The good lady has just told me Ray Bradbury has died.

Bradbury was one of the grandfathers of fantastical fiction, even when I was a lad. I would agree with his own assessment that, except for Fahrenheit 451, he wasn’t a Science Fiction writer, as most of his work was fantasy.

Partly because of that I haven’t read all of his work, not much in fact. Fahrenheit 451 obviously, but also The Martian Chronicles and The Illustrated Man.

I like these quotes from him in the obituary linked to above:-

“Fantasies are things that can’t happen, and science fiction is about things that can happen.”

“When I was born in 1920, 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.”

Had he never written another word Fahrenheit 451 would still have stood as a proud memorial. A novel about the importance of the written word, and the abomination that any book burning, of any book at all, represents. It is also about the indomitability of the human spirit.

Ray Douglas Bradbury 22/8/1920 – 6/6/2012. So it goes.