This is rather exhilarating news to accompany Ray Bradbury’s imminent birthday (August 22). It also coincides nicely with the the fact that I’ve been listening to a truly outstanding two-hour audio dramatization of his Something Wicked This Comes over the past couple of days (and have been finding that it sharply intensifies my already intense longing for the advent of autumn here in apocalyptically hot and drought-ridden Central Texas).
“Ray Bradbury is joining forces with Phoenix Picturesâ Mike Medavoy to produce a film version of the authorâs semi-autobiographical 1957 novel Dandelion Wine…Bradbury, who turns 91 on Monday, said, ‘This is the best birthday gift I could ask for. Today, I have been reborn! Dandelion Wine is my most deeply personal work and brings back memories of sheer joy as well as terror. This is the story of me as a young boy and the magic of an unforgettable summer which still holds a mystical power over me.'” (Full story — just a short stub, really — at The Hollywood Reporter.)
Note: For more about Bradbury’s signature evocation of an intensely autumnal-magical mood, see the piece I published about him last October at SF Signal: “The October Mystique: 7 Authors on the Visionary Magic of Ray Bradbury.” My very young column over there was disrupted by the onset of the inward-turning that led me to withdraw from the Web this past January through May. I’m presently looking toward resurrecting that project.
Ray Bradbury is my favorite writer. Zen and the Art of Writing is what inspired me to write. I can think of few things I would rather see than a good movie made from Dandelion Wine.
Sounds like you and I exist on a similar imaginative and literary wavelength, Jack. Zen and the Art of Writing ranks among my top handful of magical/transformative/necessary books about creativity, writing, and life. You may enjoy, btw, my other blog, Demon Muse, which is about the theory and practice of creativity as a daimonic muse-inspired phenomenon. I’ve drawn on and quoted from Bradbury’s book several times in the articles and essays published over there.
Best of luck with your new blog. Looks like you’re off to a good start!
Matt, thanks for posting this. I love this story!
You’re welcome, Pam! Glad you enjoyed it.
Hi Matt — I’m glad you enjoyed SOMETHING WICKED THIS WAY COMES from my audio collection. Since you mentioned DANDELION WINE, I thought I’d let you know that I just posted the 2 hour audio drama version of that story, also. It’s really great. Here’s the link: http://autumnradio.wordpress.com/2011/10/05/dandelion-wine-audio-drama/
Thanks for the heads up, Mike! And also for the continued audio drama goodness. I’m headed over right now to download DANDELION WINE. If right now, in early October, isn’t the perfect season for such things (even though DW is set in a magical summer), then I don’t know what is.