Historic and Thematic Context of Fahrenheit 451
About Ray Bradbury
Although well-known to and beloved by many as a leading writer of science fiction, Ray Bradbury is a far more complicated subject than most may realize. In the world of science fiction, he is an object of admiration and dismay, while outside the genre, he is an enigmatic figure who blends a lyricism, nostalgia, and scientific possibility in ways that surprise and delight.
Ray Bradbury was born on August 22, 1920 in Waukegan, Illinois, the third son of Spaulding Bradbury and Esther Marie Moberg Bradbury. By age eight, Bradbury had discovered pulps like Amazing Stories, which he began to read voraciously. His father suffered the trials of most Depression-era Americans, moving his family from and back to Waukegan three times, before finally settling in Los Angeles in 1934. That year, Bradbury began to write in earnest, publishing in an amateur fan magazine in 1938 his first story, "Hollerbochen's Dilemma." In 1939 Bradbury started publishing his own fan magazine, Futuria Fantasia ; in 1941 he began attending a weekly writing class taught by science fiction master Robert Heinlein.
In 1941, Bradbury, with coauthor Henry Hasse, published his first paid short story, "Pendulum," in Super Science Stories. Up until this time, Bradbury had been selling papers, a job he gave up in 1942 in order to write full-time. That year he wrote "The Lake," the first story written in the true "Bradbury style." Three years later, he began to publish in the better magazines, at which point various short stories started to receive national recognition: "The Big Black and White Game" was selected for the Best American Short Stories 1945; "Homecoming" for the O. Henry Awards Prize Stories of 1947; "Powerhouse" for an O. Henry Award in 1948; and "I See You Never" for Best American Short Stories 1948. In 1949, Bradbury was selected by the National Fantasy Fan Federation as best author in 1949. Meanwhile, as he collected more accolades, his personal life also took a fateful swing. In 1947 he married Marguerite McClure, by whom he had four daughters.
Bradbury's major breakthrough came in 1950 with The Martian Chronicles, his story cycle of Earth's colonization and eventual destruction of its Martian neighbor. Although the quality of work could easily have stood on its own merits, the strong praise it received from Christopher Isherwood, Orville Prescott, Angus Wilson, and Gilbert Highet established Bradbury as a writer of national merit. Bradbury capitalized on the confidence expressed in his capacity to imagine and write boldly with such seminal works as The Illustrated Man (1951), Fahrenheit 451 (1953), Dandelion Wine (1957), Something Wicked This Way Comes (1962), and his many excellent short-story collections.
Despite Bradbury's association in the public mind with science fiction, he has shown himself far too ambitious to be limited to a single genre. Bradbury has successfully published in other genres. A closer reading of much of his fiction will reveal tales that, despite their lyrical and overimaginative tone, are, for all intents and purpose, exemplars of light realist fiction, from his autobiographical novel Dandelion Wine to the amusing "Have I Got a Candy Bar for You!" Bradbury also has taken stabs at writing drama, poetry, screenplays, detective fiction, and even musical compositions. Although he has never achieved the fame in these genres that he has in his science fiction, there is little doubt the extension of his horizons as a writer into these genres is the direct result of his continuing interest in challenging his limits as a writer, just as he once challenged the limits of science fiction itself.
Source: St. James Encyclopedia of Popular Culture. 5 vols. St. James Press, 2000.
Used by permission of Thomson-Gale.
Additional information about Ray Bradbury may be found at the following websites:
Ray Bradbury - Official site for the author from Harper-Collins Publishers.
Ray Bradbury Online - Fan site with bio, bibliography, and selected quotes. From SpaceAgeCity.
Ray Bradbury at the IMDB - Internet Movie Database entry on Bradbury, with a complete filmography and other links.
"Without libraries what have we? We have no past and no future."
- Ray Bradbury
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