LeVar Burton Reads · LeVar Burton and Stitcher

"The Toynbee Convector" by Ray Bradbury

May 7, 2024·43 min·2 clips

At the promised moment, the sky stays empty and Stiles says, “I lied.”

Season 13 ends here. Burton treats the reading as a farewell, but not a dead stop; his love of reading aloud will find another way back to shared storytelling. Bradbury is the guide for the sendoff. Burton introduces the piece as a time travel story, then keeps the attention on human destiny, hope, and what people do with a story once they believe it. The sky turns into a stage. A young reporter named Someway stands with the old inventor Stiles, watching clouds, checking the time, and waiting for the great arrival. The countdown has a ceremonial hush. Ten minutes before four, they circle back to the moment Stiles says he crossed time and changed the world's future from dark to light. He says he rushed through rebuilt cities, clean seas and rivers, smog-free air, unfortified nations, and saved whales, grabbing photographs before racing home down the years. Now everyone is watching. What began as private invention has become public ritual, with crowds in nearby fields and objects circling overhead. A cork breaks the spell. Stiles opens champagne, and the two men hold their glasses until the exact moment, so the celebration feels close-up and staged at once. Someway keeps pushing the practical questions. Why did no one else travel in time? Why did Stiles stop it after proving such a future could exist? The excerpt leaves that hanging. The tension sits between proof and faith, between one man's tale and the civilization built around it. Burton gives that unease room. His closing thanks the Bradbury estate, credits the production team, and sends the story back out as something to pass along, not just finish.

As heard by us

Bradbury's future feels most vivid when Burton lets its hope and uncertainty breathe.

Ray Bradbury's The Toynbee Convector is a time-travel story that imagines rebuilt cities, clean seas and rivers, fresh smog-free air, and saved and beloved whales, but its real concern is hope for the future.

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Why you'd press play

For when you want time travel, hope, and a reflective take on human destiny from Ray Bradbury.

Read the full recommendation in PlayNext →

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