Ray Bradbury, I Hardly Knew Ye

A couple of months ago I read Fahrenheit 451 for the first time. I didn’t really know what to expect. I just knew that the book was supposed to be one of those classics you have to read, and that some people considered it so profound you could almost drown in it.  To be honest, I just wanted to check it off my to-read list. I didn’t expect to love it. 

But I did. Not only that, I felt an actual kinship to this book, to the words written there. I wanted to read them. I wanted to write them. I wanted to make sense of them, and, at the same time, to not understand them. To just read them and enjoy.

I remember it like a dream now. I went through a phase where I couldn’t stop reading, and then, I was filled with an infinite sadness at the thought that the book might end, so I started reading slowly, savoring each word. I couldn’t bear the thought that I might soon be finished, so I read only paragraphs at a time and then I couldn’t remember where I’d left off, so I read them again.

All good things must come to an end, though, and later, not sooner, I finished the book. And then I did what I always do when I love a book so much that the idea is stuck in my head for days and days and I wanted close to me in case I want to reread a paragraph or just a quote. I moved my copy from the bookshelf to my nightstand.

I never re-read it, not till this week when I heard the news Ray Bradbury had passed away. And then I did, I re-read it all, in one sitting, never stopping for a break. And I loved it even more, if possible. But this time the joy of one of my favorite books was tinged with the sadness that its author would have no more to give, not only to me, but to the world.

When I die, I want someone to mourn me just like I mourn Ray Bradbury today. As someone who took people on literary flights of fancy, who made us realize to importance of imagination. As a writer who, always, always found it within himself to dream big dreams. 

Thankfully I came late to the Ray Bradbury party, and there is still a lot to be read, a lot to be discovered. And, like I did with Fahrenheit 451, I will have to take it slowly. This time there will be no more stories after I’m done.