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LeVar Burton Reads
"The Toynbee Convector" by Ray Bradbury
00:43:13
The world's only time traveler finally reveals his secrets. "The Toynbee Convector" © 1983 by Ray Bradbury Content advisory: suicide
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Hi, I'm levar burton, and this is levar burton reads. In every episode, I have hand picked a different piece of short fiction and I've read it to you. The only thing these stories have had in common is that I love them, and I hope you have too. This is indeed the final episode of season 13 of LeVar Burton reads, Y'. All. But here's the thing. You know how much I love reading aloud, and so rest assured I'll figure out how to continue to engage with you in storytelling that we love. And as it's the final episode, it really made sense to read something today by one of the greats, a speculative storyteller whose work has endured for decades, the great Ray Bradbury. Ray Bradbury's stories are so powerful and appeal to so many people, partially because they are lyrical and colloquial, often playful, while all the time engaging with difficult truths. The story that I've chosen for today is one of Bradbury's tales about time travel. I think it's about human destiny and hope for the future. More than anything, I think it's about the power of human storytelling. The Toynbee Convector was written in 1983 and first published in Playboy magazine and then later featured in a collection of short stories by the same title, the Toynbee Convector, and it's still in print today. Go, Ray. As one of the characters explains, the Toynbee in the name refers to the historian Arnold J. Toynbee, who said any group, any race, any world that did not run to seize the future and shape it was doomed to dust away to the grave in the past. Can't wait for you to hear this story. You'll find a content advisory for this story in the written episode description. And now, if you're ready, let's take that deep breath. Yay us. The toynbee convector by ray bradbury. Good. Great. Bravo for me. Roger Shumway flung himself into the seat, buckled himself in, revved the rotor, and drifted his Dragonfly super six helicopter up to blow away on the summer sky, heading south toward La Jolla. How lucky can you get for he was on his way to an incredible meeting. The Time traveler, after a hundred years of silence, had agreed to be interviewed. He was on this day, 130 years old. And this afternoon at 4 o' clock sharp, Pacific time was the anniversary of his one and only journey in Time. Lord. Yes, 100 years ago, Craig Bennet Stiles had waved, stepped into his immense clock, as he called it, and vanished from the present. He was and remained the only man in history to travel in time. And Shumway was the one and only reporter after all these years to be invited in for afternoon tea and the possible announcement of a second and final trip through time. The traveler had hinted at such a trip. Old man, said Shumway, Mr. Craig Bennett Stiles, here I come. The dragonfly, obedient to fevers, seized a wind and rode it down the coast. The old man was there waiting for him on the roof of the Time Lamasery at the rim of the hang glider's cliff in La Jolla. The air swarmed with crimson, blue and lemon kites from which young men shouted while young women called to them from the land's edge. Stiles, for all his 130 years, was not old. His face, blinking up at the helicopter was the bright face of one of those hang gliding Apollo fools who veered off as the helicopter sank down. Shumway hovered his craft for a long moment, savoring the delay. Below him was a face that had dreamed architectures known incredible loves blueprinted mysteries of seconds, hours, days, then dived in to swim upstream through the centuries, a sunburst phase celebrating its own birthday. For on a single night 100 years ago, Craig Bennett Stiles, freshly returned from time, had reported by Telstar around the world to billions of viewers and told them their future. We made it, he said. We did it. The future is ours. We rebuilt. The cities freshened the small towns cleaned the lakes and rivers washed the air, saved the dolphins, increased the whales stopped the wars, tossed solar stations across space to light the world colonized the moon, moved on to Mars, then Alpha Centauri. We cured cancer and stopped death. We did it. O Lord, much thought thanks. We did it. Oh future's bright and beauteous spires arise. He showed them pictures. He brought them samples. He gave them tapes and LP records, film and sound cassettes of his wondrous roundabout flight. The world went mad with joy. It ran to meet and and make that future Fling up the cities of promise, save all and share with the beasts of land and sea. The old man's welcoming shout came up the wind. Shumway shouted back and let the dragonfly simmer down in its own summer weather. Craig Bennett Stiles, 130 years old, strode forward briskly and incredibly helped the young reporter out of his craft. Shumway was suddenly stunned and weak at this encounter. I can't believe I'm here, shumway said. You are, and none too soon, laughed the time traveler. Any day now I may just fall apart and blow away. Lunch is waiting. Hike. A parade of 1stiles marched off under the fluttering rotor shadows that made him seem a flickering newsreel of a future that had somehow passed Shumway like a small, small dog after a great army followed. What do you want to know? Asked the old man as they crossed the roof. Double time. First. Gasped Shumway, keeping up. Why have you broken silence after a hundred years? Second, why to me? Third, what's the big announcement you're going to make this afternoon at 4 o', clock, the very hour when your younger self is due to arrive from the past, when for a brief moment you will appear in two places. The paradox. The person you were man. You are fused in one glorious hour for us to celebrate. The old man laughed. How you do go on. Sorry. Shumway blushed. I wrote that last night. Well, those are the questions. You shall have your answers. The old man shook his elbow gently. All in good time. You must excuse my excitement, said Shanghe. After all, you are a mystery. You were famous, world acclaimed. You were went, saw the future, came back, told us, then went into seclusion. Oh, sure. For a few weeks you traveled the world in ticker tape parades, showed yourself on tv, wrote one book, gifted us with one magnificent two hour television film, then shut yourself away here. Yes, the time machine is on, on exhibit below. The crowds are allowed in each day at noon to see and touch. But you yourself have refused fame. Not so. The old man led him along the roof. Below in the gardens, other helicopters were arriving now, bringing TV equipment from around the world to photograph the miracle in the sky. That moment when the time machine from the past would appear, shimmer, then wander off to visit other cities before it vanished into the past. I have been busy as an architect helping build that very future. I saw when, as a young man, I arrived in our golden tomorrow. They stood for a moment watching the preparations. Below, vast tables were being set up for food and drink. Dignitaries would be arriving soon from every country of the world to thank for a final time. Perhaps this fabled, this almost mythic traveler of the years Go along, said the old man. Would you like to come sit in the time machine? No one else ever has, you know. Would you like to be the first? No answer was necessary. The old man could see that the young man's eyes were bright and wet. There, there, said the old man. Oh, dear me. There, there. A glass elevator sank and took them below and let them out in a pure white basement, the center of which stood the incredible device. There. Stiles touched a button and the plastic shell that had for 100 years encased the time machine slid aside. The old man nodded. Go sit. Shumway moved slowly toward the machine. Stiles touched another button and the machine lit up like a cavern of spiderwebs. It breathed in years and whispered forth remembrance. Ghosts were in its crystal veins. A great God spider had woven its tapestries in a single night. It was haunted and it was alive. Unseen tides came and went in its machinery. Suns burned and moons hid their seasons in it. Here and autumn blew away in tatters there. Winters arrived in snows that drifted in spring, blossoms to fall on summer fields. The young man sat in the center of it all, unable to speak, gripping the armrests of of the padded chair.
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Now let's get back to our story. Don't be afraid, said the old man gently. I won't send you on a journey. I wouldn't mind, said Shumway. The old man studied his face. No, I can see you wouldn't. You look like me 100 years ago this day. Damn if you aren't by honorary son. The young man shut his eyes. At this the lids glistened and the ghosts in the machine sighed all about him and promised him tomorrows. Well, what do you think of my Toynbee Convector? Said the old man briskly. To break the spell, he cut the power. The young man opened his eyes. The Toynbee Convector. What more mysteries, huh? The great Toynbee, that fine historian who said any group, any race, any world that did not run to seize the future and shape it was doomed to dust away in the grave. In the past did he say that? Or some such? He did. So what better name for my machine, huh? Toynbee, Wherever you are, here's your future seizing device. He grabbed the young man's elbow and steered him out of the machine. Enough of that. It's late, almost time for the great arrival and the earth shaking final announcement of that old time traveler. Styles, jump back. On the roof they looked down on the gardens, which were now swarming with the famous and the near famous from across the world. The nearby roads were jammed. The skies were full of helicopters and hovering biplanes. Hang gliders had long since given up and now stood along the cliff rim like a mob of bright pterodactyls, wings folded, heads up, staring at the clouds, waiting. All this, the old man murmured. My God. For me? The young man checked his watch. 10 minutes to 4 and counting. Almost time for the great arrival. Sorry? That's what I called it when I wrote you up a week ago for the news. That moment of arrival and departure in the blink of an eye when by stepping across time you changed the whole future of the world from night to day, dark to light. I often wondered what? Shumway studied the sky. When you went ahead in time, did no one see you arrive? Did anyone happen at all to look up, do you know, and see your device hover in the middle of the air here and over Chicago a bit later, and then New York and Paris. No one. Well, said the inventor of the Toynbee convector at the I don't suppose anyone was expecting me. And if people saw, they surely did not know what in blazes they were looking at. I was careful anyway, not to linger too long. I needed only time to photograph the rebuilt cities, clean seas and rivers, the fresh smog, free air, the unfortified nations, say, and beloved Wales. I moved quickly, photographed swiftly, and ran back down the years. Home today, paradoxically, is different. Millions upon millions of mobs of eyes will be looking up with great expectations. They will glance, will they not? From the young fool burning in the sky to the old fool here, still glad for his triumph. They will, said Shumway. Oh, indeed they will. A cork popped. Shumway turned from surveying the crowds on the nearby fields and the crowds of circling objects in the sky to see that Stiles had just opened a bottle of champagne. Our own private toast and our own private celebration. They held their glasses up, waiting for the precise and proper moment to drink. Five minutes to four and counting. Why, said the young reporter, did no one else ever travel in time? I put a stop to it myself, said the old man, leaning over the roof, looking down at the crowds. I realized how dangerous it was. I was reliable, of course. No danger. But lord, think of it. Just anyone rolling about the bowling alley, timed corridors ahead, knocking 10 pins headlong, frightening natives, shocking citizens somewhere else, fiddling with Napoleon's lifeline behind or restoring Hitler's cousins ahead. No. No. And the government, of course, agreed no, insisted that we put the Toynbee convector under seals, lock and key. Today you were the first and last to fingerprint its machinery. The guard has been heavy and constant for tens of thousands of days to prevent the machines being stolen. What time do you have? Shumway glanced at his watch and took in his breath. One minute and counting down. He counted. The old man counted. They raised their champagne glasses. 9. 8. 7. The crowds below were immensely silent. The sky whispered with expectation. The TV cameras swung up to scan and search. 6. 5. They clinked their glasses. 4. 3. 2. They drank. 1. They drank their champagne. With a laugh. They looked to the sky, the golden air above the La Jolla coastline waited. The moment for the great arrival was here. Now. Cried the young reporter, like a magician giving orders. Now. Said Stiles, gravely. Quiet. Nothing. Five seconds passed. The sky stood empty. Ten seconds passed. Heavens waited. Twenty seconds passed. Nothing. At last Shumway turned to stare and wonder at the old man by his side. Stiles looked at him, shrugged, and said, I lied. You what? Cried Shumway. The crowds below shifted uneasily. I lied, said the old man simply. No. Oh, but yes, said the time traveller. I never went anywhere. I stayed, but made it seem I went. There is no time machine, only something that looks like one. But why? Cried the young man, bewildered, holding onto the rail at the edge of the roof. Why? I see that you have a tape recording button on your lapel. Turn it on. Yes, there. I want everyone to hear this now. The old man finished his champagne and then said, because I was born and raised in a time in the 60s, 70s and 80s when people had stopped believing in themselves. I saw that disbelief, the reason that no longer gave itself reasons to survive, and was moved, depressed and then angered by it. Everywhere I saw and heard doubt. Everywhere I learned destruction. Everywhere was professional despair, intellectual ennui. And what wasn't ennui and cynicism was rampant skepticism and incipient nihilism. The old man stopped having remembered something. He bent and from under a table brought forth a special bottle of red Burgundy with the label 1984 on it. This. As he talked, he began to open, gently plumbing the ancient cork. You name it, we had it. The economy was a snail. The world was a cesspool. Economics remained an insoluble mystery. Melancholy was the attitude. The impossibility of change was the vogue. End of the world was the slogan. Nothing was worth doing. Go to bed at night full of bad news at 11. Wake up in the morn to worse news at 7. Trudge through the day underwater. Drown at night in a tide of plagues and pestilence. Ah. For the cork had softly popped. The now harmless 1984 vintage was ready for airing. The Time Traveler sniffed it and nodded. Not only the four horsemen of the Apocalypse rode the horizon to fling themselves on our cities, but a fifth Horseman, worse than all the rest, rode with them, despair wrapped in dark shrouds of defeat, crying only repetitions of past disasters, present failures, future cowardices bombarded by dark chaff and no bright seed. What sort of harvest was there for a man in the latter part of the incredible 20th century? Forgotten was the moon, forgotten the red landscapes of Mars, the great eye of Jupiter, the stunning rings of Saturn. We refused to be comforted. We wept at the grave of our child. The child was us. Was that how it was 100 years ago? Asked Shumway quietly. Yes. The Time Traveler held up the wine bottle as if it contained proof. He poured some into a glass, eyed it, inhaled, and went on. You have seen the newsreels and read the books of that time. You know it all. Of course there were a few bright moments when salt delivered the world's children to life. Or the night when Eagle landed and that one great step for mankind trod the Moon. But in the mind and out of the mouths of many, the fifth Horseman was darkly cheered on with high hopes, it sometimes seemed, of his winning. So all would be gloomily satisfied that their predictions of doom were right from day one. So the self fulfilling prophecies were declared. We dug our graves and prepared to lie down in the them. And you couldn't allow that? Asked the young reporter. You know I couldn't. And so you built the Toynbee Convector. Not all at once. It took years to brood on it. The old man paused to swirl the dark wine, gaze at it and sip, eyes closed. Meanwhile I drowned. I despaired, wept silently late nights thinking what can I do to save us from ourselves? How to save my friends, my city, my state, my country, the entire world from this obsession with doom? Well, it was in my library late one night that my hand, searching along shelves, touched at last, on an old and beloved book by H.G. wells, His Time device called Ghost like down the years I heard, I understood, died, truly listened. Then I blueprinted, I built, I traveled. Or so it seemed. The rest is, you know, is history. The old time traveler drank his wine, opened his eyes.
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Now get back to our story. Good God, the young reporter whispered, shaking his head. Oh, dear God. Oh, the wonder. The wonder. There was an immense ferment in the lower gardens now and in the fields beyond, and on the rose and in the air. Millions were still waiting. Where was the great arrival? Well, now, said the old man, filling another glass with wine for the young reporter, aren't I something? I made the machines, built miniature cities, lakes, ponds, sea, erected vast architectures against crystal water, skies talked to dolphins, played with whales, faked tapes, mythologized films. Oh, it took years, years of sweating work and secret preparation before I announced my departure, left and came back with good. They drank the rest of the vintage wine. There was a hum of voices. All of the people below were looking up at the roof. The time traveler waved at them and turned quickly. Now it's up to you from here on. You have the tape, my voice on it, just freshly made. Here are three more tapes with fuller data. Here's a film cassette history of my whole inspired fraudulence. Here's a final manuscript. Take, take it all. Hand it on. I nominate you as son to explain. The father quickly hustled into the elevator once more. Chumway felt the world fall away beneath. He didn't know whether to laugh or cry, so gave at last a great hoot. The old man, surprised, hooted with him as they stepped out below and advanced upon the Toynbee convector. You see the point, don't you, son? Life has always been lying to ourselves as boys, young men, old men, as girls, maidens women to gently lie and prove the lie true, to weave dreams and put brains and ideas and flesh in the truly real beneath the dreams. Everything finally is a promise. What seems a lie is a ramshackle need wishing to be born here thus. And so he pressed the button, then raised the plastic shield, pressed another, started the time machine humming, then shuffled quickly in to thrust himself into the convector's seat. Throw the final switch, young man. But you're thinking. If the time machine is a fraud, it won't work. What's the use of throwing a switch? Yes, throw it anyway. This time you. It will work. Shumway turned, found the control switch, grabbed hold, then looked at Craig Bennett Stiles. I don't understand. Where are you going? Why, to be one with the ages, of course. To exists now only in the deep past. How can that be? Believe me, this time it will happen. Goodbye, dear, fine, nice young man. Goodbye. Now tell me my name. What? Speak my name and throw. Throw the switch, time traveler. Yes. Now. The young man yanked the switch. The machine hung, roared, blazed with power, said the old man, shutting his eyes. His mouth, smiled gently. Yes. His head fell forward on his chest. Chumway yelled, banged the switch off, and leaped forward to tear at the straps binding the old man and his device. In the midst of so doing, he stopped, felt the time traveler's wrist, put his fingers under the neck to test the pulse there, and groaned. He began to weep. The old man had indeed gone back in time, and its name was Death. He was traveling in the past now, forever. Shumway stepped back and turned the machine on again. If the old man were to travel, let the machine, symbolically anyway, go with him. It made a sympathetic humming, the fire of it, the bright sun. Fire burned in all its spider grids and armatures and lighted the cheeks of the vast brow of the ancient traveler, whose head seemed to nod with the vibrations and whose smile as he traveled into the darkness was the smile of a child much satisfied. The reporter stood for a long moment more, wiping his cheeks with the backs of his hands. Then, leaving the machine on, he turned, crossed the room, pressed the button for the glass elevator, and while he was waiting, took the time travelers tapes and cassettes from his jacket pockets and one by one shoved them into the incinerator, trash flue set in the wall. The elevator doors opened. He stepped in. The door open, shut. The elevator hummed now like yet another time device, taking him up into a stunned world, a waiting world, lifting him up into a bright continent, a future land, a wondrous and surviving planet that one man with one lie had created. A lot of people ask me, why science fiction? I mean, what's your, what's your thing about speculative fiction, levar? Well, for me it's the hopeful nature of the genre. You know, the idea that we can rise to our highest level of expression as a species, the hope that that inspires so much good has come from our natural inclinations to look up. You know, there's that image in the story where millions of people are looking up, right? This life has given me a lot of wonderful opportunities. I've actually become friends with a. A woman named May Carol Jemison. She was the first African American woman in space. She flew on the space shuttle and she's got a project that she's been working on for several years and I've been a tangential part of it called the 100 Year Starship. And it's an effort that gathers together all kinds of experts in all kinds of fields and they discuss what it will take in the here and now for us to create a future that will enable us to be a space faring race. And the idea is that it's not going to happen today. It's not going to happen for us. We are planning for the next hundred years. And one of the things that May says about this journey that we're on, she stresses how important it is for us to look up, right? To actually connect to the stars, to acknowledge that we come from them and that there is a calling that lives inside of us to return to that which we came from. In this story, in the very, very brilliant Ray Bradbury reminds us of that calling. As I've talked about on our way to now, this is indeed the final episode of the final season of LeVar Burton reads. It has been my extreme and joyous pleasure to be with you on this journey. It has been, well, the honor of my life genuinely to share these stories with you and sometimes my thoughts and feelings and to feel your response. I feel seen by you all and I thank you for that. As my final words, y', all, I just want to encourage you to keep reading, keep expanding, keep living in your imaginations. That is the fuel that is going to power the commitment necessary to dream big and change the world. Keep looking up, y'. All, I'll see you next time. But you know, Our producer on this episode of LeVar Burton Reads is Julia Smith. She is the best in the business, y'. All. Our fabulous researcher is LD Lewis. Always happy to have you aboard, my sister. We had additional research support this season from Talyn Stradley and Josephine Martorana. Editing and sound design by the extraordinary Brendan Burns, who also created our theme music. My great thanks to the estate of Ray Bradbury for allowing me to read his story. You can find it in the collection entitled the Toynbee Convector. If you enjoyed this podcast, please tell a friend about it or leave us a review on Apple Podcasts. Like I say, share the short fiction Wealth LeVar Burton Reads is a production of Stitcher and LeVar Burton Entertainment. Our executive producers are Josephine Martorana and yours truly, LeVar Burton. And if you want to find me on the Instagram Internet, I'm LeVar Burton on Instagram Avarburton on X. Or you can Simply go to levarburton.com you can also join my book club at Fable Co Lavar. I'll see you next time, but you don't have to take my word for it. Sam.
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