I CAME LATE TO THE RAY BRADBURY PARTY.  It was a couple of years ago.  Donald Miller had spoken highly of Bradbury’s collection of essays on writing: Zen and the Art of Writing.  Somewhere around there I found my way to Fahrenheit 451.  Both books blew me away.  I had heard of Bradbury’s great novel, of course, heard it referenced here and there.  But to read it?  A strange but powerful revelation.

Fahrenheit 451 was a revelation because I’m a reader surrounded by non-readers.  It’s not the people around me hate books; they just don’t have the time to read and then don’t say anything about what they have time for.  My students, God bless them, read less and less each year.  Reading allows for at least some sense of distance from everyday life, gives you a broader horizon to view life against.  I wish every one of my students, my co-workers, my friends could have a Guy Montag series of moments, of revelations about the power of books.

The title and cover of Zen and the Art of Writing were major turn-offs for me.  Brightly colored with cheesy font, title all but ripped of from another work (assuming the other came first).  But the insides? Potent stuff.  Something about his style: honest and true, scalding like magma.  It was from his essay “The Joy of Writing” that I took the title of the blog between my last one and this: “I claim no victory.  But there was blood on my gloves when I hung them up.”  That’s what writing was about to him: fighting through your loves and hates, your joys and sorrows.

While I am saddened to hear of Bradbury’s passing, I’m glad I found my way to him.  I haven’t made it beyond these two books, but I now find myself referring to them often (along with giving copies when appropriate).  Makes me think twice about how flippantly I may treat the written and printed word.

(Image courtesy of The Guardian UK)