Daily Inspiration Quote by William Shatner

Shatner calling Asimov and Bradbury "classic authors" is doing two jobs at once: it’s a sincere little valentine to the books that built his imagination, and it’s a quiet rebranding of a genre that used to get treated like pulp. Coming from the face of Star Trek, the line reads like a cultural victory lap. The kid who read sci-fi for escape got to grow up and become the genre’s most recognizable emissary, then casually fold those writers into the literary furniture.

The phrasing is telling. He doesn’t say he studied them or was shaped by them; he "enjoyed" them. That’s actor talk, not critic talk, and it matters. Shatner positions reading as pleasure rather than homework, a subtle pushback against the gatekeeping that still hovers around science fiction. By labeling Asimov and Bradbury as "classic", he’s also lobbying for legitimacy without sounding like he’s lobbying. It’s a soft sell: you’re allowed to admire these writers the way you admire Dickens or Hemingway, no apology required.

There’s also a bit of Shatner-era irony baked in, even if unintentionally. Asimov and Bradbury are canonical to millions, yet they’re still "genre" to certain tastemakers. Shatner’s line collapses that hierarchy with the matter-of-fact confidence of someone who benefited from sci-fi becoming mainstream. It’s not an argument; it’s a shrug that lands like a claim.