Ray Bradbury, author of The Martian Chronicles and Fahrenheit 451, and all-around science-fiction Grand High Master, died yesterday in Los Angeles. He was 91. Bradbury was responsible for turning untold numbers of young humans into powerful thinkers and dreamers, and here, in an essay originally published in Holiday magazine in 1965, he considers the robots of Disneyland and a future of animatronics that both guard and resurrect the past for students of the not-too-distant future. Almost two decades later, Bradbury would become also part of Disney's world, helping to design the look and create the narrative metaphors for Epcot Center's Spaceship Earth.
"THE MACHINE-TOOLED HAPPYLAND" BY RAY BRADBURY Two thousand years back, people entering Grecian temples dropped coins into machinery that then clanked forth holy water. It is a long way from that first slot machine to the "miracles of rare device" created by Walt Disney for his kingdom, Disneyland. When Walt Whitman wrote, "I sing the Body Electric," he little knew he was guessing the motto of our robot-dominated society. I believe Disney's influence will be felt centuries from today. I say that Disney and Disneyland can be prime movers of our age. But before I offer proof, let me sketch my background. At twelve, I owned one of the first Mickey Mouse buttons in Tucson, Arizona. At nineteen, selling newspapers on a street corner, I lived in terror I might be struck by a car and killed before the premiere of Disney's film extravaganza, Fantasia. In the last 30 years I have seen Fantasia fifteen times, Snow White 12 times, Pinocchio eight times. In sum, I was, and still am, a Disney nut. You can imagine, then, how I regarded an article in The Nation some years ago that equated Disneyland with Las Vegas. Both communities, claimed the article, were vulgar, both represented American culture at its most corrupt, vile and terrible. Read the rest of the essay over at Motherboard.
"THE MACHINE-TOOLED HAPPYLAND" BY RAY BRADBURY Two thousand years back, people entering Grecian temples dropped coins into machinery that then clanked forth holy water. It is a long way from that first slot machine to the "miracles of rare device" created by Walt Disney for his kingdom, Disneyland. When Walt Whitman wrote, "I sing the Body Electric," he little knew he was guessing the motto of our robot-dominated society. I believe Disney's influence will be felt centuries from today. I say that Disney and Disneyland can be prime movers of our age. But before I offer proof, let me sketch my background. At twelve, I owned one of the first Mickey Mouse buttons in Tucson, Arizona. At nineteen, selling newspapers on a street corner, I lived in terror I might be struck by a car and killed before the premiere of Disney's film extravaganza, Fantasia. In the last 30 years I have seen Fantasia fifteen times, Snow White 12 times, Pinocchio eight times. In sum, I was, and still am, a Disney nut. You can imagine, then, how I regarded an article in The Nation some years ago that equated Disneyland with Las Vegas. Both communities, claimed the article, were vulgar, both represented American culture at its most corrupt, vile and terrible. Read the rest of the essay over at Motherboard.
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