R.I.P. Ray Bradbury, dies at 91

[Jobydrone]

Sad news, some of the first science fiction I read in my life was by Ray Bradbury.

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/lanow/2012/06/author-ray-bradbury-dies-at-91-daughter-says.html

Ray Bradbury, the writer whose expansive flights of fantasy and vividly rendered space-scapes have provided the world with one of the most enduring speculative blueprints for the future, has died. He was 91.

Bradbury's daughter confirmed his death to the Associated Press on Wednesday morning. She said her father died Tuesday night in Southern California.

Author of more than 27 novels and story collections — most famously "The Martian Chronicles," "Fahrenheit 451," "Dandelion Wine" and "Something Wicked This Way Comes" — and more than 600 short stories, Bradbury has frequently been credited with elevating the often maligned reputation of science fiction. Some say he singlehandedly helped to move the genre into the realm of literature.

"The only figure comparable to mention would be [Robert A.] Heinlein and then later [Arthur C.] Clarke," said Gregory Benford, a UC Irvine physics professor and Nebula Award-winning science fiction writer. "But Bradbury, in the '40s and '50s, became the name brand."

Much of Bradbury's accessibility and ultimate popularity had to do with his gift as a stylist — his ability to write lyrically and evocatively of lands an imagination away, worlds he anchored in the here and now with a sense of visual clarity and small-town familiarity.

Bradbury frequently attempted to shrug out of the narrow "sci-fi" designation, not because he was put off by it, but rather because he believed it was imprecise.

"I'm not a science fiction writer," he was frequently quoted as saying. "I've written only one book of science fiction ["Fahrenheit 451"]. All the others are fantasy. Fantasies are things that can't happen, and science fiction is about things that can happen."

Ray Douglas Bradbury was born Aug. 22, 1920, in Waukegan, Ill., to Leonard Spaulding Bradbury and the former Esther Marie Moberg. As a child he soaked up the ambiance of small-town life — wraparound porches, fireflies and the soft, golden light of late afternoon — that would later become a hallmark of much of his fiction.

"When I was born in 1920," he told the New York Times Magazine in 2000, "the auto was only 20 years old. Radio didn't exist. TV didn't exist. I was born at just the right time to write about all of these things."

[Bromptonboy]

Very sad.  One of the last remaining Grand Masters of the genre.

[moyer777]

RIP Mr. Bradbury. 

[M-5]

So sad.  Rest in Peace Mr. Bradbury.

[billybob476]

Very sad, I love Fahrenheit 451.

[WillEagle]

R.I.P. Mr. Ray Bradbury.

[Rico]

Ray was one of my very early favorite authors.  I love his books and he always seemed like a perfect gentleman too.  Rest in Peace on Mars Ray.

[Ensign Random]

One of the great ones. May he rest in peace.

[turtlesrock]

aww that's sad :( i just finished reading fahrenheit 451 as part of reading groups a month or 2 ago.

[Ktrek]

Bradbury is one of the last of the old school sci-fi authors. I loved his books and read many of them when I was younger. I'll always have affection for his Illustrated Man. A true classic! RIP Mr. Bradbury. :(

Kevin