A brief tribute to Ray Bradbury

[fingal]

I've read very few of his books, but I suddenly remembered that he was responsible for getting me interested in computers. When I was in my early 20s - and well before I actually owned a box - I read a book of his about using a computer. How I wish I could remember the title! Some things from his book which I will never forget:

remember that computers are stupid;
people make mistakes, not computers (a nice contradiction! They are stupid after all!);
no matter what you think, computers are going to happen to you;
if you don't own and use a computer, you life will be harder and people will be able to exploit you more easily. Buy one and defend yourself;
a computer is nothing more than a box of switches.

I never became an avid reader of Mr. Bradbury's work, but I was saddened when I learned about his death several years ago. Now - with hindsight - I realise that his simple ideas have shaped my life. What a strange world ... you can read a book and it can alter your destiny if you let it.

[Dapper Dan]

Hi fingal,

Ray Bradbury is generally considered a science fiction writer but his work goes well beyond that. He was one of the best short story writers of our time. If you have a chance, it would be well worth it to pick up a collection of his works at the book store. "The Illustrated Man" is one of the best short stories I've ever read. "The Wonderful Ice Cream Suit" will have you wailing with laughter! I read most of his stories while in High School and College and to this day often draw lessons, ideas and images from them.

[fingal]

Thanks Dapper Dan

Tomorrow I'm going to look for those stories. I want to catch up with his work.

[cousinlucky]

Whereas the two of you have high praise for the work of Ray Bradbury I must surely be missing something.

[fingal]

Whereas the two of you have high praise for the work of Ray Bradbury I must surely be missing something.

Well ... I've only read one of his books so far. His computer book was very helpful early on. This is completely off-topic, but I don't care about that! Yesterday I found out that there's a missing Shakespeare play. I had no idea before, but I would bet everything I have that he helped to write it. Some details are here.

[cousinlucky]

Lo and behold I have seen adaptations of Bradbury's writing in movies-Fahrenheit 451, It came from outer space, & the Beast from 20,000 Fathoms.
Wikipedia has a superb list of 200 of his works, a biography, and numerous links.
This is exactly why this old man loves the Internet.

[fingal]

Wikipedia has a superb list of 200 of his works, a biography, and numerous links.
This is exactly why this old man loves the Internet.

Same here ... I love finding out new things online.

[DThor]

Bradbury was an awesome writer. When I was younger, in the 70's, I was heavily into science fiction and horror, but even then there was something *different* about his writing...it seemed deeper than other scifi I read. Couldn't put my finger on it at the time. Now, as someone that rarely reads scifi anymore, I understand - the guy was a *writer*, not a scifi writer(they're not mutually exclusive, but often are, just like other genre writers). We took "A Sound of Thunder" and "The Illustrated Man" in a lit class I had in high school with a real hippy-dippy teacher I had a crush on, I remember thinking it was so cool that she let us read scifi, but I get it now.

"The Illustrated Man", "The Martian Chronicles" and "Something Wicked This Way Comes" still gives me chills - he had a way of nailing that cool fall night, wind blowing, something odd in the air sort of mood.

DT

[cousinlucky]

Looking at reality I have four books that I paid for but I haven't opened one of them as yet. I do not read books anymore. Another consequence of my present addiction to the Internet.

[DThor]

You'll read them when you're ready. I was addicted to reading starting as a 2 year old, I've read a lot of books over the years, but with the inet, digital TV, DVDs I've found it screws with your attention span bigtime. I stopped reading for quite a while. It's a big downside, I think, to tech. However, over the last few years I've been easing back into more reading, now I'm gobbling it up again. Even though I have Google News, I still read the paper front to back every day, and I'm into fiction and non-fiction again.

I had to stop feeling guilty about it, just forgot about it, and then put a little time aside and I was back into it. It really is a pleasure to read words other than on an illuminated screen.

DT