Ray Bradbury: A Sampler

Posted on Jun 6, 2012

cdrummbks (CC BY-ND 2.0)

“Writing is not a serious business,” wrote Ray Bradbury, the prolific author of dystopian, fantasy and science fiction, who died Tuesday at the age of 91. “It’s a joy and a celebration. You should be having fun with it.”

Generations of Americans have reveled in the fruits of Bradbury’s imagination since he began publishing stories in magazines as a teenager in 1938. The Christian Science Monitor collects 10 of his most beloved works below, beginning with the book-burning and mass-culture polemic, “Fahrenheit 451.”

The Christian Science Monitor:

1. ‘Fahrenheit 451’

Inspired by the Cold War, the rising popularity of television, and Bradbury’s deep commitment to libraries, this 1953 novel predicted a dystopian future of superficial pleasures in which television and empty entertainment destroys interest in literature and firefighters are instructed to burn books. “It was a book based on real facts and also on my hatred for people who burn books,” Bradbury told The Associated Press in 2002. He wrote the book over the course of nine days at the UCLA library on typewriters that rented for 10 cents a half hour for a total cost of $9.80.

Read more

Check out this Truthdig interview with the legendary author from 2008 here.

Follow Alexander Reed Kelly on Twitter: @areedkelly.

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