Evil Ways

Interview with author Ray Bradbury from the Wall Street Journal.

I've read Fahrenheit 451, but precious little of his other works. I do fondly remember my seventh-grade English teacher reading a story from Dandelion Wine out loud to the class. I don't recall the name of the story, but it was very creepy - about a serial killer called 'The Lonely One' terrorizing a small town.

This was well before serial-killers-as-literary-villains were in vogue, but to be honest I've never found Hannibal Lector or any of his killing cousins to be as frightening as 'The Lonely One'. I think it was because while Lector is presented as a super intelligent, alomost superhuman madman, The Lonely One was a very ordinary guy-next-door type. The kind of guy who might have a beer and a bit of chat about the Red Sox with you down at the local - before he want off to strangle some women. Evil disguised as banality is much more frightening than evil presented as an arcehtype - and much more plausible.