Ray Bradbury (born August 22, 1920) is a science fiction and fantasy writer.
He was born in Waukegan, Illinois, and his family moved several times, eventually settling in Los Angeles in 1934. In his family were many publishers of books and not surprisingly, Bradbury was a reader and writer throughout his youth. He graduated high school in Los Angeles but could not afford college. To make a living, he sold newspapers. He educated himself at the library and being influenced by science fiction heroes like Flash Gordon and Buck Rogers Bradbury soon began to successfully publish science fiction stories. He sold his first stories to pulp magazines in the early 1940s. His first book, the collection Dark Carnival, was published in 1947.
He has also worked on screenplays, including Moby Dick (1956) and King of Kings (1961), directed by John Huston and Nicholas Ray, respectively. Bradbury wrote the voice-over narration for King of Kings, notably Christ's final monologue, but did not receive screen credit. He has also written stories for The Twilight Zone, again uncredited.
His short story "The Foghorn", in which a sea monster mistakes a foghorn for the mating cry of a female, was adapted into the film The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms in 1953. Several of his stories were adapted by EC Comics in the 1950s, and later, a number of his novels were made into films. The Martian Chronicles was made into a miniseries starring Rock Hudson in 1979. Adaptations of his short stories were used as the basis for a television series, the Ray Bradbury Theater , along with his own screenplays, in the mid 1980s. A film adaptation of A Sound of Thunder is due to be released in 2005.
Works
Note that for Bradbury, there is some blurring of categories, and the distinctions below are somewhat subjective, for he frequently has written multiple short stories about a set of characters or a subject, making minor edits or adding supplemental material, and calling the results a "novel".
Novels
Short story collections
Honors and Awards
There is an asteroid named in his honor called (9766) Bradbury, along with a crater on the moon called "Dandelion Crater" (named after his novel, Dandelion Wine).
On November 17, 2004, Bradbury was the recipient of the National Medal of Arts, presented by President George W. Bush and Laura Bush.
He has also received the World Fantasy Award life achievement, Stoker Award life achievement, SFWA Grand Master, SF Hall of Fame Living Inductee, and First Fandom Award.
External links
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Wikiquote has a collection of quotations by or about Ray Bradbury
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- Ray Bradbury http://www.raybradbury.com/ - Official site
- Illustrated guide to Bradbury's stories http://immersion.raybradbury.ru (English, Polish and Russian languages)
- exhaustive bibliography at FantasticFiction.com http://www.fantasticfiction.co.uk/authors/Ray_Bradbury.htm
Last updated: 02-08-2005 09:55:11
Last updated: 05-03-2005 17:50:55
