Ray Bradbury-Science Fiction Author

             Ray Bradbury is one of American literature"s foremost authors of science fiction. He has been able to attract readers to his works that are avid followers of science fiction, as well as, the casual reader of science fiction. His influence has flowed over to areas outside of the written word, such as movies and television programs.

             Ray Bradbury was born in Waukegan, Illinois, 1920. The third son of Leonard Spaulding Bradbury and Esther Marie Moberg Bradbury. In the fall of 1926 Ray Bradbury's family moved from Waukegan, Illinois to Tucson, Arizona, only to return to Waukegan again in May 1927. By 1931, he began writing his own stories on butcher paper. In 1932, after his father was laid off his job as a telephone lineman, the Bradbury family again moved to Tucson and later returned to Waukegan the following year. In 1934 the Bradbury family moved to Los Angeles, California. Bradbury graduated from a Los Angeles High School in 1938. His formal education ended there, but he furthered it by himself at night in the library and by day at his typewriter. .

             He sold newspapers on Los Angeles street corners from 1938 to 1942. Bradbury's first story publication was "Hollerbochen's Dilemma," printed in 1938 in Imagination!, an amateur fan magazine. Bradbury's first paid publication was "Pendulum" in 1941 to Super Science Stories. In 1942, Bradbury wrote "The Lake," the story in which he discovered his distinctive writing style. In 1947 Bradbury married Marguerite McClure.

             For more than half a century science fiction writers have thrilled and challenged an insight into what they expected man, society, and the universe to be like at some future time. In Ray Bradbury"s novel Fahrenheit 451, Bradbury utilized this concept in his work, a futuristic look at man and his role in society. Bradbury show the luxuries of life in America today, in addition to various occupations and technological advances, to show what life could be like, if the future takes a drastic turn for the worse.

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