Happy birthday, Ray Bradbury!

It's hard not to think of Ray Bradbury as a true Angeleno: He's lived here for a full three-quarters of a century. But in fact the author of "Fahrenheit 451," "The Martian Chronicles" and "Something Wicked This Way Comes" was born in Illinois, 89 years ago today. Happy birthday, Mr. Bradbury!

Bradbury has won a fleet of awards and worked with everyone from Walt Disney to NASA. He is a supporter of libraries, trains and independent bookstores, and is an active member of the Los Angeles literary community. We count him (sorry, Illinois) as one of our stars.

In 1953, the L.A. Times reviewed Bradbury's then-newest book, "Fahrenheit 451n" under the headline, "Storyteller of the Future Also a Social Critic":

"Ray Bradbury does not like the civilization in which we exist. But he differs from the regular science-fiction writer in his approach to life, today and in a tenuously possible tomorrow. He is a social critic, and a storyteller such as America has not seen in many long years.

"He is original without being robot-like in his imagination. His people and their backgrounds hold compelling conviction and warmth even where the story takes place in the future or amongst metaphysical contemporary events. 'Fahrenheit 451' is another of Bradbury's logical surprises....

"Readers of Bradbury's 'Martian Chronicles,' 'The Illustrated Man' and 'The Golden Apples of the Sun' do not have to be told what quality to expect. But Bradbury fans and new readers alike never know just what this remarkable writer is going to do next.

"In his fireman fantasy, Bradbury has taken today's fear of dangerous thoughts and words offensive to groups, organizations, minorities and he has projected this fear into the near future, when book-burning is a profession.

"People no longer want to read, anyhow. They have 'parlors' on whose walls TV programs are projected; they have tiny receiving sets for radio, placed in their ears. Books, to these folk, are frightening or boring.

The 1953 review of "Fahrenheit 451," written by Don Guzman, continues:

"Fahrenheit 451 is the temperature at which book-paper catches fire and burns. Houses are built of fireproof material, and there is no longer any need for firemen; yet there are fire stations, fire trucks, sirens, and midnight runs. The fireman's job is not to put out fires, but to set them! 

"Montag has been a fireman for 10 years, a job inherited from his father and grandfather. He knows only the pleasure of burning books, when an informer sends in an alarm. He delights in the smell of kerosene.

"And then, one night, he encounters an old lady who refuses to leave her house so that they may burn her books. He has also met a girl who knows something of the past, a closed book to Montag.

"That is the beginning of Montag's doubt in himself and the world he lives in. It leads him on into a new kid of inferno, internal as well as external. And here the reader must follow him, for the reviewer has already betrayed far too much of Bradbury's magnificent conception.

"Bradbury has more than ideas, and that is what sets him apart from most writers who try to be original. He is fantastic, and human. He never looks at anything with a jaded eye; he is a storyteller every  minute of the time, and he is definitely his own kind of storyteller.

As some of Bradbury's vision of the future materializes around us -- in the form of tiny radios and projected television programs -- he makes sure that another aspect doesn't. To Bradbury, books are still essential -- he published a collection of short pieces, "We'll Always Have Paris," earlier this year.

-- Carolyn Kellogg

Photo: Ray Bradbury in 2000. Credit: Kirk McKoy / Los Angeles Times

Comments

[Brandon True]

Happy Birthday Ray! I hear he is having a big celebration at a bookstore somewhere. My english teacher called to let me know it was his birthday because he knows I'm such a fan of Ray's work. The Martian Chronicles is my bible!

[Shii]

May he live to see 2012!

[NAtalia]

Happy birthday RAY!!!! or FELIZ CUMPLEAÑOS!!!! grettings from ARGENTINA!!!!...Natalia

[Lilly in Edinburgh]

Ray Bradbury, the shining light of my childhood and an author I re-read regularly, is surely the youngest 89 year old on this planet. He has never once lost his child-like wonder and inquisitiveness. He taught me the phrase "What if...?"

He made the long and sometimes sad days of childhood and adolescence brighter and easier. He made ordinary things like running shoes and yellow ticonderoga pencils special. He taught me how to listen, and whenever I was sick I would lie in bed and listen to the sounds coming into my room and imagine in my mind's eye the scene outside the window, outside my bedroom door.

When I view the pictures coming back to us from Mars, it is with Bradbury eyes. I wonder if there is a old well somewhere. I wonder how we will change when we go there.

And once a year, I read The October Country. Thank you Ray, for years of company and inspiration. I hope that even if we do not build a calliope and run it backwards with you on it, that you will be with us for many years to come.

[John York]

I love this man. I hope to meet him someday. I am very happy to wish him a Happy Birthday!

[Ron Albano]

Thanks, Ray, for giving me the greatest books I could hope to teach. You inspired me and my students. Happy Birthday!

[John Bartel]

Happy Birthday Ray!
You are the architect of my childhood day dreams andthe person that taught me what a well developed fantasy would look like!
I had the honor of meeting you at a book signing years ago in New York and you were gracious enough to draw a picture in my copy of the Halloween tree which you told me was one of your favorite works.
You are an american treasure and I am so lucky to have enjoyed the fruit of your labors.
Thanks once again!
John Bartel
Dallas Texas

[Hailey Dickinson]

hello,
HAPPPPYYYY BIRTHDAY YOU ARE AWESOME,I LOVE YOU MR. BRADBURY!!!!!

[ashley]

hey happy b- day!!!!!! have a good one..

[John Thomas]

Happy Birthday, Ray.
Your books mean so much to me.