Briefly, as a Critic

I have been doing a large amount of reading lately, more than I ever have in my life. I read by the river with new baby ducklings and in a bar drinking red wine, and later in my bed with the air conditioner running. From Hemingway's bullfights to Cervantes and La Mancha to Spain's role in an ever progressing Euro-crisis, I have managed to make a lot of it compliment the Spain outside my door. It makes you appreciate the world around you, and makes you literate. Who doesn't want to sound cool at parties.

Ray Bradbury, the author of Fahrenheit 451 and hundreds of other short stories, just died. He was 91 years old. I watched a short video of a speech of his, given late in life. He looks plump and old, but happy and fulfilled. He said people often complain about not being able to afford an education. He says that's bull, because as a kid he walked to his library and spent hours and days writing and reading. Everything we need -- enough to absorb in a lifetime -- is free to us; we just aren't willing to work for it. I liked listening to him talk. People's voices always more inspiring after death.

What we choose to read is everything. You know a lot about someone by the book resting in their hands, because we have lives and jobs and families and the time we can spend alone with a book is precious and deliberate and our only connection with the candlelight flickering rooms of the past. I criticize how people use their time these days, and what they even decide to read, because it's all so limited, and they do such wasteful things. What's to our lives if we don't make them better.

Electrico touched the 12-year-old Bradbury with his sword and commanded, "Live forever!"

"I decided that was the greatest idea I had ever heard. I started writing every day. I never stopped."