Ray Bradbury Is Wrong
I can say that about him on here, because he hates the Internet (he once called it a "bunch of noise"), so I'm pretty sure he'll never read this.
The author of the dystopian Fahrenheit 451 once stood up to discuss the book in an auditorium full of students. He tried to explain to them that the main theme of his book was about the evils of television. The students insisted, repeatedly, that the book wasn't about television but about government censorship. They told him he didn't know the meaning buried in the book he had written himself.
Frustrated, he walked off the stage in the middle of the discussion.
Ray Bradbury is wrong, but not because he's wrong about his own book...he knows full well what he wrote it about, better than any of those students he was speaking to. But collectively, readers drew a different conclusion. The message they received didn't quite match the one that Bradbury was trying to send.
This isn't the fault of the readers; it's the fault of the author. The audience sees what it wants to see. If the artist paints a picture of what he thinks is a cow, but most spectators see a horse, then it might as well be a horse. If the artist has a problem with this, he should paint another picture...one that more closely resembles a horse. Whining about how it's a cow won't make it so in the minds of the readers.
Any work of art stands alone in the minds of the viewers...it shouldn't require the artist to stand by and explain it. (This is why DVD commentaries can't salvage David Lynch's films.) Bradbury tried to say one thing, and since most people didn't hear him say it, he's welcome to try writing a different book.
The author of the dystopian Fahrenheit 451 once stood up to discuss the book in an auditorium full of students. He tried to explain to them that the main theme of his book was about the evils of television. The students insisted, repeatedly, that the book wasn't about television but about government censorship. They told him he didn't know the meaning buried in the book he had written himself.
Frustrated, he walked off the stage in the middle of the discussion.
Ray Bradbury is wrong, but not because he's wrong about his own book...he knows full well what he wrote it about, better than any of those students he was speaking to. But collectively, readers drew a different conclusion. The message they received didn't quite match the one that Bradbury was trying to send.
This isn't the fault of the readers; it's the fault of the author. The audience sees what it wants to see. If the artist paints a picture of what he thinks is a cow, but most spectators see a horse, then it might as well be a horse. If the artist has a problem with this, he should paint another picture...one that more closely resembles a horse. Whining about how it's a cow won't make it so in the minds of the readers.
Any work of art stands alone in the minds of the viewers...it shouldn't require the artist to stand by and explain it. (This is why DVD commentaries can't salvage David Lynch's films.) Bradbury tried to say one thing, and since most people didn't hear him say it, he's welcome to try writing a different book.