The Quiet World (And not in the Jeffrey-McDaniel-Romantic sense)
[Source of Illustration]
I have this thing about authors and their books. Knowing very intimately, the difference between the genius of a creation and the genius who created it - has always left me wary about genuinely admitting to “liking” the creator of a piece (be it a book, a song or a painting) of genius.
Take Kurt Vonnegut for example - one of the only authors who I can say I wholeheartedly respect and love as a fellow human being - he has been very consistent in his work and his beliefs. While I do not know him personally (rather obvious), in his essays - in his works of non-fiction - he is the kind of man who writes exactly as he believes and whose stance on things are therefore very clear. There are other authors, who seem to have hidden agendas and who aren’t as transparent as K.V. has been and it is these creators, whose works I admire without the kind of personal attachment that happens between you and someone whom you respect - whose words you so delicately carry with you out of a shared belief or just that magical feeling of “knowing” that the intention behind the genius creation is pure and admirable. It must be said then that I am rather wary of Ray Bradbury because while Fahrenheit 451 is a stroke of genius in its own right - I don’t think the author himself explains well his younger self’s intention to having written the novel. It is clear it is not merely the issue of censorship that the book tackles but the issue of the fast-paced world of information we live in.
One click and this is sent, to everyone everywhere - but will people have the patience to read it? Or is it what Ray Bradbury predicted, that everyone wants everything dissected in 140 characters or less? The foreword/introduction of the graphic novel tackles censorship much more than the questions I have just posed, and that was a great disappointment because what the book awoke in me, was that Ray Bradbury foresaw all of this detachment from ourselves and the meaningful happenings - which I think is far worse than statewide censorship and the like. It’s as if we’re starting to censor ourselves. We’re giving in and surrendering all our control.
