The State of Things; Ray Bradbury

this is the state of things on frank station burning desire to you know imagine desiring ray bradbury imagines a world full of people who share just that desire to science fiction classic fahrenheit four five one turns fifty this year and many of its themes are more relevant today than the day they were written policies a one column two sons is a headline then in midair all of the dishes were old man's mines run so fast under the pumping hands of the publishers of voters broadcasters that the centrifuge things off all unnecessary time wasting thought ray bradbury's our guest and take your calls this hour of the state of things it's been extended mix this is the state of things i'm frank stay show a guest today is ray bradbury this marks the fiftieth anniversary of the publication of his book fahrenheit four five one a novel that imagines a

future dystopian we're reading and literacy are banned by the government in the name of equality is a world of large interactive television sets but no books the central character montag is a fireman in his television set these task is not to prevent fires but in fact the burned books and libraries it was a pleasure to work it was a special pleasure to see things he couldn't see things like and it changed with a brass muslim his fists with his great python spitting is that was cursing upon the world the blood found in his bed and his hands were the hands of some amazing conductor playing all the civilians of blazing and burning taylor's of history next month the book will be read and talked about across wake county as part of the library sponsored wake reads together program library patrons voted

and shows fahrenheit four five one is the book to read and ray bradbury as i said is my guest day you can join us also by giving us a call at one eight seven seven nine six to nine eight six to eight seven seven nine six to nine eight six to ray bradberry welcome it is such a great pleasure to have you on the program and talking about this book at this sermon at this time in our history a tussle with that though for fahrenheit four five one we're introduced to a fireman and set fires their houses a multitude of television screens no books society has chosen and this is an important element of the book to give up civil liberties of the freedom to read a freedom fought in order to make people equal what was on your mind in the late nineteen forties as you began to write a story that would evolve into fahrenheit four five or eight you were just a one hour lecture and there's a standing where to talk about the

book to them a lot of earth person there or do your whoever wins this letter my life that when i discovered the center is your would be years have been burned in some places like they're under you know when you're a girl to buy ita that they're warm barn prepares and remember brin the books in berlin and then we heard rumors of course what russia was doing is he with books destroying them quietly mouth like so over the years i began to fear for the for the future of our worries and i began to

write short stories about the short stories of entry will that bring to a question i've always wanted to put you in that is whether you thought you were writing a kind of prophecy or was fahrenheit four five one an allegory about the times you're living would begin to really happen the road to overthrow the things that begin to roll but margie from the arctic were back together again you say it's going to held one of the things about the system today and the changes that have taken place that lead you to say

your luggage you reading and writing with new or should be taught in kindergarten and first grade mary oliver pretty great regret at all or at a recruiting trip on a reboot right of world war ii up to the very great with no education in reading and writing by the time they get the eighth grader in the tenth grade they'd they're not good routine riders tell us your gates we'll discuss the many of the themes in the book and i want to talk about love those in the hour that we have the money to back to the book for a second the idea of a fireman who who burned books and where did that idea come from luke top of the fire station and walk you know more

than my dad knew all the farmland there are not going to leave the denomination dark said that this is all my life going to the lake and the farmers of marketing korean are americans very very warm so i suppose i remembered that experience with the firemen and then i wrote some articles a fifty five years ago about a future that might possibly have every warm completely fireproof you would be put together with material that wouldn't worry about was about noon the next step was well he can catch fire and burn wood ego do with the harmonies and the world are meant to go out and start fires were in the mouth rule book i'm interested to do to see how

these ideas came together in your mind because i understand how to come together quickly you were writing this story on on a rent a typewriter in the basement of the ucla ucla library is iran every sport to reform so walking around the usual it happens one day more than fifty years ago and in the other room the character margaret everywhere mr parrish you through your room whoa whoa are brothers paula second movement sending you know about the law when i go about it but i'm so moved and

typing room and in the bottom of the harbor of their own mind they heard from nine dollars and eighty five and beyond that i receive recruiting for part one let me steer you're lying because you said that you said that this this makes this the original dime novel so this is amazing so this thing has just flew off your fingertips in just a few days or fortunately for me her record running of all court for quote was you every fifth rib eight years in between sessions at the piper looking the book's opening them find new court appointment in the manuscript and rolling back the blind shrimp to finish the book we talk about the year of the greater resonance of

writing this book you know in a library but then the book became a movie and of course one of the themes in your in your book is about the use of the dangers of mass culture and and how were moving away from a literate society to sort of multimedia society that that's not a word you use in the book how did you feel about this book becoming a movie and that is the kind of objective agreement on it but don't feel bad go home and the final product of course was a mixture of foreign film work very well are rumors an excellent performer and the hero can start the grupo made a fatal mistake oh the wire with the same actors was very confusing and the he looked out the fog

you have thought they were that the largest war ii so we're going into your home is the next year all of the rights to produce it and frank there about that wonderful writer director of the shawshank redemption suit screenplay and then direct the film i'll really look forward douglas ok well then i'll say i'm i didn't pay to get a little bit back again you know to the business about ms casting and in their the truffaut movie not only did the same as great actors play both the lead roles female roles but the lead role of do you prefer clarice are clears mary c up occurs they called aquarius in the movie but the owl farm when she was much older than she should a damage should be a teenage girls that makes your clearly what role and

leads the fighting in the book and in the the play the opera for over one from a common form of a fifteen year old girl in ramallah at the bureau closed grange then he'd paid to monitor to fall in love with books as you'd hardly knows what you're doing there and where they are to come and where the fun comes in that's completely missing susan and i wrote the book should happen to work well i never question my characters with a common demand for it they want they care about the record or my larry levine

lawyer we're going to let you speak as well to our guest ray bradbury here with us today on the state of things talking about his classic fahrenheit four five one also john kasell will join as he's the director of creative writing at north carolina state stay with us nino welcome back to the state of things i'm frank stay show my guest today ray bradbury support for the state of things come from the corporation for public broadcasting and people like you to support wu and see this that we're talking with ray bradbury about his book fahrenheit four five one and were taken your calls at eight seven seven nine six to nine eight six do you can send us an email at s o t a w unc dot org also joining us now is john cassel who teaches science it's fiction he's the director of creative writing at north carolina state now teaches creative writing as i said and also science fiction literature and john welcome to the

program thank you could hear what would you remember do you remember reading fahrenheit four five when the person you must tell you i don't put a stone science fiction fan i bore nineteen fifty and i was exactly the right age and into the fifties fall in love with a rubber his work i read all the books are for rocket us for space everything martian chronicles and fahrenheit four five one i remember reading it in and i guess the political implications didn't hit me much when i was ten years old i was i was really taken with the story and i was exactly the kind of library rat that <unk> bribery talks about it i love the library i was librarians pat i'd be there every week picking out twelve books and so the idea to bring a box was exactly that the kind of thing that would catch my imagination ray will you retire him of the year the political implications of this thing of course initially you think about the horror of burning books in the last of our history and legacy of the people the interesting thing to me about the book gray is that

unlike say a nineteen eighty four that represents this apocalyptic vision you're talking about a totalitarian states armed group ruthless maniacs to run the world is about you and me giving up a right to to know and our right to have our history because it's just plain easier for us or we go educational loans you pay attention to that part of the law a remark so far not really giving about you loving it vanish with so we have to heat to it that in the next few years we put together a strong kindergarten to improve growth that really are running during that period but i wonder why that's happening it seems to

me that if that has gone out of her education process there is some element of public will that has to contribute to that we have to have allowed that to happen for it to be part of our education is a democracy after all what accommodation of lazy teachers really think we have to make them pull up its parks and then begin the cajun pay attention and a lot of that of course is the development of the abortion rights movement more with children being raised without a full permit your educational i wonder how many i wonder how many parents and teachers and maybe those who then taxpayers who would agree with bd the that for the service the firemen here who does his speech about it out on the movie for a moment where he talks about the reason that that is perfectly okay to burn books let's let your of movie

recently month it wants to each farm at least once his career he just itches to know what these political about it just baked to know that so one time i was in montana there's nothing there but have nothing to say there is almost all the people that never existed to be able to read the minutes an unhappy with aromas makes modern in other ways they can never really be a long long time or his philosophy thinkers philosophers owns a second dissenting only highlight the others are all idiots once injured that examined the next episode of freedom of choice a lot of them out of fashion that's all the last minute just like drop ss this year versus next year

it isn't about lung cancer is your cigarette smokers get into an executive of these of mine we burn it it's no good month and we've all got to be like you're going to be happy for anyone to be made equals so there must learn the post punk diet or all the focus seems to be a very important theme re in the book it says airstrikes means more than just laziness this is people who have willed themselves to forget their past and give up their legacy in because it's just a lot simpler walter with that the growth of the political correctness we continued free speech were afraid to speak her mind where an attack came from and for argentina though says so worried the voice

paul for a list of bribery are out what things it's in the book that i don't remember in the film and it's scary pure isn't very interesting to me is that the whole story takes place against the background of war and preparations for war they're screaming of jet planes over a city and and yet the people don't seem to be interested in that they spend their time watching the television essentially they're watching joe millionaire or survivor or interactive tv shows and i wondered if you have a purpose in and bring it having that war background there or i wrote the book and we were just a few years away from in a way thought experiment and for paul and we were having the big competition with russia of course and we lived in fear of the oven eric nuclear war or not true or put that in the book but

in the years when i wrote a play and we do the motion picture it was an obscure their wars of background who might have neglected came by ignoring the educational didn't need the war the songs that he is on the line yuan and i'm very being here and for fifty one i read it when i lived in and how people at a college and my intuition and the price of that and i really like the new animal farm in high school they were open and kind of deficient the things that were going on around here remembering that you have you be a little bit more thoughtful and i think that it could go the day that my children that i teach and how they do they don't think they don't have a question about what we're telling them they

complain that they're in canada they're in contact and actually go through who i am all that wouldn't we have an education being up at home mother of three children we've invited a hopeful because like children that i teach for that they call us and them and it's really the pride night the with the kind of warrior ethic of it that we have now dropped but what the committee that they'd have an arm fahrenheit four five when it seemed to be i am very protective today and i feel like we need to kind of go back and read the great author the great writers that we can think well read welcome speak well and i think if one of half ounce or children that they can be about and ann before he thinks listed response vocal well he's proving once again

that we are further complete shakeup over a judicial woes you're welcome the group plays is there a problem jack as elle i'm interested to know at the college level how your students respond to this book i mean do they see this is an urgent problem sculpture at that that's pretty interesting and i think they do respond to it but it also i think sometimes i'm very cynical attitude and waterways the students who come into to college now are just as they're really trained in a video culture and they're they're just as distracted by that television and an image or images as old as some of the characters in the book i think they think they're quite capable of serious thought and i i really enjoy engaging them on this but they did they often haven't

really taken a timer or been challenged to do this about if you put the book in front of them they will they will respond and then that is it has a curious problem and any idea of learning or forgetting how to read and re certainly you you touch on this possibility that that in fact even as the themes are read out loud people can't power outlets is that it's not so much that they don't know how to read but that that reading is boring comparison to a movie that has been our exposure is every minute or a tv show we're now they're being titillated and in a dozen different ways and amber book as passive you know you have to you have to bring something to the book yourself you have to let you have to turn off the stereo cocaine you have to be in a quiet room and end with a light in front of you in the book and and let your mind fall be captured by the book and that's a that's a more active thing and then then television recently to the senses it's a boring thing that ray as you point out in the book when you read the passages themselves

they become very volatile and when when lamontagne reads to his wife's friends their shaken up because this is somehow reaching a core that the television doesn't get even the interactive television asked what would you do mildred you know when she votes them off the island or whatever she does that the fact is i wonder how much readers to day or students today are afraid of feeling bad that deep compassion inside that stirred by literature re read trying to get at some of them and was that part of what you were thinking when you're writing about war you know early years young readers into new pope said noting that one for europe they were read more boring or hear about her memory to begin with all through the early grave the world war ii era the boys in education and i should do something to help their attention and make a reading

the mercury letters over the years from the young man an older man who is a bank for them book robert heinlein arthur clarke a lot of my shelves that gave them a motive for reading the idea that ritual they couldn't it's seven seven nine six to nine eight six to the number of calls you want to join our conversation with ray bradbury jimmy is on the line from chapel hill i journey i know thank you know the amateurs with bribery one and i'm a big fan and i have been for a long time are many of your book and and it's interesting what you say about introducing kids artillery literature young age to find fiction because that's exactly what happened with me out with your book another one and as i remembered them and people often do with the treasure this child that found that there were different levels

but i couldn't join anti group of individual or three more like poetry i am an effect manage it for more profound level are an obama mccain no television came to effective differently but what it did it bring everything in its own referendum have music to underscore mood cast over how to feel about particular thanks and tv is the main media ethics teaching our children now and i'm wondering if i can compete with that compete with a visual medium we have to warn people to watch local television news it's all reduced murders he was tired and

funerals but again this a canadian winters and a list of the radio wars sherrod who wrote where your work but the great thing about four years ago what you do sami are the education that into the road to the job of tissue review of the party you clearly had tv in mind when you began writing this book i say that you can tell me i'm wrong but if this was in the late forties when the first iteration of this book came out of the typewriter was coming in imports was it then and were did you see television becoming the influence that it has become today oh you were going to reveal the river much like what happened in tv later there were heater

interactive radio shows they published regime in chicago tribune and you read descriptions the voices on the radio and play a part they love to actually open and the people only great year with the client and the new response so from that beginning of the most thorough i was forty years old there were very low who knows which you're an abomination in the the immediate up but the immediate excitement is what the va is offering of them to play ball with fatal there's a moment late in the book that i didn't remember from when i was a kid but he re reading at it it strikes me as very powerful and that's where montana's speaking two

million her friends who are sitting in the library and he turns off the television and he reads dover beach to them and it's it's it's really breathtaking because he wrote one of the women in particular who then she breaks down and and it strikes me that it's very poignant that this woman is trapped up watching television while i think for her first husband's divorced her second husband died in the war and she's barely avoiding dealing with these realities by living in the world of the television and i thought that was a very very heart rending repeat that while the grape i think that won't heal groups porter wrote and the i made you said i read that cells from a plant over a period of fifty years the new great book of poetry is a constant reminder of the situation and more than a matter of reading a book of poetry reacquire withdraw or

you are with certain melancholy and a car you could become a live leisure philosopher one of the good book of portraits you turn are alarmed over and he where we are where we've been and where we're going and that's what mark i did when he rode over beach to the women and to give them to promote you can hear where hell they were going with their lives it does strike me that arrive at this is always been evident to educators certainly to writers that what you just said about the importance of literature and passing it on and how to hold a society and individuals together and we talk about his education process that seems to have broken down and forgotten how to do that or refusing to do that and it does strike me that there must be something deeper something must've been lost in the process in it's not just a question of us not wanting to do that has always been the point of education and wondering if we get it back on the news

it's is this just a matter of a pep talk or is it something that's happened to us changed so radically in the society would last forever no we we had not the park we have to shout who are teachers in kindergarten and when the process began the program that students are really to be taught when you're only four years ago you were really torn to read and to write there were not doing that if the curriculum for rich law in america to be sure the kids get other recruits they can realize that the chair of unseen under them and exploiting them to the potential of being a lot of my guests are author ray bradbury author fahrenheit four five one a novel that turns fifty this year this year and john cassel who is the director of creative writing and nc state you can join us as well by calling one eight seven seven nine six to nineteen sixty were sending an email address or t a w and c dot org a

conversation with ray bradbury continues after this nice welcome back to the state of things i'm frank stay show my guest today ray bradbury author fahrenheit four five one also joining us today is john cassel who's the director of creative writing at nc state you can join us for calling one eight seven seven nine six to ninety six to worsening

as an email address or tea at the blue unc dot org ray bradbury you have said that you really really written only once science fiction work and that was verified four five one in the rest of the work is the fantasy and you know english between the two well thank you writing about things that are partial the martin palmer cool system portable book not the europe that the ritual in all he of our world the fear of march i have the men when they land they're what robert their fault there will come a tall crane which is live special coverage of all eighth the living and creating long after people are dead or you could build other day so the eu could make a virtual reality house it's

unclear if or maybe fifty thousand dollars when i wrote this story that would record yours who knew with the recovery i wonder if there was bribery fewer run across some science fiction critics have pointed out that you're science fiction stories in some ways are anti science fiction in the sense that the future and the technology that we see is not not really promoted so much as it is on to promote or does promote it and and there's a more of a desire for retrieving the pastor says at a fair comment i don't think so i think the misinterpret of the story just mentioned spoke on the top range cleared for a deal for good or for evil

joined the converter and which i imagine a future that i create and the mind but with technology where we can survive they can turn that negative with them more mr hall oh you do set i feel sad and i just want to mention that a rapper you know most fiction and fantasy writers really are built for the pros work but reading some of your prose especially in something wicked this way really exist you know i've written a book about all of it approaches the surface so the great drama it i haven't

confirmed in fifty years ago charles logan the great english actor and he one day when i would have the meeting with him that rape ever do remember your report bobby afraid of putting that are the page and to in the moment of truth the word that my place in the mormon church for and i was not afraid of the moment cruz said that the eu they reckon this way comes the moment when you can see are the nature of good and evil and the history of good new in the world john kessler when you teach ray bradbury i do talk about the prose as well as the themes very much one of the major points i try to make up for this rubber his work is that he comes in it and start writing in the nineteen forties and appalled magazine iraq and yet even from the beginning his his style was much more are poetic and undone nuanced than that of most of the pulp writers of the time so this is something that

readers notice of the time and it i think it would help to tune to differentiate him unfairly was it brought to the field after after bradbury many more writers said why can't i can be a poet and a science fiction writer at the same time they're going to have in an email question here for years and says the summit was to know what you think of the harry potter series the river but i gather there are quite buyers and fall the government appoint they're beautifully made but harry potter's birth character of color about them both and i'm glad that the real climb though they may hear there you have a character who can hear and roll in during the poor and the future and but the book when rosaria gather are quite wonderful to the lions again clayton is on the line from isaac sam

loyd talk profitable in liquid of the area were local of the ones that were very traumatic that i imagine the candidate the candidate they didn't have a phone and the dominant movement of update it and with the candidate michel of the article why the period the fear of ocean water go through the end of the war but even though a lot of more often killed five set i think that threw him in the present you know mortal when were looking imprint and the other the department of the i do regret that

those of a pretty narrow to a new political about that in the region that the vote coming toward the future that the terrible that we can hear president ali the only one that of the candidate but again this has to do with the fact that we're sort of speeding up the way we out process information and then the way we're getting information i guess are you ever surprised at how much of what you have written has says come to pass especially tv news earlier and when you look and become or who were on missions every day in the one second is one second that the farm owner and one a woman to hear your attention from the pigs root in your average and you can hear what the

hell you're looking up how much of that do you think has to do this is wonderful passage in the book where favor the ex english teacher philosopher says now you see why books or hated they show pours on the face of life the comfortable people want only waxman faces and we call those the botox prophecy her and this is about people who want to who are who will abandon their rights in order to be comfortable and to look good well very they are knowing that they have that that's the thing the whole the views about this whole process that we're going through with around six hundred doing were coming along the same alma rouge but two years ago and it's best to have to answer one of the original cotton to the poker her route no crop in europe were academy award two three three of those thick of the never for a

moment every job well and harriet or the one where the women in a car explosion continually that we need more explosions and north america that tension where were in grave danger with us mark is a line from brownsville i think we are other many who would agree or pokes at the same at the same point we keep making are these legitimate margolis could hang on a second are we becoming a different species that we no longer need thought it would become a sump some of the kind of being i'm sitting at a sequel right away in charge or the idea of a look at the one that we're who think home of overcoming fear that week for the following week the capital one commercial from another question koh the people who think that exposure

people are no young people following the verge of dropping all polling those tickets sold tickets right emotional mark i think at one point that it sometimes is that we haven't actually where it is directly opposed to me and to think primarily in question which is really an interval learned you look at many religious groups out there and they think what effect that the absolute there is no question and i think that is something that we get lonely have been writing chunk of what we're the question often a gift that it expects about weapons what about the radio is is is that enemy now is there some conspiracy something at the top that inspires against us and works dustin discourages reading no more we have very irate i'm a lawman

who believe really feel i need your republican leader democrat major catholic major news everyone to believe they go all that true by the way they can apply for the governor though we are protected for it you know through the problem comes from my pension plan are we who live tv live tv commercial when romans were in order of any all they both really at the end of the bill in the lottery at that conclusion they loathed you one thing that i remember very well from your work was read braille was that how often there was a sense of the macabre and in a story or that there was there were scenes of bizarre

conflicts are situations the characters are are put into and i wondered and i know you're a fan of paul i wondered if you might speak to that is that something you consciously tried to put into your work no i haven't so and them back a look at the human rights or e and there's an element of the very very well during that ride herd on her care from farms in the show the founder of the vanguard from farm the show wicked hard but the anti your current fourth one was the law of the army of the fill over a optimistic view i think they predict the future and with we rediscover we will release you about the re discover the poetry of water the of the realm knew were

both emotional than others came with global music a common and evil people wandering in the woman remembering all the crew will vote in fact we have a clip from that let's listen to two a part of that scene and it quickly so that we can burn it yes of course we have to say no one could take away from this year's we learn the ropes but we keep them up here where nobody can find them easy montage that man over there isn't much longer to live he's the we have harvested by robert louis stevenson the boys his nephew he's now citing insults at the boy can become the bulk of a kind art and our people do not like i

wonder sometimes if i didn't take jewish neighborhood jewish pleased to say that they voted for this mission so there is this old man lying in the snow in a shed that transferring his knowledge to a young boy who has used quite earnestly trying to memorize it and it's such a powerful image of a human connection that is the thing that's lacking throughout four five five one i know people are not connected and you know they are connected through that through the story it certainly plays well a certain political moments those who thrive on the politics of division can keep us from ever touching our own hearts and an answer of embracing our own sorrow and then the star of others and say well there must be a remedy for this mechanic a daycare that guy next door in ozark summit which had a migraine but the great thing is they're very when you're calling me about the book and about your future and about your lover and i love the moment when for couples

he would hold a lottery of the boy with global approval the beloved were ignored going how can you rule all right you're optimistic and will ray bradbury what i think is a very much for being our guest today it's been an honor for me john cassel teaches creative writing and is the director of creative writing at the new nc state courts or the ray bradbury the author of among other great work fahrenheit four five one which celebrates its fiftieth anniversary this year for about four five one will be discussed and that route wake county next month as part of that weight reads together a program sponsored by the wake county libraries today show is produced by beverly able pollack press chris tuscan and keith west and he is directing our show today executive producer is fred

wasser robin copley is our technical director we hear excerpts from ray bradbury reading fahrenheit four five one provided by harper audio clips came from a nineteen sixty six film by francois truffaut support for the state of things comes from the corporation for public broadcasting thanks so much for listening and frank station oh yeah oh wow wow nice

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