Listen to the Echoes
LISTEN TO THE ECHOES
Listen to the Echoes
The Ray Bradbury Interviews
©2010 Sam Weller
First Melville House printing: June 2010
Melville House Publishing
145 Plymouth Street
Brooklyn, NY 11201
Stop Smiling Books
1371 N. Milwaukee Avenue
Chicago, IL 60622
www.mhpbooks.com
www.stopsmilingbooks.com
eISBN: 978-1-61219-230-7
Cover Photograph: Photofest
Unless otherwise credited, all archival photographs courtesy of Ray Bradbury
Library of Congress Control Number: 2010926572
v3.1
For my two amazing fathers
WILLIAM WELLER and RAY BRADBURY
CONTENTS
Cover
Title Page
Copyright
Dedication
Foreword by Black Francis
Introduction
Chapter One: CHILDHOOD
Chapter Two: HOLLYWOOD
Chapter Three: FAME AND CELEBRITY
Chapter Four: FAMOUS FRIENDS
Chapter Five: HIS OWN WORK
Chapter Six: FAITH
Chapter Seven: ART AND LITERATURE
Chapter Eight: POLITICS
Chapter Nine: SEXUALITY
Chapter Ten: WRITING AND CREATIVITY
Chapter Eleven: SCIENCE FICTION
Chapter Twelve: LIFE, LIVING & THE PURSUIT OF HAPPINESS
Chapter Thirteen: VISIONS OF THE FUTURE
Appendix: THE LOST PARIS REVIEW INTERVIEW
Acknowledgements
About the Author
FOREWORD
In the beginning there was no Ray Bradbury, just his words. I had no need for Ray Bradbury the man, because I had his words. I was fourteen years old and I was deep into his words. The Illustrated Man. The Martian Chronicles. The October Country. At that time I probably couldn’t have told you why I liked his books; I just did. I can’t even really explain it now, but I read them and they prompted me to start writing down my own words. My high school English teacher gave me permission to ignore lessons so I could just write. He was validating my creative instincts, but Ray Bradbury had validated me first.
Now I think of Ray Bradbury the man, and I often think of pizza in a cardboard box. The first time I ever saw his face he was eating a take-out pizza. There were probably 400 other people there in the room at Chatsworth High School in the San Fernando Valley. I was in my 30s, and we were all watching Ray Bradbury eat his pizza. It didn’t bother anyone that he didn’t offer to share, which would have been silly because of the size of the crowd. He apologized for having the pie brought in at the end of his speech, but he had given it his all and he was hot and tired and he needed fuel. He wasn’t going to take it in the back room because he knew we all wanted his autograph. Four hundred people waited in line patiently to get something signed, including me, and to perhaps exchange a few personal words with the man who had us under his spell, most of us long before that day. He had told us about his life, about the many things he loved, his ups and downs, his adventures, about space, writing, movies, war, fear, comedy, love, death, horror, ecstasy; he seemed to be relishing the whole thing, and so it was so satisfying for us to see him, of course, loving his pizza.
I heard him speak again a couple of years later, and one time I even got to interview him on the telephone for the LA Weekly—a milestone for me. But those words in his books still caress with love. The words are not all happy, but they are all beamed out from a heart hopelessly in love. They can be dark yet they whisper sweet, sweet love. Ray Bradbury loves you. He loves the whole damn thing, from the most distant burning star to your silly haircut. It’s a Jacques Tati love, a Yoko Ono love, an Alfred Hitchcock kind of love. It’s not fiction. It’s a human saying yes to life itself, yes, yes, yes. Ray Bradbury validates not only humanity but every molecule in this exploding soup of a universe. This is the spirit that haunts his words, the spirit that shines through on every page of this fascinating book of interviews.
I made a record called The Cult of Ray, which has a song on it called “The Cult of Ray.” The rhyme can be called weak, but I think it expresses my feelings about him.
What is there to say?
Still I can’t be silent
Hear the Cult of Ray
And you’ll be enlightened
Black Francis
Los Angeles, California
LISTEN TO THE ECHOES
INTRODUCTION
Ray Bradbury once wrote a teleplay for a short film titled, “The Great Shout of the Universe.” It was a musing on the miraculous formation of the cosmos—a classic Bradburian consecration of life and creation. Looking over the conversations contained in this book—interviews that I conducted with the author over the course of nearly a decade—it becomes readily apparent to me that with his film title, Bradbury could well have been referring to himself.
He is outspoken, vociferous, brimming over with joie de vivre. He is a confetti storm of a man, a celebratory blizzard of color and kinetic energy. He is also undaunted when it comes to sharing his often controversial opinions, from politics, to faith, to the state of contemporary cinema and much more. All of this emerges in the pages of this book.
Bradbury is one of the great idea men of twentieth century literature, a remarkably prolific writer who has explored his many philosophies, moral viewpoints, and humanistic themes through a colorful prism of poetic language and fantastic fable. Literary critics, scholars, and mainstream readers alike have hailed him for his imaginative concepts, rich use of metaphor, and lyrical language.
In “There Will Come Soft Rains,” the house of the future goes through its daily machinations, even after humanity has been eradicated by nuclear annihilation: The voice clock still sings the hour, the stove browns toast and fries eggs, robotic mice glide to and fro, vacuuming the living space of the recently deceased.
In “The Swan,” a young man at the beginning of his life meets an old woman at the end of her days, and they come to realize that they are soul mates who have met at the wrong point in time.
In “A Sound of Thunder,” a time traveler steps on a butterfly and returns to the present to find his world irrevocably altered. (Through this tale, the term “butterfly effect” entered the language as a metaphor for our smallest daily decisions having universal implications.)
And, of course, with the October 1953 publication of his opus, Fahrenheit 451, Bradbury established himself as a visionary. In this dystopian masterwork, he predicted, among other technological and cultural prognostications: flat panel televisions, ear-bud headphones, 24-hour banking machines, live television broadcasts of fugitive chases, the rise of teen violence and school shootings, the decline of newspapers, and the demise of literary reading. Yet with all of Ray Bradbury’s vision, originality, and prolificacy (some 600 published short stories and seventy significant trade and limited edition books), little has been done to document the personal philosophies and opinions that have inspired so many of his narrative concepts. Even in the biography I wrote, The Bradbury Chronicles: The Life of Ray Bradbury (William Morrow, 2005), there was only so much latitude to examine the author’s contemporary viewpoints.
And Bradbury tells it like it is. He is a deeply opinionated man. And why shouldn’t he be? As I write this, Bradbury is on the precipice of entering the rarified realm of the nonagenarian. Through so much of his nine decades of life, he has encountered, known, and worked with a sweeping roster of historical and cultural notables. As a child, he sat on the knees of Civil War veterans. Later, as the oft-recognized “poet of the rocket age,” he befriended many of the Me
rcury and Apollo astronauts, who, incidentally, read his books and were inspired to dream for the stars.
From the veterans of Antietam, to the veterans of the Sea of Tranquility, Ray Bradbury has witnessed and celebrated a century of unprecedented global progress and change. His is a quintessentially American story.
Along with books such as Fahrenheit 451, The Martian Chronicles, and The Illustrated Man, he has worked and crossed paths with Walt Disney, Alfred Hitchcock, Rod Serling, Chuck Jones, and John Huston. Bradbury has worked in film, radio, television, comic books, theater, and architecture. As a result of this varied career, Bradbury has things to say, stories to tell, and ideas and opinions on just about every topic. And in listening to him—his thoughts, his memories, his ideas—one thing more than any other shimmers at the surface: He loves life. LOVE with all capital letters. And he is not timid about expressing his gratitude.
I sat down for my first interview with Bradbury on Memorial Day weekend, 2000, for a cover story for the Chicago Tribune Magazine. That feature story ultimately morphed into my 2005 biography of the literary icon. Over the course of working on that book, I clocked hundreds of hours of conversations with Bradbury, traveling every two or three weeks from my home in Chicago to his home in Los Angeles. Even after the book was published, as his biographer I continued to visit his home to document more of his continually unfolding legacy.
In working with Bradbury, there were many, many privileged and decidedly surreal moments. In the autumn of 2004, we called upon two diametrically opposed, yet unequivocally American domiciles—the Playboy Mansion and the White House. In a short span of days, we shook hands with Hugh Hefner and George W. Bush.
When we drove up the winding entrance of the Playboy Mansion, we passed a yellow road sign cautioning: “Bunny Crossing.” Upon pulling up to the Mansion, indeed, a trio of Hefner’s photo-friendly cottontails, garbed in skin-tight lycra workout gear, roamed free about the spongy front lawn.
“I’m never leaving!” proclaimed Ray Bradbury.
At the White House, George W. Bush pushed Ray Bradbury around the Oval Office in his wheelchair. Karl Rove, advisor, deputy chief-of-staff, and controversial lightning rod, was so giddy upon meeting Bradbury, he nearly shook the author’s arm off while professing his love for The Martian Chronicles.
From the Grotto to the West Wing, these are the everyday voyages of Ray Douglas Bradbury.
Bradbury was born on August 22, 1920, in Waukegan, Illinois. The son of a local utility lineman, he was a child reared on popular culture. At an early age, he was inundated by cinema, traveling circuses, comic strips, illustrated children’s books, stage magicians, and the literature of the fantastic—including the works of Poe, Baum, Burroughs, Dickens, Verne, and Wells. When he began writing at the age of twelve, it was his steadfast dream to one day find his books shelved alongside his literary fantasist heroes. Amazingly, fueled by the high octane of his creative passion, he did exactly that.
Bradbury came of age during the Great Depression, a child of modest means, his family moved to Los Angeles during the golden age of cinema. A rabid film devotee, the teenager found himself surrounded by Hollywood’s greatest stars.
He established himself as a writer in the Forties: first in the literary ghetto of the pulp fiction magazines, then in slicks such as Harper’s, Mademoiselle, and The New Yorker. He later went on to shape all the mediums of popular culture that helped shape him as an imaginative child. His second book, The Martian Chronicles, brought literary credibility to the often ostracized genre of science fiction. Today, Fahrenheit 451 is a staple of grade school curricula. During his lifetime, Bradbury has attracted an impressive fan club of intellectuals and visionaries that includes Christopher Isherwood, Fritz Lang, Aldous Huxley, and renaissance scholar Bernard Berenson. In the span of his storied career, Bradbury has influenced a diverse range of creators and dreamers—from author Stephen King to Apple computer co-founder Steve Wozniak.
Author William F. Nolan, arguably the first Bradbury scholar (Nolan published The Ray Bradbury Review, an examination of Bradbury’s work, in 1952), notes that, “Bradbury is, after Ernest Hemingway, the most influential writer of the 20th century. His work has influenced writers young and old. You can talk to any writer in any field and they will tell you that they have read Bradbury and been influenced by him.”
His cultural impact extends beyond the boundaries of planet Earth. NASA named a crater on the moon, as well as an asteroid, for this prolific American creator. His books are numerous and beloved, the achievements and accolades multitudinous.
In this book of interviews, you will encounter Ray Bradbury unfiltered and unplugged. He is, at turns, funny, impassioned, opinionated, poetic, and surprising. The conversations in this book transpired between May 2000 and January 2010 in the back of limos, at posh LA restaurants, and into the late hours sitting in the Bradbury home surrounded by books and cats and half-empty bottles of wine.
Here you will find Bradbury’s opinions on everything from his religious beliefs to the presidential candidates he supported over the decades. He muses on the origins of many of his short stories, and illuminates the creative process that has made him one of the most prolific writers of his time. Bradbury shares stories about love, sex, and the secret to his hopeful outlook on life and living. He shares the tales and encounters from his childhood spent traversing the star-studded streets of old Hollywood. And as his career took off into the literary stratosphere, he muses on his relationships with many of the twentieth century’s greatest artists and creators.
Ray Bradbury is a master storyteller. In Listen to the Echoes, the subject of his captivating tales is himself. Befitting the author of Fahrenheit 451—one of literature’s great opponents of censorship—Bradbury spares no opinion and censors nothing. In these pages, you will discover the Great Shout of the Universe.
Sam Weller
Chicago, Illinois
April 2010
chapter one
CHILDHOOD
RAY BRADBURY IS THE POSTER CHILD FOR THE IMPORTANCE OF EARLY childhood development. For him, so much points back to the formative years: dinosaurs, Mars, and Egypt, not to mention carnivals, freak-show tents, and dark locomotives lumbering into town in the shadow-hours before dawn.
Then there are the early, profound literary influences: L. Frank Baum, Edgar Allan Poe, Edgar Rice Burroughs, H.G. Wells, and Jules Verne. Cinema and pulp magazines and comic strips, along with lavishly illustrated tomes of children’s fables, filled Ray Bradbury’s wide-eyed boyhood, as did World’s Fairs, architecture, and enigmatic stage magicians.
Even at the age of 89, he is still the quintessential man-child. He is just as likely to be found reading the prefaces of George Bernard Shaw as the early comic-strip reprints of Prince Valiant.
Venturing into his home in a manicured enclave of West Los Angeles, you notice it right away. There are toys everywhere. Oversized stuffed animals sit perched on the furniture in the spacious living room—giant lions and dogs—even a human-sized Bullwinkle the Moose sits in a cushioned chair. The room is a fine representation of the dichotomy that is pure Bradbury. Clean, white, floor-to-ceiling bookcases are packed with weighty volumes on world history, philosophy, religion, architecture, and art. There are shelves lined with rare Bradbury first editions. Stunning original landscape paintings by Eyvind Earle, the background artist on the Disney film Sleeping Beauty, adorn the walls. Gleaming Cable Ace Awards line the mantel over the fireplace, accolades garnered for the television program The Ray Bradbury Theater.
In the dining room, next to the long, honey-colored table, is a small shelf. On it rests a shrine to Bradbury’s great childhood mentor, his beloved Aunt Neva, who first introduced him to so many seminal influences—Poe and Baum and Grimm’s fairy tales, among others. There is a black-and-white picture of Neva, circa 1925, with her striking gray, crystalline eyes. One of Neva’s small paintings is there, a framed portrait of a child and a dog. In a small gold urn rest Neva’s ashes. Nev
ada Marion Bradbury, nine years Ray Bradbury’s senior, passed away March 16, 2001.
Throughout the house—more toys. A small tin robot atop a tiny bicycle pushes an ice cream cart. A massive hand-carved wooden Tyrannosaurus Rex bares its needle-like teeth. A limited-edition Hot Wheels-brand Mars Rover traverses a cluttered tabletop landscape of envelopes and stationery. And then there are more and more and more stuffed animals.
Bradbury is the first to make the point. He has grown and acquired adult intellectual tastes, but he also never loosened his grip on youth. And it is this connection, this inseparable and vital partnership with his younger self, he insists, that led to his success as a writer and visionary.
WELLER: From Dandelion Wine to Something Wicked This Way Comes—and in many of your short stories—you write about childhood. It is one of the predominant themes of your oeuvre. Why do you suppose you have returned so regularly to your own childhood in your writing?
BRADBURY: It’s going back to your own myth, going back to your root system. It’s not just your childhood, but all the things that were important. It’s going back to The Hunchback of Notre Dame, to The Phantom of the Opera, to Edgar Rice Burroughs’ Mars books; it’s going back to dinosaurs. I’ve never lost track of that root system. And most of my books wouldn’t exist without that. I wouldn’t have gotten the job writing Moby Dick if I hadn’t stayed in love with dinosaurs. That one story about the dinosaur falling in love with the lighthouse, “The Fog Horn,” is why John Huston hired me for Moby Dick. He read it and later told me that he sensed the ghost of Melville in that story.
WELLER: What is your earliest childhood memory?
BRADBURY: I remember the day I was born. I have what might be called almost total recall back to my birth. This is a thing I have debated with psychologists and with friends over the years. They say, “It’s impossible.” Yet I remember. My response to people who say, “It’s impossible” is: “Were you there? Because I was.” I was a ten-month baby, you see. Most people are in the womb for nine months, but when you stay in the womb for ten months you develop your eyesight and your hearing. So when I was born, I remembered it.