Famous writer Ray Bradbury passed this week. An influential person in the genre of science fiction, the most well-known work of Mr. Bradbury is the classic Fahrenheit 451. While he often shunned the label of science fiction writer, his work shaped the genre. The prolific writer of over 50 books did not want to be wrongly categorized. He once said that “You have to know how to accept rejection and reject acceptance” A statement that he truly abided by. Valuing the literary form of science fiction over the less cerebral cinematography based science fiction, Bradbury focused on storytelling.
Science fiction as a genre has the mark of Bradbury on it. The Christian Bale movie Equilibrium was heavily influenced by Fahrenheit 451. His body of work is a testament that science fiction is a genre that deserves respect, and not just about robots, laser cannons, and aliens. Bradbury was 91 years old.
Marc W. Polite