Posted on 06/06/2012 8:04:35 AM PDT by Iron Munro
Ray Bradbury, the writer whose expansive flights of fantasy and vividly rendered space-scapes have provided the world with one of the most enduring speculative blueprints for the future, has died. He was 91.
Bradbury's daughter confirmed his death to the Associated Press on Wednesday morning. She said her father died Tuesday night in Southern California.
Author of more than 27 novels and story collections most famously The Martian Chronicles, Fahrenheit 451, Dandelion Wine and Something Wicked This Way Comes and more than 600 short stories, Bradbury has frequently been credited with elevating the often maligned reputation of science fiction. Some say he singlehandedly helped to move the genre into the realm of literature.
The only figure comparable to mention would be [Robert A.] Heinlein and then later [Arthur C.] Clarke, said Gregory Benford, a UC Irvine physics professor and Nebula Award-winning science fiction writer. But Bradbury, in the 40s and 50s, became the name brand.
(Excerpt) Read more at latimesblogs.latimes.com ...
Actually his death was on June 5 local time. Of course it was already June 6 in some time zones.
As for Ray B. I am sad. He more-or-less owned my teenaged years. Someone bought me an omnibus of his short stories when I was 14. I must have read that book 50 times. Nobody could weave prose quite like him.
Jerry responds to almost all correspondence if he is feeling well. Like I said, he’s a gem.
I liked that one as well and remember it although I didn’t recall who wrote it.
I think one of my favorite short stories that he wrote was *The Pedestrian*.
And Clarke, although I liked his older stuff more than his newer material.
In his space odyssey sequels he seemed more interested in pushing his views on sex than writing a good science fiction novel.
Puts him pretty high up in my world. He is a gem.
/johnny
This is Montag, Block 813!"
"Come in Cousins...be one of the FAMILY!"
Rest In Peace, Ray Bradbury!
with love, Montag813
found this on line:
he was a conservative
Science fiction author Ray Bradbury sits in front of a photo of Mars, presented to him during an 83rd birthday party in his honor on Aug. 23, 2003.
Ray Bradbury, master of the sci-fi fantasy and author of Fahrenheit 451, died Tuesday at 91.
The man who chronicled dystopian societies had strong political beliefs and spoke as darkly about contemporary politics as he did about burning books.
[See the latest political cartoons.]
“I think our country is in need of a revolution,” the Los Angeles Times quoted him as saying in 2010. “There is too much government today. We’ve got to remember the government should be by the people, of the people and for the people.”
A Ohio Tea Party blog later quoted him on it, and the conservative blog All American Blogger wrote: “I think Ray is ready to lead the Tea Party movement.”
Bradbury also had some choice words for our nation’s presidents.
On Bush: “He’s wonderful. We needed him.” - Interview with Salon, 2001
On Clinton: “Clinton is a sh*thead and we’re glad to be rid of him. And I’m not talking about his sexual exploits. I think we have a chance to do something about education... We should have done it years ago.” - Interview with Salon, 2001
On Reagan: “Reagan was our greatest president. He lowered our taxes and gave the money back to the people.” - At Comic-Con in 2010
On Obama: “He should be announcing that we should go back to the moon... We should never have left there. We should go to the moon and prepare a base to fire a rocket off to Mars and then go to Mars and colonize Mars. Then when we do that, we will live forever.” - Quoted in Los Angeles Times in 2010
According to fan site Bradbury Media, the writer once declared in an interview all politicians to be fools.
I LOVE it!!!!!
“June dawns, July noons, August evenings over, finished, done, and gone forever with only the sense of it all left here in his head. Now, a whole autumn, a white winter, a cool and greening spring to figure sums and totals of summer past. And if he should forget, the dandelion wine stood in the cellar, numbered huge for each and every day. He would go there often, stare straight into the sun until he could stare no more, then close his eyes and consider the burned spots, the fleeting scars left dancing on his warm eyelids; arranging, rearranging each fire and reflection until the pattern was clear...
So thinking, he slept.
And, sleeping, put an end to Summer, 1928.”
Farewell, Mr. Bradbury, and thank you for all you did.
I'm guessing about ninety-plus. Had a nice email chat with him about 3 years ago, where the subject was symphony orchestras. I found out that he had attended my hometown symphony, and I clued him in to a recording they had recently released.
He's married to a younger woman who is (or was a few years ago) a professor of, IIRC, English at a suburban Chicago college.
Mr. Brandbury was a great human being, even if he’d never written a word.
I will never forget hearing him say, and I heard this in person with my own ears, “There is a free PhD education for everyone in this country. You’ll find it at your local library.”
I wanted to live to see the Alderson Drive, not the effen super-EPA or whatever that federal agency was called in FA.
Dr. Jerry was scrambling today for the press interviews, so I already know he has good things to say about Ray. Contemplating seeing what he has to say at club on Thursday.
Read his short story “Dandelion Wine.” If you don’t like sci-fi, you will love that! It encapsulates American life so well, and it’s practically poetry.
RIP Mr. Bradbury.
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