davidcayjohnston@aol.com

Ray’s fans may be interested in the insights in the review, below, of Weller’s Ray biography. It ran in The Philadelphia Inquirer. The reviewer, who is trained as a historian and specializes in critical studies, is writing a book on Rod Serling, television and modern culture.
This is her first published article, and indicative of the scholarship going into her own book. She is my daughter.

The Philadelphia Inquirer Book Review, Sunday, June 12, 2005
A biography fails to shed much light on Bradbury's life

Reviewed by Bonk Johnston (sokafka@yahoo.com)

Bonk Johnston is writing a book on Rod Serling's influence on modern culture.



The Bradbury Chronicles
The Life of Ray Bradbury
By Sam Weller
Morrow. 400 pp. $26.05


One can assume that the intent of Sam Weller's authorized biography of Ray Bradbury is to illuminate the life of one of the 20th century's most prolific and admired writers. Weller, a Chicago literature professor, made more than 50 trips to Los Angeles over four years to interview Bradbury.

He calls himself a Bradbury fan, which underscores the major fault with this book. Instead of investigating, Weller just retells the grand old man's tales.

Consider the plagiarism charges that Bradbury levels at his friend Rod Serling. Bradbury says Serling admitted that the 1959 Twilight Zone pilot came from a story in Bradbury's The Martian Chronicles. But Weller neglects to mention that, throughout his career, Bradbury successfully sued writers for plagiarism. He never sued Serling.

Weller uses the phrase "according to Ray" as if this were enough to make something factual. Although he had unfettered access to Bradbury's personal files, he doesn't cite any evidence to back up this particular claim of Bradbury's. Moreover, at a Web site, Weller has written that he did not visit the Serling archive in Wisconsin, just 150 miles from his home, to check out Serling's side of the story.

Both Bradbury and Serling were known for keeping nearly every piece of paper that crossed their desks. Weller did not even interview Serling's widow, who is alive and well in Southern California - although she plays an integral part in the story he recounts from Bradbury's memory.

Bradbury, 84, can hardly be faulted for lapses of memory; it is Weller whose duty it was to check the facts. Weller must assume the task of, if not disproving Bradbury's recollections, at least pointing out the contradictions in them. Weller either didn't see the contradictions or refused to investigate. Weller even repeats Bradbury's claim to remember his own birth, but doesn't compare Bradbury's published writings on the subject.

In Zen in the Art of Writing, for instance, a 1992 collection of essays, Bradbury writes that, in his 20s, he remembered a nightmare of not only his birth but also his circumcision. In a later essay in the book, Bradbury again recounts the story of his birth, only this time claiming it is from memory alone.

For decades, Bradbury has emphasized that most of his writing was not science fiction. He sees himself - properly - as a writer of popular literature, because he often disregards known scientific facts and instead relies on romantic notions of the heavens to tell his stories. Bradbury told Weller that he refuses to read any science fiction or fantasy unless it is written by, or recommended by, friends - for fear that he will be accused of stealing or emulating. Weller never examines what this tells us about Bradbury, a man who has always said that his seminal work, The Martian Chronicles, is based in both theme and style on Sherwood Anderson's Winesburg, Ohio.

Bradbury's life deserves study. He has created enduring images, especially the book-burning dystopia of Fahrenheit 451. And, despite its serious flaws, The Bradbury Chronicles is almost a seamless read.

Weller's style resembles Bradbury's, detailing emotional and personal relationships. This book is important because it reveals how Bradbury wants to be remembered, as a man so free of flaws that his only questionable actions were two extramarital affairs. Even then, Weller offers Bradbury's own justification.

In Zen in the Art of Writing, Bradbury wrote about how, when he was a boy, going to the bathroom at night required a scary journey up a dark flight of stairs. He would begin the ascent, only to scurry down until his mother would awaken, go up the stairs for him and turn on a light. After Bradbury had relieved himself, she would tuck her frightened little boy in bed, comforting him. He wrote that fear of the unknown lurking in the darkness atop the stairs haunted him from 1926 to 1986, when he finally wrote a short story to exorcize that demon.

Bradbury clearly knows that future, unauthorized biographers will examine his life after he enters the ultimate darkness. He has allowed Weller to walk up the dark stairs, turn on the light, and tuck him in, assuring that his own version of his life would be told in a most comforting way.
###

davidcay

Bonk Johnston probably did not intend to give herself away with her posting of Sam Weller's biography and Ray Bradbury himself, but she surely did...by few simple words near the end of her article:

"...after Bradbury enters the ultimate darkness..."

Does she not know that...that the mystery and marvel of Bradbury's work is the grand and incredible sense of immortality he establishes within the reader? Tho he gives his olden family on ancient porchsteps and far away summers descriptions alotted more to heavenly realms than mortals, none of this distracts from the essential power of his work: a wonder to inspire that often transcends description.

Yet Bonk Johnston would like to think that there is darkness after all is gone. There, then, an injurious flaw of everything she may want to describe of this man. Pick the bones. Skeltons are all we are made up of. Why not look deeper still? Is it not fashionable to tear apart the carcass? Especially if all is darkness up ahead...

Love covers a multitude of sins. Bonk Johnston is not in love.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: Nard Kordell,

While we're on the subject, here are excerpts from Rod Serling's final interview, in 1975! (the 30th anniversary of his death is upon us!) with quotes by him and Ray regarding death, which can be found here: http://www.rodserling.com/brevelleint.htm

Brevelle: Ray Bradbury said—

Serling: I'm afraid of what he said.

Brevelle: He said, "All through history in every culture we've had to make up mythology to explain death to ourselves and to explain life to ourselves." Do you have any thoughts on that?

Serling: Very provocative statement. That may be, but now death is with us in such abundance and hovers over us in so massive a form that we don't have time to invent a mythology, nor is our creativity directed toward same. Now it's to prevent death. It matters not one whit what form it takes—whether it's an old man with a scythe or a pale rider on a horse or what it is. Now it's become so omniscient and so constant that our major battle is warding it off. (Long pause) I yield to no man in my respect for Ray Bradbury, however.

Brevelle: If you're reincarnated, what will your next life be?

Serling: I don't believe in reincarnation. That's a cop-out, I know. I don't really want to be reincarnated. I think one time around...I think Willa Cather did a short story called "Paul's Case," and in it, when he finally commits suicide, it says, "He surrendered to the black design of things." And that's what I anticipate death will be: a totally unconscious void in which you float through eternity with no particular consciousness of anything. I think once around is enough. I don't want to start it all over again. She said, "What happens now if I come out as Louis XIV's donkey or something?" Or I come out as a rose? You know, in my case, with my kind of luck, I'll have rose bugs and things eating my leaves!

I suppose if I had it to do over again, I'd like it to be just as it's been. And to be able to make the decisions sometimes better than they've been made. That kind of thing.

Now that we're all cheered up, my own particular rants on the issues between Ray and Rod, and the striking parallels, similarities, and differences in their lives, can be found here:

https://raybradburyboard.com/eve/forums/a/tpc/f/3791083901/m/5131026901

and here:

https://raybradburyboard.com/eve/forums/a/tpc/f/379108390...531009901#8531009901

You know, I read Winesburg, Ohio, and didn't see all that much point to it, the way I do with "The Martian Chronicles." I also plan to read "Spoon River Anthology," a similar work said to have inspired "The Martian Chronicles," and anticipate much the same result.

Time later to review posts pointed out by dandelion....but one comment I must now make:

Made mention of this before (and without going into the archives) let me briefly re-state it:

Met science-fiction writer Poul Anderson when he was at the top of his form. I was awed that he seemed to exude a God-inspired demeanor in his writings and persona. So when I asked him about his belief in God, he simply answered with... "I don't believe in God". That comment is forever chiseled in my memory as an ...impossible to imagine comment. In other words, how can a man who seems to write about God things, whereby his personality seems to reek with God gifts, 'NOT' be aware of what's happening here?!

THIS in itself is a mystery...that one doesn't look inside to deal with...but rather pushes aside. Too many push-asides...and it's all soon replaced by one's own damaged nature...

Hemingway's "In Our Time" seems much more evocative of what Bradbury is doing in "Martian Chronicles", in that the stories are much more closely tied together. In "Martian Chronicles" it is a series of exploratory missions that show the "spaceward" movement of man to study, invade and inhabit a new frontier. The stories are not necessarily related by characters, or even plot, but by the fact that they are chronicles of the movement to Mars as a habitation of man. In Hemingway's "In Our Time", the stories are tied together in a character and deal with that character's growth through disillusionment and then to coming up with a way to deal with that disillusionment in a constructive way. (At least, the most constructive way possible, given a kind of existentialist world view.)It may be that "Windesburg, OH" is similar to "In Our Time" in that it seems to deal with an attempt to create wholeness in it's narratives.

That sounds like a great book which I've been meaning to read. My dad taught it in high school English, along with "Our Town." I believe "Our Town" is one of the best literary examples ever--in studying the lives of several characters in a certain time and place, Thornton Wilder touches on deep universal truths. My mom knew someone who met him once and called him, "Such a wise man, you didn't even have to tell him anything. He just knew."

That is exactly the impression I had on meeting Bradbury. Except for the God thing. That is a real puzzle. The same thing with Bradbury's best friend Forrest J. Ackerman. Told me point blank, which I have on tape, that there IS no higher power and there IS no survival of anybody, of any kind, in any form, after death. Leaving a lot less explanations for the inexplicable--part of the inexplicable being why are these such nice guys? What keeps them going AT ALL, nice or not? Now, someone ought to write a book about THAT!

In one respect, I must take exception with Bonk Johnston's review. It seems to imply that all Sam Weller did in his research was talk to Ray Bradbury in person and by phone and take his word for things. This is far from the case. Weller interviewed many people and did a tremendous amount of research checking and cross-checking the facts. I do absolutely agree he could have gone further as far as the part involving Serling, but this does not reflect on the overall value of the book.

This thread is hereby being bumped up for the edification and benefit of Rabbit.

Thank you again!