Remembrance

Bradbury felt great responsibility for the gift of life, and chapter 44 opens with a survey of his allusions to remembrance in his fiction and unpublished notes. Preserved memories from the distant past ranged from old phonograph records his mother would play for him in the 1920s to remembered color photographs of King Tutankhamen’s golden death mask. The chapter also chronicles his friendship with Carla Laemmle, one of the last silent film actresses; the 2009 radio production of Leviathan 99, Bradbury’s last collaboration with radio legend Norman Corwin; and Bradbury’s gentle decline and death on June 5, 2012. Bradbury’s passing was noticed around the world, prompting reflections on the transmission of his best early work through generations of readers.