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Ray Bradbury Turns 88

Posted by timothy on from the bradbury-is-everywhere dept.

Lawrence Person writes "Legendary science fiction writer Ray Bradbury turned 88 years old on August 22. Happy Birthday Ray! 'The Illustrated Man' was one of the first science fiction books I ever read, and I've been hooked ever since. I'm sure that's true of a lot of science fiction writers and readers, be it that, or 'The Martian Chronicles,' or 'Fahrenheit 451.' There are also several videos of Ray on that page, including one where he doesn't endorse Sunsweet Prunes." I remember when another student on the bus loaned me "Fahrenheit 451," and my middle-school English teacher Mrs. Young was smart enough to include "All Summer in a Day" in her curriculum.

155 of 194 comments (clear)

  1. Re:"Slow News Day" tag? by PunkOfLinux · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Yeah, it should, considering he is one of the most influential SF writers to date. Slashdot loves scifi, so, we love to hear about this stuff.

    There's a reason why Foundation and Dune come up a lot.

    --
    Show this to your friends and family that don't know what a real hacker is
  2. Re:"Slow News Day" tag? by TuringTest · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Should this really make the front page of Shlashdot? A writer's birthday?

    When the writer is Ray Bradbury, yes, it should.

    And isn't 88 a special age for hobbits, or something?

    --
    Singularity: a belief in the "God" idea with the "demiurge" relation inverted.
  3. Happy Birthday Ray!! by eclectro · · Score: 4, Funny

    May you never reach 451 degrees.

    --
    Take the cheese to sickbay, the doctor should see it as soon as possible - B'Elanna Torres, "Learning Curve"
  4. The Pedestrian by samcan · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I liked the short-story The Pedestrian. From what I hear, it was the basis for Fahrenheit 451, however, I think that one can get some different meanings out of each.

    What's interesting about Fahrenheit 451 are some of the parallels that could be drawn to today's society. Guy Montag's wife has a seashell like device that she puts in her ears so she can listen to the radio, much like today we have iPods, where people can seem to be in their own little worlds.

    The fascination she has too with the telescreens, and wanting to be involved in one of the, for lack of a better word, "soaps," could tell of our society's own inordinate fascination with the personal lives of the "rich and famous."

    Finally, that overwhelming desire for more, another telescreen, even though the last one was put in within a year prior, could speak to our society's want for material goods.

    Whether or not Mr. Bradbury believes our society could degenerate to a point where we burn books, I would argue that our society already contains elements of his fictional society.

    The Pedestrian is similar in that the everyday man is fascinated with what takes place on his television screen, and cannot be bothered to calmly walk down the street and think.

    One connection I believe can be found between the short story and the novel is that in The Pedestrian, the main character is arrested for walking down the street (as nobody does that anymore, he must be suspicious), and in Fahrenheit 451 the girl who talks to Guy Montag mentions that her uncle got arrested once for walking down the street.

    1. Re:The Pedestrian by BitterOldGUy · · Score: 5, Insightful
      Fahrenheit 451 and Orwell's 1984 should be required reading in our schools. But I don't think the folks who want to hang on to their power would like that.

      The British and Australian MPs, on the other hand, appear to be using them as a policy guide. We're not too far behind.

    2. Re:The Pedestrian by pieisgood · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Great Britain isn't far behind "1984". America isn't far behind "brave new world" and Russia/china aren't far behind "Fahrenheit 451" (just with a pinch of communism).

      --
      Eat sleep die
    3. Re:The Pedestrian by samcan · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Actually, in high school we read Animal Farm and 1984, and my middle school's library got kids to read Fahrenheit 451.

      Maybe not the norm, but nice anyway. I sped-read through Brave New World. Didn't like it as much.

      In one of my high school English classes, we actually discussed how one goes about creating a closed society. Relating it to the reading that we were doing (either 1984 or Animal Farm) gave a whole new dimension to the novel.

    4. Re:The Pedestrian by Workaphobia · · Score: 5, Interesting

      I remember reading an account by Bradbury regarding Farenheit 451, in which he described walking down the street, passing a woman who was listening to a Walkman while walking several dogs, completely oblivious to her surroundings. He then states, "This is not a work of fiction."

      It's been a while since I read the book, so while I remember that I enjoyed it, some of the details and even a portion of the main theme escape me. Along the lines of what you mentioned, my favorite passages from the book include the minimum speed limit of 60 mph in Montag's nightmare, and the part where he asks his wife what the play is about and she responds by naming the characters, as the play had absolutely no redeeming content.

      So yes, it's a great tale of how we become lost in the more superficial aspects of our lives, but it's not a point that I necessarily agree with. For instance, I don't think that walking your dogs while listening to an audio player, digital or analog, constitutes losing touch with society.

      Now that I reread your description of the Pedestrian, I'm fairly certain I have read it (probably in the back of a publication of Jonas and the Giver, back in middle school). Yes, it fits perfectly. What stands out the most is how their techno-skewed culture not only rejects nonconformity - it doesn't even comprehend it.

      Of course, Farenheit 451 is also a great story about oppression by government. Not quite as biting and frightening as 1984, but it's up there. You can't control books the way you can televisions. You can't retroactively erase their content to suit your current propaganda or to eliminate inspiring ideas. Of course, more useful then the books themselves was the knowledge of who was harboring books, so you would know who rejected society's mandates and thus who must be destroyed.

      Then again, Bradbury wrote a non-canonical passage in which Guy Montag was shocked by his firechief's personal library. The chief responded that it was only reading that was a crime, not possession.

      Sigh. It's been a while. I wish I had the time and patience for reading, but since I'm no longer in high school and thus required to read, I just can't find the time, what with.. all these... modern distractions..

      Dear God, this is indeed not a work of fiction.

      --
      Evidently, the key to understanding recursion is to begin by understanding recursion. The rest is easy.
    5. Re:The Pedestrian by the+99th+penguin · · Score: 1

      Fahrenheit 451 and Orwell's 1984 should be required reading in our schools.

      Don't forget Yevgeny Zamyatin's We

    6. Re:The Pedestrian by kungfugleek · · Score: 3, Insightful

      I kind of thought that Fahrenheit 451 was less about government oppression and book burning, and more about a society that has become so apathetic that they allow the government to oppress them and burn their books. The second-scariest part of the book, for me, was that almost nobody really cared that the book burnings, oppression, and even the atomic war were even going on. The scariest part was how much it reminded me of the society I live in, or at least my perception of it.

    7. Re:The Pedestrian by Jorophose · · Score: 1

      Here in Ontario, at least in the French boards, 451 is requirement in 10th grade. I have no idea any more if 1984 is required (but I did read it!).

    8. Re:The Pedestrian by glwtta · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Fahrenheit 451 and Orwell's 1984 should be required reading in our schools. But I don't think the folks who want to hang on to their power would like that.

      Both are, in fact, commonly found in high school curricula - no reason to get all melodramatic (it takes more than a couple of books, no matter how poignant, to trouble those who "want to hang on to their power").

      --
      sic transit gloria mundi
    9. Re:The Pedestrian by MobileTatsu-NJG · · Score: 1

      Fahrenheit 451 and Orwell's 1984 should be required reading in our schools.

      Fahrenheit 451 was required reading when I was in high school, that was 1995 in ... Kansas City of all places. (tee hee!)

      Dunno if that matters, but given some of the other things that have happened in Kansas schools in recent years, I thought a couple of you might find that amazing.

      --

      "I like to lick butts!" by MobileTatsu-NJG (#32700246) (Score:5, Informative)

    10. Re:The Pedestrian by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful

      Of course, Farenheit 451 is also a great story about oppression by government. Not quite as biting and frightening as 1984, but it's up there. You can't control books the way you can televisions. You can't retroactively erase their content to suit your current propaganda or to eliminate inspiring ideas. Of course, more useful then the books themselves was the knowledge of who was harboring books, so you would know who rejected society's mandates and thus who must be destroyed.

      What I found particularly interesting was how apolitically Bradbury portrayed this oppression. He recognized that you don't have to be a far-right-wing book-burning Nazi fascist to fit the mold of 451 - you could just as easily be a member of the far-left-wing political correctness police.

    11. Re:The Pedestrian by Ctrl-Z · · Score: 1

      I read 451 in high school English as well, but it was the sci-fi English course, not the core English curriculum. I was in an English school, not French.

      --
      www.timcoleman.com is a total waste of your time. Never go there.
    12. Re:The Pedestrian by SlowMovingTarget · · Score: 1

      Both were part of my 10th grade English Literature class (nearly two decades ago). I don't know if that's still a part of the curriculum.

    13. Re:The Pedestrian by penguin_dance · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Fahrenheit 451 and Orwell's 1984 should be required reading in our schools.

      Unfortunately, I suspect too many students associate Bradbury's work with Michael Moore's film.

      I remember reading a number of short stories or excerpt from Bradbury. One that still brings goosebumps is "There Will Come Soft Rains" about an automated house that carries on, not knowing that the owners have all been killed by a nuclear blast:

      "The garden sprinklers whirled up in golden founts, filling the soft morning air with scatterings of brightness. The water pelted windowpanes, running down the charred west side where the house had been burned evenly free of its white paint. The entire west face of the house was black, save for five places. Here the silhouette in paint of a man mowing a lawn. Here, as in a photograph, a woman bent to pick flowers. Still farther over, their images burned on wood in one titanic instant, a small boy, hands flung into the air; higher up, the image of a thrown ball, and opposite him a girl, hands raised to catch a ball which never came down."

      And some are there just to give you chills, such as The Veldt and inspired my own writing aspirations. We had a wonderful high school sophomore English teacher who introduced us to this and many other works. Bradbury is a hacker of the written word.

      --
      If you've never been modded as "flamebait" or "troll," you've never tried to argue a minority viewpoint here!
    14. Re:The Pedestrian by n+dot+l · · Score: 1

      We read the same two short stories in English class (among many others from other genres, of course). I can still remember sitting quietly for about an hour after reading these, just absorbing what I'd just read and thinking about it. Actually, the thing that really struck me was that even the kids that were usually far too cool to be seen caring about English (as if the study of the language we communicate in could possibly be worth their while) got visibly creeped out by "The Veldt".

      We had a wonderful high school sophomore English teacher who introduced us to this and many other works.

      Same.

      Bradbury is a hacker of the written word.

      Amen.

    15. Re:The Pedestrian by Siridar · · Score: 1

      The burning books idea, to my mind, felt more as though people were being told history shouldn't be remembered. Books were a permanent record of what happened before now - which may contain either a) entertainment that couldn't be monetised or b) certain facts that the current power-brokers may not wish to come to light. My personal feeling is, if 451 was written today it would be deleting data, rather than burning books. The rest of the book (families not interacting with each other, the lack of respect for strangers and their property, finding entertainment in someone else's troubles) is, sadly, what life is becoming.

    16. Re:The Pedestrian by jacquesm · · Score: 1

      It wasn't always like that, but then again, there were fewer books then.

      As the value of a bit goes down the signal to noise ratio will decrease and those in power will sleep better.

      --
      MP3 Search Engine
    17. Re:The Pedestrian by 0xdeadbeef · · Score: 1

      The sad thing about Farenheit 451 is that it owes more to the ideology of the likes of Neil Postman and Andrew Keen than any sort of anti-totalitarian sentiment.

    18. Re:The Pedestrian by dkleinsc · · Score: 1

      On the flip side, though, there is in the environment of despair some real hope in the form of the Books. Society may go to hell in a handbasket, but there's always going to be some who find ways to work around that problem.

      --
      I am officially gone from /. Long live http://www.soylentnews.com/
    19. Re:The Pedestrian by dogeatery · · Score: 1

      I agree, they are commonly read in schools. One thing I recall, though, is discussion of the books dulled the point -- they were projected onto the former Soviet Union instead of our own society.

    20. Re:The Pedestrian by KDR_11k · · Score: 1

      Fahrenheit 451 was about decadence and mass media consumption, not censorship (burning the books was just a result as the dumb masses got scared of even knowing someone has books and might be one of the smart people). I don't think any common description of the life in communist countries involves consumerism and media overload.

      --
      Justice is the sheep getting arrested while an impartial judge declares the vote void.
    21. Re:The Pedestrian by KDR_11k · · Score: 1

      History might be a better teacher than fiction when it comes to totalitarianism. Living in Germany means history lessons spend a lot of time on the third Reich including its origins with faked terrorist attacks, knee-jerk "national security" laws being passed in the wake and general bitterness and hate left over from the first world war. Meanwhile behind the wall (at least before it fell, of course) there was a prime example of a communist police state. Who needs fiction when history contains all the lessons much more clearly?

      --
      Justice is the sheep getting arrested while an impartial judge declares the vote void.
    22. Re:The Pedestrian by KDR_11k · · Score: 1

      It was said that books got banned because the people demanded it, they were afraid of people who had an attention span long enough to read a book.

      --
      Justice is the sheep getting arrested while an impartial judge declares the vote void.
    23. Re:The Pedestrian by OSXCPA · · Score: 1

      One item I noted when I reread 'Farenheit 451' last year after a LONG absence... here in the US, the government doesn't have to force us to give up books, walking, political discussion, etc. (although some would argue that there's lots of effort in those directions) - we've given up these ourselves. Think I'm wrong?

      Here's a little test:
      1. Name all the people who live around you - next door, both sides, across the street. Bonus points if you know all the names, first and last, and how old the kids are.
      2. Name your librarian - at least one of them.
      3. Now, count up all the people you just successfully named, double the number (call the doubled number X), and list that many television shows, movies and/or celebrities. Note: Bonus points if you can name X of each category instead of in aggregate.

      Am I wrong?

  5. But he has a tombstone by AhtirTano · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Still alive, yet he still has a tombstone in a cemetery in L.A. The same cemetery were Marilyn Monroe and Dean Martin are buried. Strange, but true.

    1. Re:But he has a tombstone by Trailwalker · · Score: 4, Interesting

      More normal than you think. Walk through most American cemeteries and you will see many markers/monuments in place for those yet living.

      The Cemetery and Funeral businesses call these Pre-need sales and use them to maintain sales numbers.

      As you kiddies will find out, when life gets near its end, the idea of selecting the services and memorials you want is very attractive. Pre-need is much less expensive than At Need. The "Death Industry" loves At Need sales. The families are easy marks for higher prices, and expensive, but unneeded services.

      For a good book on the subject, try Jessica Mitford's "American Way of Death, revisited" circa 2000.

    2. Re:But he has a tombstone by fm6 · · Score: 1

      The Cemetery and Funeral businesses call these Pre-need sales and use them to maintain sales numbers.

      You make it sound dishonest. I assume that when you get a "pre-need" plot you have to actually pay for it? Then it's sold. When you buy a new residence, the sale occurs when you pay your money, not when you move in!

    3. Re:But he has a tombstone by Foobar+of+Borg · · Score: 1

      I hope to shoot myself if ever I become so self-obsessed. Get a life now, before you die.

      It's not about self-obsession. It's about not wanting to burden those you leave behind. Kind of like with leaving a will, it's better to have everything worked out in advance so you don't make so much trouble for your loved ones after you are dead.

      --
      Similar to the upcoming US election results
  6. Re:"Slow News Day" tag? by Bieeanda · · Score: 4, Funny

    And isn't 88 a special age for hobbits, or something?

    No, it's the age at which science fiction authors start to travel backwards in time.

  7. 2 days late. by Xupa · · Score: 1

    About average for slashdot. And anyone who doesn't think Bradbury's birthday is relevant on a tech forum needs their head checked, preferably into something made of steel.

  8. Re:"Slow News Day" tag? by thermian · · Score: 4, Insightful

    If you can find me one geek who doesn't list an SF writer as a major influence in their interest in technology, then I'll agree with you.

    I have my doubts that you would succeed though. For me it was Douglas Adams.

    --
    A learning experience is one of those things that say, 'You know that thing you just did? Don't do that.' - D. Adams
  9. Re:"Slow News Day" tag? by the_humeister · · Score: 3, Interesting

    I have to agree with the grandparent post. Sure, Ray Bradbury is important in the sci-fi world. But is he anymore important than say Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, Larry Ellison? We don't mention their birthdays here. Other people of importance for whom birthdays we don't mention on Slashdot either: Stephen Hawking, Kip Thorne, William Gibson, and the all important etc. So, yes, it is a slow news day.

  10. Re:"Slow News Day" tag? by reboot246 · · Score: 1

    It fits right in on Slashdot, as does being two days late with the story.

  11. Has anyone actually read Farenheit 452? by BadAnalogyGuy · · Score: 1

    Bradbury's Farenheit 451 is really not that good. The writing is pretty poor, and the storytelling is uneven. Bradbury uses silliloquies to express his points. So what you end up with is a series of monotonous essays rather than an actual story.

    1. Re:Has anyone actually read Farenheit 452? by Xupa · · Score: 1

      This, from "BadAnalogyGuy." I'm sure your 88th birthday will be remembered. By someone.

    2. Re:Has anyone actually read Farenheit 452? by icegreentea · · Score: 2, Interesting

      *shrug* I found it ok. I got around to reading it after watching/reading a bunch of other similarly themed works. Like Equilibrium. So really, I got spoiled into thinking there would be some sort of badass action scene.

      Really, the fact that no part really stands out for me probably says something about the book. Reading it was kind of jarring, but I put it off at the 'disturbingness' of the plot/theme/idea. The only thing I remember is how close his wife behaved to stereotyped dumb blonds, NASCAR fans, and /.'s 'Joe Sixpack'.

    3. Re:Has anyone actually read Farenheit 452? by Siridar · · Score: 1

      Farenheit four five _two_ eh?

      nope, haven't read it. :)

    4. Re:Has anyone actually read Farenheit 452? by OSXCPA · · Score: 1

      You are confused -a soliloquy is not an essay. Essays are ordered and logical and make a point by (hopefully) proposing a clear, orderly argument or discussion. A soliloquy is a character speaking (or 'speechifying' in slang, if done badly) 'aloud' to the reader, although not necessarily out loud in context, or even consciously to the reader, elaborating his or her chain of thought. You were bored because Montag liked to muse on his surroundings, one of the traits that set him apart from his peers, and which proves his undoing, as it moves from musings to thinking to action. If he were thinking in essays, he'd be far less credible as a character, and the book would be much more preachy. Montag would likely be much less sympathetic - no one likes a preachy, self-righteous jerk, even if they are 'right'. Ayn Rand wrote preachy characters, which is why I'd argue her books were much more clearly about the 'detail' of ideas (philosophy), but her characters were far less well-formed than Bradburys' - his writings about ideas never went past the thematic - in '451' on its own, anyway.

      As for uneven storytelling, I can't possibly imagine what you mean. Sorry you didn't like the book.

  12. Meh by Guppy06 · · Score: 1, Flamebait

    Clarke is dead but Bradbury persists. There is no God.

    Oh yes, I've read your precious Fahrenheit and your Martian Chronicles, much to my dismay. Simply because he said 'teh future!' in one and 'Mars, bitches!' in the next somehow makes these browbeating, one-dimensional allegories that could literally have been set in any place and time "Great Works in Science Fiction" (TM).

    H. G. Wells. E. E. Smith. Not Ray Bradbury.

    1. Re:Meh by 0xdeadbeef · · Score: 2, Funny

      Your Heinlein paperbacks are sticky, aren't they?

    2. Re:Meh by Xupa · · Score: 1

      ...and yet, here he is. Sharing his vivid insight with his Friends.

    3. Re:Meh by gregbot9000 · · Score: 3, Interesting

      H. G. Wells? Who's stories could be boiled down to thinly veiled allegory for england at the time: a superior power invading what was though the premier power with nightmarish force saying 'Mars, bitches!', and a man venturing to different lands where there happens to be a society that resembles what his is like at the extremes in 'teh future!'. Very few sci-fi writers actually write fiction based on science. More tend to be allegory's of the modern society set against different backdrops. You may not like Bradbury's stories but attacking them on their merit as qualifying as "sci-fi" is probably the worst place for you to pick your battle

    4. Re:Meh by Guppy06 · · Score: 3, Interesting

      "Your Heinlein paperbacks are sticky, aren't they?"

      While Heinlein does tend to be "Ayn Rand in Spaaaaaace!" at least it actually feels like space! Stranger in a Strange Land had flying cars and bounce tubes and stuff. The Martian Chronicles took place on Mars for no other reason than because the author says so.

      Jules Verne figured out that Floridian latitudes were convenient, and yet "Rocket Summer" took place in Ohio? And for how many centuries did we know that the surface of Earth was mostly water, and yet he consistently describes Earth as a green dot in the Martian sky? These are things that anybody living after 1750 or so with a globe on their desk could deduce (and they often did), but Bradbury couldn't be bothered to exercise his supposedly vast imagination even that much? Even if it helped immerse the reader just a little bit? No, such things would get in the way of The Point. Instead of creating an imaginative world that was "the same, but different" where he could explore ideas, he created a world that was "the same, only they say they're on Mars."

      Agree or disagree with Heinlein, the man could write a good story. Agree or disagree with Ellison, the man could write a good story. Ray Bradbury cannot write.

    5. Re:Meh by Workaphobia · · Score: 1

      *Chuckles*

      Not to be insulting - because I can't remember enough of Farenheit 451 to intelligently defend its worth - I just like your single-quoted summaries of those two books. Someday in the future, if F451's distopia prevails (or more likely, Idiocracy's), 'teh future!' and 'Mars, bitches!' might be labels on the bindings of Bradbury's work in an incredibly dusty library.

      --
      Evidently, the key to understanding recursion is to begin by understanding recursion. The rest is easy.
    6. Re:Meh by Guppy06 · · Score: 1

      "Someday in the future, if F451's distopia prevails (or more likely, Idiocracy's), 'teh future!' and 'Mars, bitches!' might be labels on the bindings of Bradbury's work in an incredibly dusty library."

      Except, even then, George Orwell managed to do a much better job with the theme of a deliberately illiterate state/society four years prior. Orwell thought up Minipax and Minitruth, while Bradbury had "He's called a 'fireman' because he starts fires! I'm so clever!"

      (What do you call the guy who shovels the coal into the locomotive and generally tends the fire again?)

    7. Re:Meh by gardyloo · · Score: 4, Funny

      Your Heinlein paperbacks are sticky, aren't they?

      Some people have time enough for love.

    8. Re:Meh by gardyloo · · Score: 1

      What do you call the guy who shovels the coal into the locomotive and generally tends the fire again?

      Mister Tibbs?

    9. Re:Meh by Guppy06 · · Score: 2, Interesting

      "a superior power invading what was though the premier power with nightmarish force saying 'Mars, bitches!', and a man venturing to different lands where there happens to be a society that resembles what his is like at the extremes in 'teh future!'."

      But the key here is that Wells actually worked on the metaphor. Good science fiction tends to be stories of "Let's take contemporary society (or some other meme), but dial up Aspect X a few orders of magnitude and explore what happens." Most of Bradbury's work starts with "Let's take contemporary society," and that's as far as he ever gets.

      One of the more damning criticisms of science fiction as a genre, all the more damning because it's often true, is that many science fiction authors write science fiction because the standards are so much lower than for other forms of fiction or literature. For every genuinely good book in the genre, there are fifty that wouldn't even get shelf space in the trashy romance section.

      Other than the very end, where Earth is destroyed in a fashion that more resembles Alderaan than Hiroshima, Martian Chronicles could just as easily have been written about a previously undiscovered island in the South Pacific somewhere, followed by its subsequent colonization and subjugation of its peoples (you know, what Bradbury was trying so God damned hard to write about). But "Polynesian Chronicles," named and written as such, sitting in some other part of the bookstore, wouldn't have sold enough to merit a second printing. Put "Mars" on the cover, and there's a chance that preteen boys of the day will buy your (supposedly) Mars-themed book rather than a Mars-themed trading cards, Mars-themed comic book, or Mars-themed horror movie ticket that week.

      The government wants to keep you stupid, people never change, and atoms are bad, mmmkay?

    10. Re:Meh by Hal_Porter · · Score: 1

      Don't mod down N word trolls in this thread!

      Bradbury would not approve.

      Mod them up.

      --
      echo -e 'global _start\n _start:\n mov eax, 2\n int 80h\n jmp _start' > a.asm; nasm a.asm -f elf; ld a.o -o a;
    11. Re:Meh by 0xdeadbeef · · Score: 1

      And which will stand the test of time better? The story that is style and allegory, or the one devotes pages of exposition to laughably wrong predictions of a supposedly realistic future? It all might as well be spaceports in Ohio.

    12. Re:Meh by Guppy06 · · Score: 1

      "The story that is style and allegory, or the one devotes pages of exposition to laughably wrong predictions of a supposedly realistic future? It all might as well be spaceports in Ohio."

      "Predictions?" As I said before, anybody since Sir Isaac Newton could easily see that lower latitudes were beneficial. Jules Verne did figure it out. Better still, Bradbury could have set it in segregated Florida and maybe get away with combining a story or two.

      And the image of the destruction of Australia (!!!) being visible with the naked eye from the surface of Mars isn't a "wrong prediction," it isn't "obsolete scientific opinion," it's the writings of a man who never actually looked up at the night sky and noticed "Gee, it's just a rust-colored dot, can't really see much from this distance," in spite of writing a book that supposedly takes place there. Aside from being a visual too jarring for the reader to stay in the narrative, it reflects Bradbury's own geocentrism, a notion he spends a great many pages mocking and belittling his characters for showing.

      Just as discongruent was the idea that almost everybody on Mars would go back to Earth (even after seeing such a spectacle) to die with that planet, rather than accepting a flood of war refugees. But any amount of believability that gets in the way of Father Bradbury's sermon has to go, he's got A Point to Make.

    13. Re:Meh by Guppy06 · · Score: 1

      "Here's a clue: Moby Dick isn't really about a whale."

      And Nathaniel Hawthorne didn't really spend a good deal of time conversing with ghosts, but both he and Melville managed to create something in their readers usually referred to as "suspension of disbelief."

    14. Re:Meh by OSXCPA · · Score: 1

      No one has ever, to my knowledge, claimed Ray Bradbury writes, or has ever written, 'hard' science fiction. He writes literature, using a 'science fiction-y' setting. Mars, to him, is a totally new place with totally alien people on it, but it has air just like Earth... hmmm... He uses the notion of a totally new place to cover issues like race, difference, perception, etc. One could argue he wrote fantasy, not science fiction, but 'Ray Bradbury cannot write' ? Come on, that is too much.

      Did the 'Ohio latitude' issue really make 'Rocket Summer' suck? Seriously? So, by implication, anyone who liked the story is an idiot, because how could it be good if setting it in Ohio would completely blow suspension of disbelief for any marginally intelligent person...

      I respectfully suggest you have taken a bit too extreme a position on the subject, but I respect your willingness to at least elaborate on it.

  13. Re:"Slow News Day" tag? by gregbot9000 · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Well i think it's news worthy in that it wasn't an obituary. How many of the great Sci-fi authors are left?

  14. I remember when Ray Bradbury defended Bob Packwood by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Ray Bradbury was a good friend of senator Packwood, and when the senator's political career began to unravel amidst allegations of sexual abuse and harassment from his female staffers, Bradbury tried to defend him on an episode of politically incorrect. Among other things, he said something to the effect of "who hasn't slapped a girl on the butt?" and "I sexually harassed my wife until she married me."

    A class act, that guy is.

  15. Re:"Slow News Day" tag? by echucker · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Actually, some of the geeks that are of the latest generation may lean more towards movies and games than the printed word. So I'd bet that not listing a SF author would be entirely possible.

  16. Middle School Sci-Fi by buddhaunderthetree · · Score: 3, Insightful

    By some chance both All Summer in a Day and Sound of Thunder were in my 7th grade lit book, better than the crap my kids are assigned to read.

    --
    "Technology.....the knack of so arranging the world that we don't have to experience it." Max Firsch
    1. Re:Middle School Sci-Fi by Nefarious+Wheel · · Score: 2, Insightful
      Although I read (and enjoyed) most of Bradbury's work, I never considered him a mainstream science fiction writer. His very best work was horror, of the type that involved the suggestion of hot, pressured humid days before a storm, a lightning rod salesman, and the implied certainty of damnation from the combination. He's a prose writer with the soul of a poet.

      I see SF as a story where the world, and behaviour, has changed as a result of some technical progress, whether or not that technology is explained. Bradbury, to his credit, did have the world changed because of technology, and didn't explain it at all -- just the effect. This was not Doc Smith's footnotes on corpuscular drive and space suits of phenoline and bakelite. Both had their place.

      --
      Do not mock my vision of impractical footwear
  17. Re:"Slow News Day" tag? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful

    Those are not geeks.

  18. All Summer In A Day by rumblin'rabbit · · Score: 1

    Now there's a simple, powerful, and disturbing story. I read it when I was in my early teens, and have never forgotten it.

    For a (so-called) science fiction writer, Bradbury was an unabashed romantic of the American school. He goes right along Steinbeck in my view.

  19. Where, oh where... by kclittle · · Score: 1

    ... is this man's Nobel Prize for Literature? I'm completely serious.

    --
    Generally, bash is superior to python in those environments where python is not installed.
    1. Re:Where, oh where... by Lilith's+Heart-shape · · Score: 1

      Science fiction isn't considered "serious" enough to warrant the Nobel committee's attention, but they'll sometimes throw the magical realism crowd a prize. On the other hand, Doris Lessing got the 2007 prize, and has written some science fiction.

      --

      I write sci-fi for metalheads

    2. Re:Where, oh where... by Lilith's+Heart-shape · · Score: 1

      Margaret Atwood also stands a chance of getting the price some day, although she vehemently denies that she has anything to do with sci-fi.

      Yet she has no issue with using sci-fi tropes and imagery in her novels. If it walks like a duck...

      --

      I write sci-fi for metalheads

    3. Re:Where, oh where... by OSXCPA · · Score: 1

      She' smart and ambitious - once tarred with the label 'science fiction', a written work may no longer be referred to as 'literature' and admiring it, except after much sherry in the faculty lounge, one may confess to having not hated such work when one was too immature to know better.

      Ms. Atwood probably doesn't want to risk turning off her academic audience... You know, academics are truly the arbiters of quality when it comes to literature... :)

  20. He must have been very famous by flyingfsck · · Score: 1

    because I have never heard of him and I read lots of science fiction...

    --
    Excuse me, but please get off my Pennisetum Clandestinum, eh!
    1. Re:He must have been very famous by Xupa · · Score: 1

      so which part of your post isn't true?

    2. Re:He must have been very famous by dbolger · · Score: 1

      If you're reading lots of science fiction and you have never read anything by Ray Bradbury then you are reading lots of the wrong science fiction.

      Are you by any chance reading the greats of modern sci-fi in inverse alphabetical order, by author's surname?

  21. Bradbury and Bukowski in the same graduating class by whuddafugger · · Score: 3, Informative

    It seems Bradbury and Bukowski were in the same graduating class. According to their respective Wikipedia entries, both were born in 1920, and both graduated from Los Angeles High School.

    Interesting bit of trivia if true...

    -- anthony

    --
    http://www.whuddafug.com
  22. 2 degrees of Seperation... by B5_geek · · Score: 1

    Years ago I hung out a lot in an IRC Channel with one of his nephews.

    I always thought 451 was over-rated, my school taught it along-side 1984 and Lost Paradise. I do however enjoy several of his other books.

    --
    "The price good men pay for indifference to public affairs is to be ruled by evil men." ~Plato (427-347 BC)
  23. Greatest SciFi Writer of Our Age. Period. by teknopurge · · Score: 3, Interesting

    I contend that Bradbury is the single greatest science fiction writer of our age. Period. What he did - his vision - and when he did it was truly remarkable.

    I still remember reading the Martian Chronicles and the Illustrated Man. For a kid that didn't like to read for fun it says a lot about books that kept me up 3 nights straight to find out how things ended.

    --
    Website Hosting
  24. Re:"Slow News Day" tag? by hey! · · Score: 3, Informative

    I should think not.

    Bradbury was one of the first science fiction authors to have a wider cultural impact outside of sci-fi fandom, and is still one of the most important.

    Of course, there's no way to precisely rank the importance of writers in a genre; perhaps there were more influential writers within the genre, but clearly he is a writer of the first rank. Within his historical cohort, many have passed away: Poul Anderson, Isaac Asimov, James Blish, Robert Bloch, Arthur Clarke, Philip K. Dick, Gordy Dickson, Frank Herbert, Damon Knight, Stanislaw Lem, Kurt Vonnegut ... all were his contemporaries, all gone. Even Gene Roddenberry and Rod Serling if you choose to include them.

    Bradbury belongs to a seminal generation of science fiction writers. If you go back a decade earlier by birth date, you get a few names who are recognizably and undeniably part of the genre: H. Beam Piper, Robert Heinlein, Clifford D. Simak. Bradbury himself was a later bloomer, beginning his most important work in the 1950s, while his near exact contemporary Isaac Asimov was publishing a decade earlier, and who perhaps is a link to an earlier, pulpier age. If you go back even further, you get figures like Doc Smith (who was very advanced for his era) who were writing in a very different kind of genre.

    The distinctive accomplishment of this generation of writers is that they raised the science fiction bar from thrilling adventure (although not stinting in that department) with serious literary craft, social critique, and scientific speculation, a fact that escaped the notice of wider audiences for years. Bradbury was one of the first to get noticed outside the club. And he did it without having to cross over into social satire, with sci-fi served up neat.

    It's remarkable and happy news that Bradbury is still with us. There aren't many of that generation who are. Brian Aldiss, Anne McCaffrey, and Ursula LeGuin among the top tier writers. John Christopher, and Kate Wilhelm certainly.

    So, yes, it's newsworthy that he's still with us.

    --
    Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
  25. When I was fifteen,... by walter_f · · Score: 3, Informative

    I liked Bradbury a lot. And Heinlein. And E.E. Smith.

    A few years later, Farmer and Stapledon.

    At the age of 25, I discovered two very witty and humourous authors, namely Robert Sheckley
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Sheckley

    and R.A. Lafferty
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/R._A._Lafferty

    Not to forget Philip K. Dick, Stanislaw Lem, the Strugatskijs.

    And of course, the British Authors: Douglas Adams, and Clarke, Moorcock, Brunner, Ballard, Aldiss,...

    Among them, the great but not well-known David I. Masson ("The Caltraps of Time")
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_I._Masson

    Somebody just tell me to stop?
    Thanks. ;-)

    1. Re:When I was fifteen,... by goose-incarnated · · Score: 1

      Don't stop - try Terry Pratchett. "Small Gods" is a good one.

      --
      I'm a minority race. Save your vitriol for white people.
    2. Re:When I was fifteen,... by walter_f · · Score: 1

      Of course, Terry Pratchett.
      And Neil Gaiman ("Good Omens")
      http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neil_Gaiman

      By "stop" I did not mean "stop reading SF" at all (I wouldn't), but merely stop listing my favourite authors here on /. ;-)

      By the way, did I mention Bob Shaw? ;-))

  26. It's perhaps not so science-fictiony... by gardyloo · · Score: 3, Interesting

    ... but "Something Wicked This Way Comes" is one of my favorite, most enjoyed influences in terms of writing style and pure entertainment. I've read many of his other stories (and I agree with some that "Fahrenheit 451" isn't one of his better works, though it's undeniably important), and enjoyed them all.
          However---and perhaps it's the time in my life that I read it---for pure *joy* at the written word and how he wields them, "SWTWC" is probably in the top five works which has most affected me (and this post is no, nor is it meant to be, reflection of Ray's abilities).

  27. Re:"Slow News Day" tag? by Kugrian · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Those are not geeks.

    Because they don't read sci-fi? I never did as a child, yet consider myself a geek. I've always read a lot, but never found any sci-fi books that really dragged me in.

    What got me into tech were the movies depicting tech. Star Wars (IV), Tron, Wargames and Back to the Future (I). Playing with Lego and Mechano while watching them blew me away.

    All the while I read a huge amount. Mostly fantasy, crime and horror. When I wasn't reading, I was probably either watching sci-fi movies, or playing games or creating text adventures on my Speccy.

    As anyone who reads this is probably aware, shit changes - espically in the world of tech. Where we once read, we now may watch or listen instead. In another time slashdot may have been a newspaper with comments fueled by readers snail-mail. But it ain't.

    If you don't think viewing sci-fi in other media makes you geeky enough, then start telegramming in your punch-card comments.

  28. Golden age of science fiction by fermion · · Score: 3, Interesting
    Bradbury is one of the influential authors from the golden age of science fiction. This was a cool time when people were buying books and magazines and a writer could make a good living writing. Lok at the intro to Fahrenheit 451. He needed to sell a story, so he went to the library, put coins in a typewriter, and wrote. It was amazing.

    What makes these guys cool is that they could have probably just gotten away with writing crap, like so many authors do today, or they could have tried to prove they were smarter than everyone else by writing 'literature'. But they didn't. They wrote stuff that socially relevant and accessible to the people. As a result we have a good history or the social views of technology and cultural issues of the time. As they die we are losing first hand history from people who made living by objectively observing it and then writing it down in entertaining form.

    So all these kids that think this is not relevant, well that because we know watch tv instead of read. No one becomes a scientist because of pulp fiction. Now everyone watches TV. Which is no so good because the bandwidth of TV is nowhere near as wide as the bandwidth of pulp fiction, so the vision and opinions tend to be limited and sanitized to what will attract sufficient viewers to pay the 200K it would take to develop a script, instead of the 20K it would take to buy a story. Of course, everyone now wants to be a millionaire overnight, so likely would think it was too much to develop a story and only get 20K.

    The legacy of books that these guys left us is awesome. It is techy writing, unabashedly, unapologetically, and willingly. I will take this time to thank bradbury for the writing, be it science fiction, fantasy, or just fiction.

    --
    "She's a scientist and a lesbian. She's not going to let it slide." Orphan Black
  29. Here in the US by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Informative

    F 451, 1984, Animal Farm, and Brave New World were required reading in my schools in the late 70's - 80's.

    Not sure if they still make the kids read these anymore. I hope so.

    1. Re:Here in the US by my+$anity++0 · · Score: 1

      I remember reading all four of those during high school, which for me was 2001-2006, though I'm certain Animal Farm was for my own leisure. The remaining three I read for school, but the only one I'm sure that wasn't elective reading instead of required was Brave New World. I'm glad I read all of them though.

  30. I saw him speak by Trailer+Trash · · Score: 1

    In 1993, he was the keynote speaker at the Ingres convention in San Jose. Awesome speaker - I still remember the theme of his speech - science fiction to science reality. Very inspiring.

    --
    Do you have ESP?
  31. Re:"Slow News Day" tag? by lgw · · Score: 3, Interesting

    No, there's somehting special about books. There's just very little actual content in movies and games. A movie has what, a 100 page script? And less than that for games.

    In the room with me as I type this are about 40,000 pages of imaginative fiction, and that's the fraction of what I've read that I liked enough to keep through many moves. If your only exposure to other worlds is a few dozen skiffy movies, you've hardly left your head! Heck, you probably think skiffy is SF.

    And I don't even consider myself a hardcore fan - I've never gotten drunk with Niven, or punched in the face by Ellison, or watched Asimov put his moves on a young female fan, I just read a bit in my spare time, just a book or two a week.

    --
    Socialism: a lie told by totalitarians and believed by fools.
  32. Re:Greatest SciFi Writer of Our Age. Period. by buddhaunderthetree · · Score: 1

    Asimov may be better at the science part of scifi, but Bradbury is definitely the better writer.

    --
    "Technology.....the knack of so arranging the world that we don't have to experience it." Max Firsch
  33. Re:"Slow News Day" tag? by lgw · · Score: 4, Informative

    No SF author has ever creeped me out as much as Bradbury can. He can describe a happy summer day with just a note of ... something ... that makes you think you're in a horror story despite every description being pleasant. "There will come soft rains" from The Martian Chronicles still sticks with me 20 years after reading it for the first time, long after we stopped fearing the bomb. Truely a genius at his craft.

    --
    Socialism: a lie told by totalitarians and believed by fools.
  34. He's the giant... by Kid+Zero · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Modern SF Writers all stand on his shoulders when they write.

  35. Re:I remember when Ray Bradbury defended Bob Packw by PoderOmega · · Score: 3, Insightful

    I couldn't find out when Ray Bradbury got married, but I would guess it was 40+ years ago. Believe or not there was a time where most did not even know the term sexual harrasment.

  36. Re:"Slow News Day" tag? by blackest_k · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Strange you do not associate scifi writers with the films that you enjoy. Do you realise there are many films where the book came first? Ray Bradbury in particular has been the source of many stories that have been adapted for the screen.

    cutting for film loses depth and plot and takes away your part in a story, yes your imagination has an important part to play when reading a book.

    unfortunately your settling for mcdonalds instead of visiting a real restaurant.

    --
    Blarney Quality Restaurant, Plants
  37. Hobbits by snspdaarf · · Score: 2, Insightful

    And isn't 88 a special age for hobbits, or something?

    You are thinking of "eleventy-one."

    --
    Why, without your clothes, you're naked, Miss Dudley!
  38. The Coda by Enderandrew · · Score: 4, Informative

    Fahrenheit 451 itself was censored in exactly the method we wrote about for years, and he didn't know it. When he later discovered it, he wrote this new piece to go in the end of the book. Everyone should read it.

    http://members.iquest.net/~jswartz/jks/humor/451.htm

    --
    http://blindscribblings.com - Tasty pop-culture in conceptual fashion.
    1. Re:The Coda by TomHandy · · Score: 1

      Of course now that he insists Fahrenheit 451 isn't "really" about censorship (see http://www.laweekly.com/2007-05-31/news/ray-bradbury-fahrenheit-451-misinterpreted/2 ), who knows what to make of that.

    2. Re:The Coda by Enderandrew · · Score: 1

      I think you misunderstand the article, and that apparently people did misunderstand the book, but not like you suggest. I thought the book was crystal clear. He didn't write about a "Big Brother" type government, even though the fire fighters worked for the government. Bradbury was clear in the book, and in how he discussed it over the years that censorship also exists in oppression from minorities. We are so afraid of offending people that we must be overtly politically correct. We snip this statement, or this though and what are we left with? If we remove anything that might possibly be offensive to anyone, then you are basically left with no one.

      The characters in 451 didn't burn books because they were anti-government, but rather because original thought might offend someone.

      451 is about censorship, but not about the government censoring people. It is about people censoring themselves.

      --
      http://blindscribblings.com - Tasty pop-culture in conceptual fashion.
  39. Categorize it as fantasy without the damned elves. by EWAdams · · Score: 1

    Something Wicked This Way Comes is nothing short of brilliant. I must have read it half a dozen times. I never saw the movie; I didn't want it to ruin it for me.

    "This letter that I am carving into the bullet is not a letter. It is my smile."

    --
    I piss off bigots.
  40. Re:"Slow News Day" tag? by hubie · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I don't think anyone questions his credentials, but I think it does make for a slow news day to point out his 88th birthday. Is this an annual announcement that is made here? Were there front page stories for his 73rd, 68th, or what about 86th?

    For what it is worth, it also was the 91st birthday of John Lee Hooker, the 69th birthday of Carl Yastrzemski, and the 146th birthday of Claude Debussy. If you want to argue that these people don't fit in with the slashdot crowd (and before you do, don't forget that baseball nerds and geeks by far predate computer geeks), shouldn't we have mentioned that the 11th was Steve Wozniak's 58th birthday, the 7th was James Randi's 80th birthday (good lord, I didn't know he was that old, but at least that is one of those decadal numbers people get all worked up about), the 5th was Neil Armstrong's 78th, and the 19th would have been Gene Roddenberry's 87th birthday.

    Unless there is some significance to this particular birthday, I would have to agree with the GP that it must be a slow news day for this to make the front page.

  41. Nobody -- NOBODY -- does paranoia better. by EWAdams · · Score: 2, Informative

    "The Fruit at the Bottom of the Bowl." He makes it sound so reasonable.

    --
    I piss off bigots.
  42. Happy birthday! (and thank you...) by Stanislav_J · · Score: 2, Insightful

    I fondly recall that Fahrenheit 451 (along with Orwell's 1984 and Animal Farm) was one of the first really serious "adult" (in the non-porno sense) books I read, when I was all of maybe 11? 12? The visions and dark allegories of all three books, combined with the events of the late 60's (and Watergate, soon to follow), which made me realize that the Real World (TM) was not at all like what my History and Civics textbooks portrayed, helped to turn that impressionable, too-smart-for-his-own-good adolescent into the bitter, paranoid, mistrusting, cynical middle-aged grunt I have become. For all the ulcers, the insomnia, the times I beat my head against the wall in frustration at the direction of government and society, and the accumulated hair I tore out of my head along the way.....I thank you.

    --
    "Every great cause begins as a movement, becomes a business, and eventually degenerates into a racket." -- Eric Hoffer
  43. Re:"Slow News Day" tag? by Gruff1002 · · Score: 1

    Absolutely there is something special about books. Every sci-fi movie or series I have ever watched made me seek out the book to fill in the details. Every game or other physical techy subject has always brought me back to the written word, after all don't most things originate with writing whether it be in a spiral notebook or on the back of a napkin?

  44. Re:"Slow News Day" tag? by bigbigbison · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Not to nitpick but several games have rather lengthy scripts with many more lines than in a typical movie. Planescape: Torment, for example, is said to have a script of more than 800,000 words

    --
    http://www.popularculturegaming.com -- my blog about the culture of videogame players
  45. Ray Bradbury Loves Bush.... by TomHandy · · Score: 3, Interesting
    http://www.spaceagecity.com/bradbury/quotes.htm

    POLITICS:
    [George W. Bush is] wonderful. We needed him. Clinton is a s***head 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.... It doesn't matter who does it -- Democrats or Republicans -- but it's long overdue. (Salon.com, August 29, 2001)

    The great thing is our counter-revolution that occurred in the polls a few weeks ago. I think it's great. All the Democrats are out and the Republicans are going to have a chance in a couple of years. It doesn't make a difference what party you belong to--it's a chance for a fresh start. It's very exciting. (Speaking about the "Republican Revolution" of 1994)

    Oh yeah, and he says that Fahrenheit 451 isn't really about censorship or oppressive governments:

    http://www.laweekly.com/2007-05-31/news/ray-bradbury-fahrenheit-451-misinterpreted/2

    1. Re:Ray Bradbury Loves Bush.... by TomHandy · · Score: 1

      You can see him here too: http://www.raybradbury.com/at_home_clips.html According to him we've never had censorship or book burnings in the US either.... and he doesn't consider books being banned from libraries (including his own) to be censorship. Yet at the same time he says Fahrenheit 451 is about how TV is replacing literature and making people morons.

    2. Re:Ray Bradbury Loves Bush.... by shish · · Score: 1

      I think we have a chance to do something about education... (August 29, 2001)

      Given that bush's government has been too busy warmongering to do anything about education (other than continuing the "no child left behind" thing, aka "no child allowed ahead"), does he still hold this view?

      --
      I mod down anyone who says "I will be modded down for this", regardless of the rest of their comment
    3. Re:Ray Bradbury Loves Bush.... by OSXCPA · · Score: 1

      You might want to add some context - Bush was new, and had not yet turned into the president we now know him to be - see the date on your posted citation (August 2001). At the time, Bush was behind the 'no child left behind' initiative, which was supposed to help education in the US. It didn't live up to what was promised, but it was the only really comprehensive solution floating around at the time. As for the 1994 quote, the 'Republican Revolution' was pretty much about people being annoyed that the Democrats who had been in office hadn't done anything they promised - kind of like now, where the last round of elections saw people like Nancy Pelosi elected on anti-war platforms, which have turned into just so much smoke.

      I'm not saying the man is a saint or even correct in his assessments of politics, but your post reads like the left-wing equivalent of a FOX News personality profile.

  46. Re:"Slow News Day" tag? by p0ss · · Score: 1

    Anne Mcaffery, Ursula K Le Guin, Orson Scott Card, Brian Aldiss, Larry Niven

    Of the more recent crop we have Neal Stephenson, Vernor Vinge and William Gibson

    And on a more mutimedia front we have Neil Gaman and Joss Whedon (He has one the Hugo Award, but then again, so has J.K Rowling).

    We may have lost many of the Grand masters, but there will allways be young heros stepping up to the plate. I personally think Andre Infante shows a great level of promise, and returns my faith in the future of sci fi

  47. "Rocket Summer" by dpbsmith · · Score: 1

    A silly little short squib of a thing, part of The Martian Chronicles, yet it has stuck in my mind for over fifty years.

    That and The Sound of Thunder--the time travelling tourist steps on a butterfly--but everyone knows that one, of course... ...and the one about the automated house that keeps running, serving meals and scraping the uneaten meals into the dishwasher, reading the housewife her favorite poem (by Sara Teasdale), and so forth, apparently unaware that the family has been vaporized by an atomic bomb, with silhouettes of what they were doing burned into the paint on the outside of the house.

    --

    "How to Do Nothing," kids activities, back in print!

  48. Re:I remember when Ray Bradbury defended Bob Packw by Moop11 · · Score: 3, Informative

    Ray Bradbury was married in 1947. 60+ years! I had a chance to talk with his daughter about 5 yrs ago and she told me how old fashioned her parents were. They had been living in the same house for 40+ years and neither of them had ever learned to drive!

  49. Me and "The Pedestrian" by haaz · · Score: 1

    Happy birthday, Ray!

    I performed a reading of "The Pedestrian" my senior year in high school for the Wisconsin state forensics program. I apparently did well enough with it that I went on to finals, for which I performed a cutting of "A Clockwork Orange" -- complete with the Russian bits -- and won the gold medal! Between that and the antics of my underground newspaper (we printed the notes from the school's meeting about a proposed dress code -- at Middleton High School!!!1!)*, I went from the geeky dweeb who everyone picked on to just about Thee Coolest Guy in School. It was a very good year. 8-)

    * Lesson: Never let the nice kid set up the Science Department's AppleTalk network. You never know where a backdoor may be left open....

    --
    -- haaz.
  50. Re:"Slow News Day" tag? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny

    And let's not forget my personal favorite, the late, esteemed genius:
    -
    - LRH! The F---NG GREATEST SF writer of all time!
    -
    - - Tom Cruise
    - (sloshed on Pinoqachole again)

  51. English teachers and science fiction by macraig · · Score: 1

    "... and my middle-school English teacher Mrs. Young was smart enough to include "All Summer in a Day" in her curriculum."

    My last high school English teacher, by contrast, declared that science fiction didn't merit being called literature and refused to even let us submit books reports about any SF novels. Several of us eloquently argued the matter with her, but to no avail. This same teacher gave birth to not one but two thoroughly gifted sons who both scored close to a perfect 1600 on the SAT, and who both appreciated science fiction unlike their mother; the entire family was eligible for Mensa, but in spite of it she held fast to this weird illogical notion.

    Had this occurred after Bill Engvall's famous "Here's Your Sign" routine(s), I'd have offered dear Constance Pencall her own custom one.

  52. Criminal!! by commodoresloat · · Score: 1

    I remember when another student on the bus loaned me "Fahrenheit 451,"

    WHOA. Hold it right there buddy, a student loaned you Ray Bradbury's intellectual property, and you read it without paying the man?! Ray's going to drag his octogenarian ass to your house and give you a good solid SF-writer-caliber whoopin, I tell you what. Look at all the ruckus he caused just because someone borrowed his title; how do you think he's going to feel when he finds out you borrowed the whole book!

  53. Re:"Slow News Day" tag? by lgw · · Score: 1

    Yeah, you probably think "Primer" and "Donnie Darko" were mind blowing, or that an RPG with both a "good path" and an "evil path" are deep. Not that these are bad things, of course, but the bar for literature is a bit higher.

    But this has been said before and diagramed in detail. You need to be a published SF author to look down on me, I'm afraid, otherwise I get to look down on you as a movie/game/anime fan - it's right there in the standards document.

    --
    Socialism: a lie told by totalitarians and believed by fools.
  54. Re:"Slow News Day" tag? by gregbot9000 · · Score: 1, Informative

    I'll give you all of them except Ursula K Le Guin.
    Worst.
    Writer.
    Ever.

  55. Re:"Slow News Day" tag? by goose-incarnated · · Score: 3, Insightful

    I have to agree with the grandparent post. Sure, Ray Bradbury is important in the sci-fi world. But is he anymore important than say Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, Larry Ellison?

    Yes.

    The people who shape others thoughts by means of art, culture, analogy and metaphor are and always will be revered. The people who contribute to the economy today are merely remembered, not revered. There is a very good reason for this.

    --
    I'm a minority race. Save your vitriol for white people.
  56. Re:"Slow News Day" tag? by Repossessed · · Score: 1

    Orson Scott Card?

    Doesn't he right religious stories for the LDS church now?

    --
    Liberte, Egalite, Fraternite (TM)
  57. Re:"Slow News Day" tag? by bit01 · · Score: 1

    I don't think anyone questions his credentials, but I think it does make for a slow news day to point out his 88th birthday. Is this an annual announcement that is made here? Were there front page stories for his 73rd, 68th, or what about 86th?

    Probably a story planted by a marketer wanting to pep up Rad Bradbury book sales. /. would be in their core demographic. Some of the /. posts in this story will be by fraudulent marketers also trying to encourage people to buy. All it takes is a very small percentage increase in sales in a million-people-sized audience to financially justify astroturfing like this.

    ---

    Paid marketers are the worst zealots.

  58. Re:"Slow News Day" tag? by jacquesm · · Score: 1

    I wasn't aware Debussy played baseball, but hey... learn a new thing every day.

    --
    MP3 Search Engine
  59. Re:"Slow News Day" tag? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Interesting

    The 22nd was also the extremely talented and lovely Miho Kanno's birthday, you insensitive clod!

  60. Re:"Slow News Day" tag? by jacquesm · · Score: 1

    someone here recently pointed out Charles Stross and his stuff is awesome.

    --
    MP3 Search Engine
  61. Re:"Slow News Day" tag? by jacquesm · · Score: 1

    No, he writes them, but otherwise you are quite correct ;)

    The largest case of astroturfing ever.

    --
    MP3 Search Engine
  62. Re:"Slow News Day" tag? by jacquesm · · Score: 2, Insightful

    If you're going to make an exhaustive list of the origins of SF you should include HG Wells and Jules Verne.

    --
    MP3 Search Engine
  63. Re:"Slow News Day" tag? by MRe_nl · · Score: 1

    "How many of the great Sci-fi authors are left?"
    The one and only http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Vance

    --
    "Kill 'em all and let Root sort 'em out"
  64. Re:"Slow News Day" tag? by Petrushka · · Score: 1

    In the room with me as I type this are about 40,000 pages of imaginative fiction, and that's the fraction of what I've read that I liked enough to keep through many moves.

    Rather than rabidly leaping to the defence of games, as some sibling posters have done, I shall merely point out that you need more books. (Or maybe just more bookshelves, to allow a greater book density. You can do better than 100-200 books per room!)

  65. Re:"Slow News Day" tag? by Lilith's+Heart-shape · · Score: 1

    And John Lee Hooker was a bluesman. He was bad, like Jesse James.

    --

    I write sci-fi for metalheads

  66. Re:"Slow News Day" tag? by Lilith's+Heart-shape · · Score: 1

    If you think Ms. Le Guin is bad, you haven't read William Peter Blatty (the man responsible for The Exorcist) or any of H.P. Lovecraft's early work.

    --

    I write sci-fi for metalheads

  67. Re:"Slow News Day" tag? by Lilith's+Heart-shape · · Score: 1

    Ah, yes, good old Jack Vance. If he hadn't come up with Vanceian spellcasting, Gary Gygax would have had to do it himself.

    --

    I write sci-fi for metalheads

  68. Re:"Slow News Day" tag? by Lilith's+Heart-shape · · Score: 1

    And Mary Shelley.

    --

    I write sci-fi for metalheads

  69. Bradbury a romantic? by Lilith's+Heart-shape · · Score: 1

    Ray Bradbury's a romantic? I always thought of Bradbury as a naturalist -- at least as far as characterization is concerned. As for whether or not he writes SF, I always thought he was more of a fantasist than a sci-fi writer. If he wants you to know that there are rockets, he'll tell you, but that's all he'll tell you. He doesn't care about how the rockets work, so he figures the reader doesn't need to know either.

    --

    I write sci-fi for metalheads

    1. Re:Bradbury a romantic? by rumblin'rabbit · · Score: 1

      Fantasy and/or technology were just props for Bradbury used to reveal the human soul. The romanticism of Bradbury (in the literary meaning) is impossible to miss.

  70. Re:"Slow News Day" tag? by MRe_nl · · Score: 1

    Owlbear! Owlbear! Prismatic spray on the Owlbear! ; )

    --
    "Kill 'em all and let Root sort 'em out"
  71. Re:"Slow News Day" tag? by Lilith's+Heart-shape · · Score: 1

    Prismatic spray? Meh. I'm gonna cast Megidolaon. (I prefer Megaten over D&D.)

    --

    I write sci-fi for metalheads

  72. Happy B'Day Ray! by dwiget001 · · Score: 1

    "Fahrenheit 451" is one of my classic sci-fi favorites. However, Ray also wrote "Dandelion Wine" (not sci-fi), which I read when I was pretty young. I could best sum it up as a story of a young boy that realizes he is alive and kind of marvels, at times, at the world around him. Great story!

  73. Re:"Slow News Day" tag? by kalirion · · Score: 1

    Is this an annual announcement that is made here? Were there front page stories for his 73rd, 68th, or what about 86th?

    Hmm, just how often does Slashdot report on news which happened before Slashdot was started?

  74. Re:"Slow News Day" tag? by Tetsujin · · Score: 1

    OK, fine, but are we gonna have the same story every year until he dies? "Ray Bradbury turns 88" "Ray Bradbury turns 89" "Ray Bradbury died today, he was eaten by wolves" "Ray Bradbury is still dead" I mean, how far does it go?

    --
    Bow-ties are cool.
  75. Re:"Slow News Day" tag? by fair_n_hite_451 · · Score: 1

    Like the story's poster, The Illustrated Man changed my life. ... as might be calculated from my Nick.

    --
    Reason why there is hope for the future generation #364:
    "I wish my grass was emo so it could cut itself."
  76. Re:I remember when Ray Bradbury defended Bob Packw by kalirion · · Score: 1

    He and Asimov must've gotten along quite well indeed.

  77. Gates Jobs and Ellison, etc by mccabem · · Score: 1

    ...are middle aged....who wants to celebrate that?

    -Matt

  78. Re:"Slow News Day" tag? by alexborges · · Score: 1

    WHAT?

    He is GIGANTICALLY MUCH MORE important than ANY of those names.

    Ill bet you that if you ask all of those, theill tip their hat, bow in humblness and say that YES, what Bradbury has done is more important than anything they have done.

    Jesus Christ, why this contempt for the book as of late?

    Go wank off to your Christina Aguilera, child.

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    NO SIG
  79. Re:"Slow News Day" tag? by alexborges · · Score: 1

    After he dies, we will still celebrate every year. YES. And ten years from then we will throw a big party and we will read his books aloud.

    TRUE Artists, ones than help redifine an art and find new ways to communicate abstraction and concrete things of the world, ones that touch people inside and help them deal with the things of the world because they communicated this or that situation or revival of past human knowledge ARE MORE IMPORTANT TO HUMANITY than media fads.... man...

    What is our culture turning into!

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    NO SIG
  80. Admirer OF W by ISoldat53 · · Score: 1

    He is also a great admirer of George W Bush.

  81. Re:"Slow News Day" tag? by kaosfury · · Score: 1

    I think we should celebrate his turning 541...

    --
    "Trust that little voice in your head that says 'Wouldn't it be interesting if...' and then do it." - Duane Michals
  82. Re:"Slow News Day" tag? by hubie · · Score: 1

    Touché

    :)

  83. "Screwed Asshole" by illegalcortex · · Score: 1

    I have to say I lost a lot of respect and fondness for Bradbury over the whole Fahrenheit 9/11 title kerfuffle. And I don't even like Moore and have avoided his movies since researching them a bit. My mental image of him went from a starry-eyed dreamer to a crotchety old man shouting "GET OFF MY LAWN!" It made him seem to have more in common with Harlan Ellison than I ever guessed. I don't believe you should hold the character of a man against his works of fiction, but I can't pick up a book by either of them without that image constantly interfering with the story.

  84. Re:"Slow News Day" tag? by MRe_nl · · Score: 1

    I was actually refering to my first encounter with Vanceian magic, in The Dying Earth.
    Allthough upon reflection it seems to have been a Ghoul-bear, not an Owl-bear.
    I still play round the table pen & paper chips & beer RPG's weekly, I prefer FPS online (Q3A, ET).

    --
    "Kill 'em all and let Root sort 'em out"
  85. Re:"Slow News Day" tag? by Overly+Critical+Guy · · Score: 1

    I think the news is that a classic sci-fi writer is still alive and with us. 88 is up there (I don't even want to live that long).

    --
    "Sufferin' succotash."
  86. Re:"Slow News Day" tag? by KDR_11k · · Score: 1

    88 is sometimes seen as a short form of Heil Hitler, it's also the diameter of the most popular cannon the Nazis used...

    --
    Justice is the sheep getting arrested while an impartial judge declares the vote void.
  87. Re:"Slow News Day" tag? by KDR_11k · · Score: 1

    Reading something limits your imagination, just sit down and think up your own story (or get up and LIVE your own story).

    --
    Justice is the sheep getting arrested while an impartial judge declares the vote void.
  88. Re:"Slow News Day" tag? by KDR_11k · · Score: 1

    If we go "early" shouldn't we reach Verne and Wells?

    --
    Justice is the sheep getting arrested while an impartial judge declares the vote void.
  89. Re:"Slow News Day" tag? by mattgoldey · · Score: 1

    That was exactly my point. Thank you.

  90. Re:"Slow News Day" tag? by Random+BedHead+Ed · · Score: 2, Funny

    I think we should celebrate his turning 541...

    Is that the temprature at which accuracy burns?

  91. Re:"Slow News Day" tag? by kaosfury · · Score: 1

    Must be. I meant 451, but it's too late for that now. :P

    --
    "Trust that little voice in your head that says 'Wouldn't it be interesting if...' and then do it." - Duane Michals
  92. Re:"Slow News Day" tag? by Random+BedHead+Ed · · Score: 1

    Mind you, I don't know whether you've really considered the advantages of owning a really fine set of modern Bradbury hardcovers. You know, they can really do you wonders.

    (Er ... just some friendly advice from a burgler.)

  93. Re:"Slow News Day" tag? by thermian · · Score: 1

    Reading something limits your imagination,

    How gloriously ridiculous!

    --
    A learning experience is one of those things that say, 'You know that thing you just did? Don't do that.' - D. Adams
  94. Academics and quality?! BAH! by Lilith's+Heart-shape · · Score: 1

    Most academics wouldn't know good literature if it bent them over a lectern and spanked them in front of a packed lecture hall. Most academics would be more comfortable with Moby Dick if it were a doctoral thesis on cetology instead of "This is what happened to Ishmael on the last voyage of the Pequod." If I wanted somebody else's opinion, I'd be better off asking my cat.

    --

    I write sci-fi for metalheads

  95. Re:"Slow News Day" tag? by KDR_11k · · Score: 1

    You try thinking about one thing while reading about another and still remembering what you read.

    --
    Justice is the sheep getting arrested while an impartial judge declares the vote void.
  96. Re:"Slow News Day" tag? by vigour · · Score: 1

    My interest in computers came from video games (child of the 80s). I've generally disliked science fiction most of my life, only recently getting into some of it. Still can't take Star Trek, Asimov, or Bradbury (though I have enjoyed Bradbury's fantasy stuff).

    I can understand you not enjoying any of the above, however as in any genre/medium there is a huge variety of styles to choose from.

    If you want more action orientated (some might say pulp, I say fun) sci-fi there is Peter F. Hamilton.
    Roger Zelazny's Lord of Light is fantastic.
    Alastair Reynolds, if you enjoy character driven gothic work (Chasm City) or his more expansive Revelation Space 'series'.
    John Brunner's Stand on Zanzibar is another classic, with its idiosyncratic style is a cynical and bitter take on the modern world (written in the late 60s, set around now).
    Most of Dan Simmons work is highly enjoyable, especially if you like his continous references to Shakespeare, Proust, WWI poets, and many many other literary giants, along with being very playful with lit. theory. His series, like the Hyperion Cantos, and his Illium/Olympos work are amongst the most personal of any scifi novel I have read.

    There are many other sci-fi authors that I have read that are equally great in different ways, but halfway through typing this I realised, what's the point in trying to force my opinion on someone else? All I can/should do is point out some worthwile authors to read, but there is no point in essentially wasting you time reading something if you do not enjoy it or learn anything from it. Personally I ignore genre definitions when I choose what to read, 'genres' have a purpose in classification, and easy identification between different lit. techniques and styles, but it can also pigeon-hole great works into obscurity (such as Stand on Zanzibar). Ian Banks/M. Banks is a good example of main stream lit. ignoring his more interesting (and in some cases less frivolous) novels because they were sci-fi.

    While Star Trek encapsulates a type of sci-fi that quite a lot of people dislike, all sci-fi truly is, is a plot device to allow a good author to talk about the modern world, and to ask hard questions about our preconceptions (or to give us a highly entertaining yarn).

    At the end of this ramble, all I can say is, don't read sci-fi, just try to find interesting, entertaining, and thought provoking works.