Dear list
I have just joined to celebrate Ray Bradbury �s 83th year .
I met him personally at the Book Fair on Buenos Aires and gave a copy of "The book of imaginary beings" by argentine writer Jorge Luis Borges . He thanked very warmly , and also signed me a copy of The Illustrated man book that I take to the Fair.
I think Bradbury represent a way to describe things and events , that produced a refreshment on the sci-fi world , that was reduced to green martians or flying saucers firing letal X-rays .
It seems a coincidence, but planet Mars will be as closer as it ever has been this following august 27th , I will remember Mr.Bradbury this day
Warm regards
Alberto Gesualdi
Buenos Aires

Thanks for your post. The Celestial coincidence is cool for August:

--Mars being closer to earth than in 50,000+ years.

--Ray's Birthday.

--The publication of his new anthology: "100 Celebrated Stories"

When was he in Buenos Aires?

Doesn't his "Best of Ray Bradbury: Graphic Novels" come out this month, also?

THE AUTUMN PEOPLE CELEBRATE�

It�s Long After Midnight and the light in his Jack O� Lantern IS STILL burning bright.

It�s burned for quite a while, 83 years in fact! Cats sense it, even though we may have missed it. His feline followers tiptoed with lighter feet as the day approached. They yowl gleefully into the night, while at the same time many miles away, a massive beast from about 20,000 fathoms roars as the brightness in a lighthouse keeps him company. The Beast weeps with joy.

Who could ever imagine a world without him? Who would want to? The planet Mars shines even more brightly in the night sky because of him and the smell of burning leaves seems to follow him somewhat. Why even the Dandelion Wine tastes better when he�s around.

Paper burns at 451, and the memories stay. Do you remember? Do you remember the first time you read a sentence he wrote? The first time you were carried away by his prose? I do.
It was the revenge tale from The Martian Chronicles, Usher II: 2010.
Revenge for the ones responsible for the book burning of Fahrenheit 451, revenge against the ones who say what you can read and what you can�t. Gothic macabre tales of mystery and the imagination reaching up from the ashes like a Phoenix and punishing those who burned without reading�who destroyed without bothering to even see what it was they were destroying.
Stendahl was my hero, for he avenged Poe. Vincent Price was the natural one to play that role in my youthful imaginative eye. Mores the pity, he never did.

The Halloween Tree was next in my exposure to the world of the October King�I journeyed with Carapace Clavicle Moundshroud every year after that first encounter�every year. And every year, I still do.

My Jack O Lanterns in my own homemade Halloween Tree will burn for him again this year. The wind that whips the trees in the weeks before year�s end will have the chilling, thrilling sting that only his narrative can give it. There�s something about the man. Something magic.

Time passes and the moon rises and sets. Mechanical coffins work evilly long into the night.

He lives in the October country and as a youth, he gleefully pranked and grinned with his two partners in crime, Forry and Ray. They ran the streets of boyhood like cats, and dove and leaped, and rolled and shrieked, til their tennis shoes rotted off their feet.

He never drives anywhere by the way. The master of science fiction, the dreamer of other worlds, never learned to drive a car. He refuses to even try, owing to a horrible car accident he witnessed as a boy.

What really strikes me is the candy corn soul that he instills in all his work. No matter what the tale is about, you can taste the wax lips, feel and smell the cold breath tinged with sweetness, and see the glowing grins. You can smell licorice and cotton candy in everything he writes. You know that the twinkle in his eye is the twinkle of a fire inside a pumpkin�a glimmer of orange warm light in the dark dark night.

I Sing the Body Electric!!

Can you hear now? Another burst of celebration and memory from the Dark Carnival�Calliope music is starting. Cougar and Dark�s Pandemonium Shadow Show is springing to life, unfurling and setting itself up in the moonlight. Cotton candy is being sold while a twisted dwarf gazes with love and longing at his new self in a distorted funhouse mirror. A woman heavy with child glides by, with a worried expression, what is this thing inside her? There are crowds of people gathering, strangers of course, who seem to appear at the scene of every accident�. every death�the same people, all the time�

On the platform to our right, people gather to stare at the skin of a massive bald man. Posing and parading to the gawks and applause of the Autumn people, The Illustrated Man shows us moving figures on his very skin that tell even more tales�

We journey to the basement of a residential home, on Halloween night (naturally), a macabre game is being played in the dark��this is the witches heart��. just make sure some idiot doesn�t turn on the light!

Drew Erickson just inherited a farm from a total stranger!!! Now, if he could only let go of that Scythe�

Good men and women, talking excitedly, all gathered around to see the thing in The Jar�to try and determine what exactly it is�it looks vaguely familiar..

High above it all, Uncle Einar soars freely, his great bat-like wings filled with glorious air from the end of the year. He pauses to wave at a massive Pterodactyl kite, festooned with images of wild carnival animals, and trailing a tail made of Halloween boys�

The moon rises and falls..

�The Smile of the Witch
The smile of the Cat
The smile of the Beast
The smile of the bat
The smile of the Reaper taking his fee,
All cut and glimmer on the Halloween Tree.�

The lights at the carnival are shutting out now, and the cotton candy is gone�

My heart and my soul have been made greater through his presence on the earth. I weep with joy each time I fall under his spell.
God blessed us all when he gave Ray Bradbury his gift. Let�s continue to treasure his work, and honor him for what he gives to us all so freely.

The music finally grinds to a halt and the Merry-Go-Round has skidded to a halt. The Dark Carnival is over.
Only a lone wanderer remains, dressed in black, with rolls of attraction posters for the next show under his arm. He wanders now from pole to pole, corner to corner, pasting up his posters. As he does so, he whistles a familiar tune...

Now peal the bells more loud and deep
God is not dead, nor doth he sleep
The wrong shall fail, the right prevail
With peace on earth, good will to man!

..the whistling fades as he wanders off into the night.


HAPPY BIRTHDAY�
Ray Bradbury.
August 22, 1920.

Wonderfully well said, profgriffin. To take a line from Eugene O'Neil, there's more than "a touch of the poet" in you. I would only add, very simply: Happy Birthday, Ray. Many, many happy returns....and thank you so much.

[This message has been edited by Richard (edited 08-22-2003).]

Very nice, profgriffin. For me to say more would spoil it!

Happy Birthday!!! Ray, Thank you for 83 years of flinging out rockets, banshees, timemachines, and skeletons out of the collective closet of your genuine fertile imagination. Mars shall rise again, the soil is still fertile enough for mans desire to know so much more. Ray at 83 you have with each consecutive keystroke created your own
legacy of work that will last on forever as a cerebral "sound of thunder". Happy-Happy Birthday Ray and many more!


[This message has been edited by uncle (edited 08-22-2003).]

Wow. Well, I think we all agree that profgriffin said it all. Happy Birthday, Ray. I can only hope that one day some of us will be able to pass on inspiration to others the way we have been inspired by you. To all the other members, doesn't it almost feel like it's your own birthday today? What a great holiday! I think I'll go open a present. Well, I'm off to the sci fi section of this here library now...

The happiest of birthdays and a big LIVE FOREVER to Ray!

I have posted here before, but I haven't in a very long time. For some reason, I got nostalgic today and was looking up some Bradbury stuff and realized it was his birthday. Coincidence? Maybe, maybe not, but a bit odd to say the least that I would wander here on this day.

Two items: One has to do with an event celebrating Ray's birthday today.
The other, about next week Mars- Encounter....

MARS
http://www.kansascity.com/mld/kansascity/entertainment/6569008.htm

BIRTHDAY http://www.mnsun.com/story.asp?city=Bloomington&Story=118482

[This message has been edited by Nard Kordell (edited 08-22-2003).]

Well, I had a happy Ray Birthday! I received two items in the mail today;

(1) A 1st edition copy of William F. Nolan's "The Ray Bradbury Companion".

(2) The brand new "The Best of Ray Bradbury: The Graphic Novel". (ibooks, NY)

What a great coincidence that they both came today, on Ray's birthday.

Hope his birthday celebration is a good as my presents!!!!!

Happy birthday, Ray. I love you!!

Mr. Dark:

I parted company with my edition of Nolan's Bradbury Companion some years back. I could never find another copy, even from Gale Publishing. Where O where did you find yours?

I had Amazon.com do a search and they came up with a list of about ten of these books at different places. I read through the descriptions, and picked one out. I am very happy with it. Very good shape.

On the new Graphic novel, I preordered that on Amazon.com several months ago (as I did with the new anthology -- which I received ONE DAY after it's release date!). I've been very happy with them as my primary book source. (I got Greg Miller's book through them, also.) As a matter of fact, that's how I got Machineries of Joy several months ago. They found a very nice hardcopy in Canada that I got for $4.95 (plus shipping, of course).

I got a very nice copy of "The Ghosts of Forever" this way, also.


[This message has been edited by Mr. Dark (edited 08-23-2003).]

Happy Birthday, Ray, and much love!!!

Greg