Works:
Works by Richard Bach |
| 1972 | Jonathan Livingston Seagull. Bach's inspirational fable about a seagull who discovers the joy of flight becomes a surprising bestseller, eclipsing the hardcover record set by Gone with the Wind, with more than three million copies sold. Bach had worked as a charter pilot and barnstormer throughout the Midwest. |
| Occultism & Parapsychology Encyclopedia: Richard Bach |
Writer on aviation who became famous with his book Jonathan Livingston Seagull (Macmillan, 1970; Avon, 1973), written as a result of psychic experience over a period of several years. He was a U.S. Air Force pilot from 1956 to 1959 and a technical writer for Douglas Aircraft and associate editor of Flying magazine from 1961 to 1964. Bach was also a director of the Antique Airplane Association and editor of its magazine Antiquer, and did some airplane barnstorming in the Midwest. His early books include Stranger to the Ground (1963), Biplane (1966), and Nothing by Chance: A Gypsy Pilot's Adventures in Modern America (1969).
In 1959, while living at Belmont Shore, California, Bach was walking by the waterfront when he heard a disembodied voice say "Jonathan Livingston Seagull." This was followed by a kind of daydream of a seagull flying alone at sunrise, and a realization of its significance. Bach felt impelled to write this down, using a green ballpoint pen and some old scratch paper (the only writing materials handy), and completed the first part of the story of Jonathan Livingston Seagull up to the point of Jonathan's expulsion from the flock. Not until eight years later in Iowa, 1,500 miles away, did the next section of the book come to Bach in a dream. He immediately typed it out and sent it to a magazine, but it was instantly rejected. Next he sent it to Private Pilot, which published it reluctantly at below regular rate, but the reader response was so great that the publisher demanded more seagull stories. Bach sat down at his typewriter and, with virtually no rewriting, knocked out the second and third parts of the J. L. Seagull saga, duly published as magazine stories.
The stories were published in book form through the judgment of Eleanor Friede, then an editor at Macmillan (now president of Eleanor Friede Books), who had an intuition about the book. Within two years the book sold over one million copies, was on best-seller lists for nearly a year, became a Book of the Month Club choice, was condensed by Reader's Digest books, and was translated into a dozen languages. It was banned only by the People's Republic of China for no very clear reason, but as composers Beethoven and Mozart also shared this prohibition at that time, Bach thought J. L. Seagull was in very good company.
The widespread success of Jonathan Livingston Seagull lies in its simple but inspiring allegory, with spiritual and psychic overtones. It embodies Bach's own philosophy, "Find what it is you want in the world to do, and then do it." Bach does not ascribe his inspired story to any psychic entity, in spite of the strange way it was manifested, but believes that part of his personality on an unconscious level was communicating with his everyday self. However, he has also had several psychic experiences, including out-of-the-body travel and healing.
His later books include A Gift of Wings (1974); Illusions: The Adventures of a Reluctant Messiah (1977); There's No Such Place as Far Away (1979); One (1988); Running From Safety: An Adventure of the Spirit (1995); and Out of My Mind: The Discovery of Saunders-Vixen (1999).
Sources:
Bach, Richard. Illusions: The Adventures of a Reluctant Messiah. New York: Delacorte Press, 1977.
——. Jonathan Livingston Seagull. New York: Macmillan, 1970.
——. One: A Novel. New York: William Morrow, 1988.
| Quotes By: Richard Bach |
Quotes:
"Listen to what you know instead of what you fear."
"You are never given a dream without also being given the power to make it true. You may have to work for it, however."
"The best way to pay for a lovely moment is to enjoy it."
"In order to win, you must expect to win."
"Rarely do members of the same family grow up under the same roof."
"Don't be dismayed at good-byes. A farewell is necessary before you can meet again. And meeting again, after moments or lifetimes, is certain for those who are friends."
See more famous quotes by
Richard Bach
| Wikipedia: Richard Bach |
Richard David Bach (b. June 23,1936, Oak Park, Illinois) is an American writer. He is widely known as the author of the best-selling novel, Jonathan Livingston Seagull, and the 1973 movie based on the book along with "Illusions, The Adventures Of A Reluctant Messiah", plus others. He claims to be a direct descendant of Johann Sebastian Bach. He is noted for his love of flying and for his books related to air flight and flying in a metaphorical context. He has pursued flying as a hobby since the age of 17.
Richard Bach attended Long Beach State College in 1955. He has authored numerous works of fiction and nonfiction, including Jonathan Livingston Seagull (1970), Illusions (1977), One (1989), and Out of My Mind (1999). Most of his books have been semi-autobiographical, using actual or fictionalized events from his life to illustrate his philosophy.
He served in the Air Force Reserve as a pilot, and afterwards worked a variety of jobs, including technical writer for Douglas Aircraft. He later became a barnstormer. Most of his books involve flight in some way, from the early stories which are straightforwardly about flying aircraft to his later works in which he used flight as a philosophical metaphor.
In 1970, Jonathan Livingston Seagull, a story about a seagull who flew for the Love of flying rather than merely to catch food, was published by Macmillan Publishers after the manuscript was turned down by many other publishers. The book, which included unique photos of seagulls in flight, became a number one best-seller on both the fiction and non-fiction lists. The book contained fewer than 10,000 words, yet it broke all hardcover sales records since Gone with the Wind. It sold more than 1,000,000 copies in 1972 alone.[1]The surprise success of the book was widely reported in the media in the early 1970s.[2]
In 1973, the book was turned into a movie produced by Paramount Pictures Corporation. The movie included a soundtrack by Neil Diamond.
A second book, Illusions: The Adventures of a Reluctant Messiah, published in 1977, tells the story of the author's encounter with a modern-day messiah who has decided to quit.
Bach has retained a dedicated fan base throughout the years.[3] During the 1990s, Bach appeared online at Compuserve, where he answered e-mails personally. Bach was interviewed in April, 2005 on Conscious Talk Radio, and this interview was replayed a few times in 2006. Click here to download it.
Bach had six children with his first wife, Bette. They divorced in 1970, because Richard didn't believe in marriage. His son, Jonathan, is a journalist, who wrote a book about growing up without knowing his father, Richard; and then later meeting him as a college student. (Richard gave his approval; although he noted that it included some personal history he'd "rather not see in print").[4]
In 1977 Bach married actress Leslie Parrish whom he met during the making of the Jonathan Livingston Seagull movie.[5] . She was a major element in two of his subsequent books — The Bridge Across Forever and One — which primarily focused on their relationship and Bach's concept of soulmates. They divorced in 1999.[6]
A little-known fact is that Richard Bach, a fan of the original Star Trek televsion series, also wrote a script for the unproduced Star Trek Phase II televsion series that was to be produced in the mid-1970s. It was entitled "Practice in Walking" (Episode #4). According to Harold Livingston, producer of the Phase II project, his script was one of the most popular story ideas among the Star Trek Phase II crew. They felt that Richard Bach would add a certain amount of class to the series and pave the way for new directions.".[7]
Bach espouses a consistent philosophy in his books: Our true nature is not bound by space or time, we are expressions of the Is (see: Non-duality), we are not truly born nor truly die, and we enter this world of Seems and Appearances for fun, learning, to share experiences with those we care for, to explore - and most of all to learn how to love and love again.[citation needed]
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Copyrights:
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 | Works. The Chronology of American Literature, edited by Daniel S. Burt. Copyright © 2004 by Houghton Mifflin Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved. Read more |
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| Occultism & Parapsychology Encyclopedia. Encyclopedia of Occultism and Parapsychology. Copyright © 2001 by The Gale Group, Inc. All rights reserved. Read more |
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| Quotes By. Copyright © 2008 QuotationsBook.com. All rights reserved. Read more |
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| Wikipedia. This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article "Richard Bach". Read more |
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