Ray Bradbury Essay

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Ray Bradbury has often been voted as one of the top ten science fiction writers of the 20th century. Best known for his groundbreaking science fiction novels of the 1950’s. Bradbury claimed not be a science fiction writer but a fantasy writer (An Interview with Ray Bradbury). He often preferred to call science fiction the fiction of ideas. “Science fiction is the fiction of ideas. Ideas excite me, and as soon as I get excited, the adrenaline gets going and the next thing I know I’m borrowing energy from the ideas themselves.“ (Interviews). Bradbury was born during the depression era, and did not receive an formal college education. In lieu of any formal training or education, he was an avid reader. As a youth he visited the library on a continuous basis and read books two or three times a week. Having books of all sorts at his disposal enabled, provided the education needed to hone his writing skills and to become a writer well into adulthood. For years to come Bradbury would endorse libraries and promote their virtues: “I spent three days a week for 10 years educating myself in the public library, and it's better than college. People should educate themselves - you can get a complete education for no money. At the end of 10 years, I had read every book in the library and I'd written a thousand stories (Ray Bradbury Quotes).” The life of Ray Douglas Bradbury began on August 22, 1920 in Waukegan, Illinois. His parents Leonard Spaulding Bradbury and Esther Marie Moberg Bradbury gave him the middle name "Douglas," after the actor, Douglas Fairbanks. Between 1926 and 1933, the Bradbury family moved back and forth between Waukegan and Tucson, Arizona. In 1934, Bradbury and his family permanently relocated to Los Angeles, Californi... ... middle of paper ... ... for a new style of writing he brought to the world of science fiction. His imaginative writing style enabled millions of readers and television viewers to enter into a world of the future. His books were the first of its kind to gain a wide acceptance and a vast audience. As a consequence of his abilities to put words to paper a new generation of science fiction aficionados were born. Sadly, Ray Bradbury passed away on June 5, 2012, at the age of 91 after a long illness. Bradbury’s legacy will be long withstanding, he will be remembered for doing what he loved, for sponsoring and lobbying to save libraries from the encroachment of technology. Bradbury life was filled with the ability to write about the things he loved. He not only educated himself, he educated others on the joys of writing every day and turning the ideas he was excited about into science fiction.

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