Really, this book isn't about censorship as much as it is about a lost heritage. The America Bradbury envisions (which is uncomfortably descriptive of our present day) is an America that doesn't value religion, art, history, philosophy, literature, or anything that might disrupt the daily pursuit of happiness in the form of the latest television program, fireworks show, or personal music stream. There is even a device called the Seashell which could easily be renamed the iPod, and another called the "parlor walls" that are essentially wall-size, semi-interactive TVs (home theater, anyone?). But it's not so much a fear of technology for technology's sake - with the advent of mass media, Bradbury predicted that art would drop to the lowest common denominator and only skim the surface of human experience, keeping people constantly distracted, their attention divided between many different mosquitos buzzing in the ears, flooded with information yet gathering no knowledge, with not enough time to sit and talk, to think quietly, or to spend more than thirty minutes on something before giving it up.
There are a few missteps for me. First, the book, though 175 pages long, is still pretty short. Things happen so fast that we don't get as much character development as I would like - it seems kind of rushed. Second, Bradbury has a few passages where he tries to be Joyce or Faulkner and go stream-of-consciousness on us, with mixed success. Finally, though I don't think he crosses this line, he dances dangerously close to the edge of intellectual elitism, or "the teeming masses are too dumb to appreciate fine art." However, these are minor quibbles in a book that is fairly on target.
Arbitrary rating: 4 out of 5 parlor walls
No comments:
Post a Comment