One Book Kick-off

One Book, One Springfield kicked off Sunday afternoon with around 75 people attending Allen Steele’s keynote address and watching the 1966 Francois Truffaut film version of the book. Allen Steele described the genesis of the book from its inception as a short story in 1951 to the 1953 full-length book. He even had a copy of the story’s original publication in Galaxy Science Fiction, and shared the story’s sometimes humorous illustrations, including a wonderful depiction of the scene I call “an evening with ‘the family’ and Dover Beach.” Being a big fan of Bradbury himself, he was an enthusiastic kick-off speaker. A tidbit for Allen Steele fans – he didn’t stay for the film showing, since he needed to get back to work on his latest book, which he said is related to the Coyote series, but not directly part of it.

The Republican has been giving the story great coverage leading up to the kick-off. Articles appeared on March 21 and March 22. Columnists Carrie Barrepski and Tom Shea each based a column on the One Book project. The individual events have been listed in Sunday’s “Booking It” column. In addition, The Republican generously donated three “Get Fired Up!” ads to help get the word out about One Book, One Springfield.

The Reminder ran a nearly full-page article in their March 15-21 issue that included a phone interview with Ray Bradbury himself. Bradbury said that censorship would be “impossible” here because all aspects of society are watching one another. Agree? Our panelists on the April 5 censorship panel (7 pm in the Central Library’s Community Room) will address that and other burning censorship issues.