Fahrenheit 451

"There is no fire like greed, no crime like hatred, no sorrow like separation, no sickness like hunger of the heart, and no joy like the joy of freedom." The Dhammapada

"Since all things are subject to change, nothing exists in a permanent position, nothing is able to remain the same under its own independent power." Dalai Lama

Back in 1966 the great French director Francois Truffaut made the best translation of a Ray Bradbury book into a film. Bradbury is one of those lyrical writers whose works are hard to translate properly. The television production of The Martian Chronicles is a case in point. Truffaut in his first English language film rendered Fahrenheit 451 perfectly. Staring the late Oskar Werner and the still exquisitely beautiful Julie Christie this film showed a world in which books were banned.

I have made no secret of my love of books and reading. For me the idea of books being banned is a terrifying nightmare. The happiest job I ever had was the year that I worked for The Tattered Cover bookstore in Denver, Colorado. It was a book lover's paradise! I just redeemed 5,500 of my Visa points on a $10.00 gift card for Barnes and Noble Booksellers. I love books and I love reading.

I am currently reading a cult favorite by Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman called Good Omens. Funny, funny, funny. You would think a book starring an eleven year old as the Anti-Christ and a demon and an angel working together to stop Armageddon would be highly controversial and right for banning but this book is fun and thought provoking at the same time. The satire in the book is perfect.

It is my love for reading and knowledge that has made me absolutely appalled by the choice of Sarah Palin for VP. It is hard to ignore someone who doesn't pay attention to Iraq, in her own words. It is hard to ignore someone who is a NRA supporter and fired a police chief who was opposed to the concealed gun law. But when she wants to fire a librarian who wouldn't tell her how to ban books that some people found the language “offensive”  I went ballistic. For her I guess words like freedom of thought, knowledge, freedom from fear, gay rights, etc. have to be pretty terrifying. In her regime the Declaration of Independence and The Constitution of the United States would have to be banned because they contain words that would let the people know that we are living in the United States with its freedoms and not in the nightmare world of Fahrenheit 451.

The picture is called Reading.