Bradburied

Just last week I was reading a book about how Ray Bradbury established himself as a writer. And now he's gone. When I grew up there were years I read little else but science fiction, and Bradbury was one of the big three, along with Asimov and Heinlein (sorry Clarke).  As I trended toward "hard" sf I read him less and less, but you never forget those early influences.

His loosely connected stories of the colonization of Mars, published in book form in 1950 as The Martian Chronicles, first brought him fame in the science fiction world.  In 1953 he came out with Fahrenheit 451, a futuristic tale of a society that bans books, which introduced him to a wider audience and is still his best-known work.  Still, my favorite Bradbury is his short stories.  The Martian stuff but also collections such as The Illustrated Man, The Golden Apples Of The Sun and I Sing The Body Electric (and I also like Dandelion Wine).

There was a debate in the sf world as to whether Bradbury was a science fiction writer at all.  He tended to avoid technology to concentrate on emotional impact.  Bradbury himself never considered himself sf.  He wrote speculative fiction, true, but it was closer to fantasy--fables for our time.  And much of his later writing couldn't be considered sf at all, anyway.  For instance, his collection of plays, The Anthem Sprinters And Other Antics, are humorous tales set in Ireland (the title comes from those who run out of the theatre before the British Anthem is played).

I did reread some of his stuff in later years (including Fahrenheit 451 with a book group) and it didn't hold up as well as I'd hoped.  But then, that's the fate of so many childhood enthusiasms.  His work was enjoyable, but the holes in his logic were too large to ignore.  Still, I have several of his books around.  Maybe I'll look at them again tonight.

PS  Here's a remembrance from Virginia Postrel.  Here's Brian Doherty, who notes how Bradbury was quite an LA Guy himself. It's true--I remember seeing him at more than one event.