I first learned about Ray Bradbury's famous book Fahrenheit 451 when i was 14 or 15 years old. It was on a Disney Channel show called "Jet Jackson"

I first learned about Ray Bradbury himself when i was 18 years old and in my senior year of high school. I had just read 1984 and Brave New World. Two really great dystopian novels. My English teacher assigned us a research paper, in which we could choose any topic that we felt would produce the most succesful paper. My original choice was to do my paper on 50 cent and his biography. I wasn't really a smart kid and i always shied away from intellectual pursuits. My english teacher asked me why i didn't choose something more intelligent, more thought-provoking. Honestly, i did not have a good answer and i just wanted to graduate and get the hell out. So, i re-thought about another topic. Inspired by BNW and 1984, i decided on Fahrenheit 451. It's funny now that i think back because i got a 88 on that paper and i handed it in a day late. I really, really did not like school. In fact, my aversion to school reflected in my senior year grades. I barely passed. That summer, after my senior year, i decided to pick up the slack and start challenging myself. I read the whole of Fahrenheit 451 for the first time; before, i just read pieces for my research paper. I was amazed about how wise Bradbury truly is. And so, i read some more books that my senior english teacher gave me: the illustrated man and martians chronicles. Good books, but not as great as F451 in my opinion.

Bradbury has inspired me to write about the flaws of our society today. Currently, there is a war going on and US troops are dying everyday it seems. And the media covers more of Paris Hilton's plight and Britney Spears's flings than the war and the real throbbing issues at hand. My questions are right here:

1) Has anybody tried to be the new modern day version of Ray Bradbury this new millenium? And if not, would it be wishful thinking if i tried to re-convey Bradbury's sentiments to readers all over this country?

and

2) Does anybody know of any good and recent dystopian novels?

I am 19 years old and receptive to encouragement and motivation!

..

Greg: BIG WELCOME

Great age to discover Ray Bradbury.

A novel that may fit what you are looking for is the 'new' one by Cormac McCarthy, titled "The Road".

Perhaps look it up on Amazon.com and read about it to see if this is something or not. It's supposed to be a really great story about a father/son relationship after the atomic war.
.
..

I wish had known about him when i was younger. Maybe i would be less dimwitted and more aware.

If you do not mind, could you answer my first question more thoroughly?

Thank you for the welcome

Greg, read more Bradbury and further realize how his works stand up through the decades. (Ie. sh. stories: Chicago Abyss, Toynbee Convector, Usher II, Veldt, Murderer, Exiles, Pedestrian...)

Also, you may want to try his essays in Yestermorrow and Zen in the Art of Writing. I am constantly offering varying doses of RB in my hs classes. The students love him. Countless over the years have been turned on to literature because of his writings. It works on many levels. His imagery, metaphors, human and technological themes, and stark ironies all serve to warn us to keep our eyes on the road, so to speak.

Paris and Brit "are" more important than anything else going on right now. As we hear and see them 24/7, "It is so!" Why, even the Gov. of CA has been dragged into the PH deal. See!?

It's not unlike the "cousins" and the "white clown" from 6-10pm daily.

Read F451 again, with no papers to write or quizzes to answer. As you read, think of Montag's plight and how Beatty hammers at him from all angles. Also, read the morning headlines, watch the 20 minute news cycles, and listen to the radio. Then see where things fall for you. Look at your own sweet home town, Dystopia on Main Street. (Sounds like an old Rolling Stones album!)

Here! TV, video games, and "electronic navels" have been ousted for more Books! Books! Books!

When you get to the river in 451, float across with Montag to the other side. You will forever have a critical eye, yet remain filled with Hope!

(Other titles - if you have not already - Time Machine, 1984, Brave New World, Flowers for Algernon, and view The Truman Show.)

BTW, what will be your vocation as you venture out?

Welcome, Greg!

Although it's a kids' book, you can't go wrong with "The Giver" by Lois Lowry.

Thank you for the replies fjp451 and dandelion

I am an aspiring writer. But i always have a fallback plan.

I have read f451 more in-depth, and i am aware of some of the stuff you mentioned, fjp451.

My question is, are there any versions of Ray Bradbury that exist in Literature today?

Greg, I caught your Q, but ultimately there is only "1" Mr. Ray Bradbury!

I often wondered if there is another author that writes so eloquently while still retaining a sparseness as Bradbury does. If there is, I have not found him/her yet. Even a small taste of Bradbury can put your off reading other authors, I've found. His words, the way he writes is so great (in my mind) that everything feels flat in comparison.

Compare say Fahrenheit 451 to a modern novel by Cory Doctorow, as I've done in the past, and you'll see that after Bradbury, Doctorow comes off as a bore. I think one of the reasons Bradbury affects me so much is that he LACKS detail. Okay, I know that sounds contrary to what good writing should be, but bare with me.

Most writers will tell you the height and the weight and the hair color, they'll go into great detail about the kind of building, the architecture, they'll get all their facts straight. But that's all they are, facts, a shopping list of character and place. But Bradbury leapfrogs all this by his use of metaphor and a lyrical quality unmatched by any other living author. We don't just get the details, we get an impression, a feeling from his writing.

This is from the opening to 'The Witch Door', a better opening you'll not find:

quote:

It was a pounding on a door, a furious, frantic, insistent pounding, born of hysteria and fear and a great desire to be heard, to be freed, to be let loose, to escape.

There's no factual detail there, nothing of what we are delivered in most fiction. Here we feel, we touch, we sense everything that is happening. Where is it taking place? What kind of door is this? Who is pounding? None of these are given to us, but it works so well. So well in fact that I've never found another author who can do what Bradbury does (okay, maybe Banana Yoshimoto on occasion, but not in the same way).

As to the creation of dystopia, this is a noble effort, and you walk in the mighty shadows of not only Bradbury but Orwell and Huxley. Shadows well worth walking in, if you feel strongly enough about your topic. One thing to bare in mind is that Dystopian fiction seems to take place in a future, not in the now. A future that has taken the extremes of the now to a very frightening, and somewhat logical extreme. The wars we wage now may become the constant war of 1984. The burning of books by Nazi's may become the society that bans and burns all books of the Dystopian future.

Maybe I'm just a nostalgianout but most of the science-fiction I've read recently (apart from the grand masters of the past) is petty and irrelevant. The future in these works is small minded and full of product placement. The ideas have plenty of chic, but no real heart. And if they're not trying to be 'relevant' they're just the fifty millionth riff on big men with guns fighting (insert enemy here).

I wish you good luck in your quest, and if you do find anyone writing now that is even near Bradbury, I'd love to know.

Waitingtom,

you have hit the nail exactly on the head. Bradbury is factually imprecise, but through his use of metaphor he gets us to conjure up stuff from our own store of experiences to make his descriptions feel uncannily correct. I believe this is precisely why some people consider Bradbury a genius while others just don't get him. I believe also that this is why TV and film adaptations of Bradbury stories often fail to work.

Very perspicacious observations, with which I agree.
See some previous posts regarding Ray's ability to "transport"! Also a few posts regarding Gerard Manley Hopkins...

quote:

Originally posted by philnic:
Waitingtom,

you have hit the nail exactly on the head. Bradbury is factually imprecise, but through his use of metaphor he gets us to conjure up stuff from our own store of experiences to make his descriptions feel uncannily correct. I believe this is precisely why some people consider Bradbury a genius while others just don't get him. I believe also that this is why TV and film adaptations of Bradbury stories often fail to work.

I've always wondered about factual precision in novels and how much it actually means to the reader beyond the story. Example, I know nothing of New York. Never been there, never wanted to, seen some films about the place, that'st the breadth of my knowledge. So if someone writes a novel about New York and tells me such-and-such a street looks this way, or this certain station opens at such-and-such a time, then I'll never know the difference. The story, if good enough, remains the same. Now if Bradbury tells me about New York I won't need to know about such-and-such, or where everything is. He's going to give me New York right here and now. Maybe it's not the 'real' New York, but it's a whole sight better than a bunch of street names and opening times.

I blame Hemingway (sorry, but I've never been a fan). The whole post-Hemingway world has fixated on 'living the experience before you write', and 'brevity'. Of course I like brevity, I think Bradbury has nailed a kind of hybrid between the terse and poetic that's hard to put down. And I'm all for writing what you know, but so many writers take the whole thing to heart. Instead of 'write what you know', they 'write what they've researched' or even worse 'write what they think they should write.' So what we have is a state of uninspired, detached, flat novels about uninspired, detached, flat characters running around in a similarly flat world.

Bradbury is the closest thing to music in fiction I've ever found. You feel, you don't think. You experience, you don't read. Like the best music, it just happens. And good music never needed to be factually accurate, I give you John Coltrane as the perfect example.

Wow! Yes, you are right about "Ray's writing is like music" and I want to add that it is also "painting". After I read Something Wicked This Way Comes - I can't describe it- but I had all of these images "etched on my eylids" like floaters or protazoa on a glass slide and I've tried to sketch and paint those memories given by his books.Its great fun. To me, when I draw images inspired by Ray I am singing a song he wrote.

I have always thought of RB's writing as poetic in its narration. But, isn't poetry also musical? So, this is what makes his style unlike any other author's. Below is a quick selection. There are so many others in each of his works.

(What instrumentation should be set to this passage!?)

Mother was slender and soft,
With a woven plait of spun-gold hair over her head in a tiara
And eyes the color of deep cool canal water,
Where it ran in shadow, almost purple,
With flecks of amber caught in it.
You could see her thoughts swimming around in her eyes,
Like fish - some bright, some dark, some fast, quick,
Some slow and easy.
And sometimes, like when she looked up, where Earth was,
Being nothing but color and nothing else.
She sat on the boat's prow...
A line of sunburnt soft neck showing
Where her blouse opened like a white flower!

-Martian Chronicles, "Million Year Picnic"

(To the haunting and distant cello of Yo-Yo Ma?)

Great thread. I've thoroughly enjoyed reading these. I do think there are unique aspects to Bradbury's writing, and agree that his lyricism and use of metaphor are high on the list. But I also think there is a "spiritual" or "religious" element to much of his writing that resonates with a lot of readers. I see this a lot in "Martian Chronicales" and "Something Wicked This Way Comes"--to absolutely fantastic books. This aspect of his work comes up in much of his short story writing, also.

Right, Mr. Dark. ("Night Meeting," MC!!) They are far more than just stories to me, also. Metaphors - and beyond. It is a daily occurrence for a Bradbury image or phrasing or moment to rush through my experience, exact and clear.

It's hard to explain to others. It is easy to feel personally, however. Life, death, fear, humor, hope, chidren, ... the wonders that are life! Maybe this takes place because RB's works are by far more familiar to me than any other author's. Maybe it is because I have seen so many lives touched here over the years. There has to be some unique thread we all share while reading his works. Like some gossamer that floats about and touches our cheeks, almost unnoticed, yet graceful and succinct. Mr. Bradbury is in tune with a very special energy, and he shares it lovingly with all who care to listen.

I wrote (a year or so back) about volunteering to paint at our boys' school gym early one hot summer morning. Alone, I heard the sound of the two of them laughing around a corner outside and then "padding" into the hallway. Up on the ladder, before they were in eyesight, I said to myself aloud, "The Sound Of Summer Running!" Then they arrived in a rush, red-cheeked and out of breath. "Hey, dad! What're you doing?"

It was as happy a moment as a parent could have. (Corny, huh?)