray created. The sensitivity about an old culture on Mars certainly finds its echo here in Tucson where those echoes of the old culture are here for anyone who chooses to hear them. My husband is an astronomer who works up on Kitt Peak Observatory and he brings home the tribal newspaper _The Runner_, since Kitt Peak is on the Tohono O'odham reservation. It is a real experience reading _The Martian Chronicles_ here in Tucson, since Sam Weller, Ray's biographer has noted that Mars was, in fact, formed here in the brain of young Ray.
I am enjoying that biography a second time, have read the Tucson pages to my students, and I sure hope that I sparked some interest at the _American Masters_ production offices on honoring the fine writers of science fiction and fantasy (and other non-genre work by these same writers) Ray Bradbury, Isaac Asimov, and Shirley Jackson (her short story "The Lottery" is read all over the country in First year College English every semester).
Hope you are all having a wonderful summer! Hello from Mars...
Oh, why didn't I think to include the link to American masters? Glad you did, though. Gloria
17 June 2012, 08:01 AM
Linnl
Its been almost two years, but thought American Masters could still do a grand program on Ray Bradbury. Any and all please send your comments to the link above.
17 June 2012, 10:47 AM
douglasSP
Sounds like a very good idea,Gloria. Ray Bradbury fleetingly lived in Tucson in his teens, and he wrote more than one story informed by the problem of "illegal" migrants, "I See You Never" being perhaps the most famous one.This message has been edited. Last edited by: douglasSP,
16 July 2012, 10:38 AM
Mike Langford
Such a program could greatly raise the "Ray-Consciousness" among casual fans as well as those otherwise informed and educated people, who may not have -- for whatever reason -- ever discovered Ray's work.
This issue of the indigenous peoples is highly important, yet it is only one such issue with which to underscore the relevancy of Ray's work. Another issue very central to The Martian Chronicles is the vision and future direction of our space program. Then there are all the issues of censorship and freedom continually swirling around Fahrenheit 451. The list goes on and on. And this is the stuff of PBS.
The American Masters series focuses on the greatest contributors to our culture. It is one of the most thoroughly researched, well produced, and sensitively written series of its type on television. It is quality television.
Let's contact PBS and keep this idea circulating.
17 July 2012, 11:20 AM
rayfan
I emailed American Masters, suggesting that Ray "would be a very deserving subject" for the series. A standard reply came back pronto, that "we have made a note of your suggestion in a report to the appropriate programming staff for review and future consideration."