Raymond (ray) douglas bradbury (1920)

Ray Bradbury is the science fiction author of more than thirty books. Among his best known works are The Martian Chronicles, Fahrenheit 451, The Illustrated Man, and Something Wicked This Way Comes. Although he is often described as a science fiction writer, Bradbury does not box himself into a particular narrative categorization.

First of all, I don't write science fiction. I've only done one science fiction book and that's Fahrenheit 451, based on reality. Science fiction is a depiction of the real. Fantasy is a depiction of the unreal. So Martian Chronicles is not science fiction, it's fantasy. It couldn't happen, you see? That's the reason it's going to be around a long time – because it's a Greek myth, and myths have staying power.

On another occasion, Bradbury observed that the novel touches on the alienation of people by media:

In writing the short novel Fahrenheit 451 I thought I was describing a world that might evolve in four or five decades. But only a few weeks ago, in Beverly Hills one night, a husband and wife passed me, walking their dog. I stood staring after them, absolutely stunned. The woman held in one hand a small cigarette–package–sized radio, its antenna quivering. From this sprang tiny copper wires which ended in a dainty cone plugged into her right ear. There she was, oblivious to man and dog, listening to far winds and whispers and soap–opera cries, sleep–walking, helped up and down curbs by a husband who might just as well not have been there. This was not fiction.

Besides his fiction work, Bradbury has written many short essayson the arts and culture, attracting the attention of critics in this field.

Having been influenced by science fiction heroes like Flash Gordon and Buck Rogers, Bradbury began to publish science fiction stories in fanzines in 1938. Bradbury was invited by Forrest J Ackerman to attend the Los Angeles Science Fiction Society, which at the time met at Clifton’s Cafeteria in downtown Los Angeles. This was where he met the writers Robert A. Heinlein, Emil Petaja, Fredric Brown, Henry Kuttner, Leigh Brackett, and Jack Williamson.

His first published story was «Hollerbochen's Dilemma», which appeared in the fanzineImagination!in January, 1938. Launching his own fanzine in 1939, titled Futuria Fantasia, he wrote most of its four issues, each limited to under 100 copies.

Between 1941 and 1947, he was a contributor to Rob Wagner's film magazine, Script. Bradbury's first paid piece, «Pendulum», written with Henry Hasse, was published in the pulp magazineSuper Science Stories in November 1941, for which he earned $15. He became a full–time writer by the end of 1942. His first collection of short stories, Dark Carnival, was published in 1947 by Arkham House.

In 1953 he has written for the theater and cinema – including the screenplay for John Huston’s Moby Dick – and has been nominated for an Academy Award. He adapted sixty–five of his storiesfor television’s Ray Bradbury Theater and won an Emmy for his teleplay of The Halloween Tree.

This author has published some 500 short stories, novels, plays, and poems since his first story appeared in Weird Tales when he was twenty years old. For several years he wrote for Alfred Hitchcock Presents and The Twilight Zone.

He has produced two of his own plays, written two musicals, two space–age cantatas with Lalo Schifrin and Jerry Goldsmith, and collaborated on an animated film, Icarus Montgolfer Wright, which was nominated for an Academy Award in 1962.

In 1964 Mr. Bradbury was Idea Consultant for the United States Pavilion at the New York World’s Fair.

In 1982 he created the interior metaphors for Space Ship Earth at Disney World’s Epcot Center. He has helped design a ride Disney World and is doing consultant work on city engineering and rapid transit.

When one of the Apollo astronaut teams landed on the moon, they named Dandelion Crater there to honor Bradbury’s novel Dandelion Wine. His novel Something Wicked This Way Comes was made into a major release feature film, and his own cable television show, called Ray Bradbury Theater, received 19 cable award nominations and won seven.

Now Mr. Bradbury lives with his wife in Los Angeles, California, and is currently working on a new novel entitled From the Dust Returned.