Advice from Ray Bradbury: Love what YOU love

From Letters of Note, via The Happiness Project.

Mark Frauenfelder is the founder of Boing Boing and the editor-in-chief of MAKE and Cool Tools. Twitter: @frauenfelder. Come and hear Mark speak at the ALA conference in Chicago on July 1.

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pjcamp

More advice from Ray Bradbury:

â€œWe have too many cellphones. Weâ€™ve got too many Internets. We have got to get rid of those machines. We have too many machines now.â€

http://herocomplex.latimes.com/2010/08/16/ray-bradbury-is-sick-of-big-government-our-country-is-in-need-of-a-revolution/

“Yahoo called me eight weeks ago,” he said, voice rising. “They wanted to put a book of mine on Yahoo! You know what I told them? ‘To hell with you. To hell with you and to hell with the Internet.’

“It’s distracting,” he continued. “It’s meaningless; it’s not real. It’s in the air somewhere. . .”

“. . .He says this while sitting in a room dominated by a gigantic flat-panel television broadcasting the Fox News Channel, muted, factoids crawling across the bottom of the screen. ”

http://www.techdirt.com/blog/?tag=ray+bradbury
Ugly Canuck

“Love what you love”?

Love to love you, Baby!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V5AztWseIdU
Pliny the Elder

“I have never listened to anyone who criticized my taste in space travel, sideshows or gorillas. When this occurs, I pack up my dinosaurs and leave the room.”

–Ray Bradbury
- Mark Frauenfelder
  
  That is the greatest thing anyone has ever said!
Anonymous

Curious why the address to Ray Bradbury Enterprises was blurred out? It is very easy to find and pretty much public information. Maybe they meant to blur out the addressee’s name instead. Still love Ray the old Luddite he still is.
Dawn Castle

A class act. His prose reads like poetry. His words like music.
Anonymous

Unfortunately what I love is inappropriate singing! It’s unfortunate for others, I mean.
Pantograph

So-so advice but awesome presentation.
I wish all correspondence were accompanied by Giacometti-esque pen drawings.
kaminariko

The grammar, typos, sans serif typewriter font, and overtypes are almost artistic, especially next to the drawing. I could actually see that as some sort of statement about humanity and technology in general coming from Ray Bradbury. It would be interesting to use that style in a web site design, I think.
emmdeeaych

AMEN
Anonymous

That was a pleasure to read.
Anonymous

Man, only Ray Bradbury could make me tear up in <2 paragraphs.
JBHemlock

Amen, baby! Amen!
nixiebunny

Fine advice.

Wheelwriter? (I love playing font sleuth.)
Anonymous

The illustration is by Joe Mugnaini. It was done for Ray’s “World of Ray Bradbury” plays back in the 1960′s.
Sarah Neptune

Great advice (and grammar), and wild personal stationery!
Shart Tsung

Did he mean to say “Who Die?”
Tim

Well fuck me, Ray Bradbury.
- emmdeeaych
  
  +1 internet. Wish I’d said it.
Anonymous

He meant “Who died?” It was just a typo. Which he can’t fix. Because he doesn’t like computers.
Anonymous

I decided to make a typography poster out of part of the text from this! I thought the phrasing was hilarious and weird out of context. You can check it out here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/wiretapstudios/5582674666/
RSFSmee

How can one not agree? With the caveat, of course, that it’s also rather important to have clean water, ample food, and, if possible, a roof over -one’s head — and that purely following one’s passions will not *necessarily* produce this result.
buddy66

When I was a teenager I thought Bradbury was the greatest short story writer alive. Later, my daughter did too (although she’s never forgiven him for the one about the buried dog). Even later, my grandson begged us for the money to take a writing class from the Master. And it ain’t over yet…

His son….
Anonymous

thanks Mark
GregS

Great advice (and presentation). Wish I’d figured that out when I was 9. It wasn’t until I was well into adulthood that I decided to embrace my inner nerd, to let my geek flag fly. Hate to think of how many years I spent feeling conflicted about this before that.