Whenever people ask me who has influenced my writing, they’re generally surprised by my response. After waffling on about how everyone I ever read has contributed to my style and approach, I generally cite one author as the greatest influence, and it’s not who you’d probably guess. It’s Ray Bradbury, who died last night.
I started reading Bradbury’s short story collections when I was quite young, long before that other guy was publishing stuff. R is for Rocket, S is for Space, A Medicine for Melancholy, The Illustrated Man, and the list goes on. Stories about rockets and space, yes, but also tales about a young couple whose romance is built around their mutual love of Laurel and Hardy or the story of a young boy who suddenly realizes there’s a skeleton inside his body. Poignant, thoughtful, mind-expanding stories written by a man who, regardless of his age, always had a little boy inside his body. His delight at the universe and its infinite possibilities always showed in his work. Many have attempted to imitate his style, but they’ve lacked his fundamental glee so they’ve been pale imitations at best. My story “The View from the Top” is about the closest I’ve ever come to homage, but it’s nowhere in Bradbury’s league. Not even in the same universe.
I’ve tried to keep up with his work over the years. I was delighted by his novels Death is a Lonely Business and A Graveyard for Lunatics, and when I mentioned Green Shadows, White Whale when I finally got the chance to meet him in 1995, he seemed pleased that I picked that book to cite. It’s a fictionalized memoir of the year he spent in Ireland writing the screenplay of Moby Dick with John Huston, and it’s chock full of classic Bradbury stories blended with Irish mythology and the love of stories that is characteristic of the Irish people. The Banshee is one of my favorite short stories of all time.
I could go on and on. How influential was Something Wicked This Way Comes or Dandelion Wine on the younger me? How fascinating is the title story in The Toynbee Convector? How delightful the oddball family in From the Dust Returned?
He lived a full life, and my life is much richer for having spent hours and hours inside his imagination. Eternal thanks to my wife who found out about his visit to Houston, got tickets to his talk and ventured off to buy a disposable camera at a convenience store to capture the moment while I waited in line to get my copy of Fahrenheit 451 signed.
