Ray Bradbury's Impact On The World

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Ray Bradbury was an American icon to people around the globe. He recently died at the age of 91, on June 5th, 2012. Bradbury helped people explore their imaginations and he brought inspiration to many other writers in the world today. President Obama said, “His gift for storytelling reshaped our culture and expanded our world” (Flood). This shows that he had a huge effect on many people during the 70 years he was in work writing books and short stories. Bradbury has a heartwarming story about how he got to where he was, and it is a delight to hear. Ray Bradbury was born on August 22nd, 1920 in a small town named Waukegan, Illinois. His parents were Esther Bradbury and Leonard Bradbury, who was a power and telephone lineman. The Bradbury family…show more content…
He would hang around the library in Waukegan and read many different writers. During one of these library visits, Bradbury read sci-fi writers and he says that that was the main reason why he got into sci-fi. Not only did he take visits, but he also was in the drama club too growing up. Bradbury believed he was going to be an actor when he grew up, but one of his teachers persuaded him to go into writing and that is what he did. He was first paid for his writings when he was 14, and he wrote for the Burns and Allen Show on the radio. He was able to get this job when he met George Burns, who was a well-known actor and comedian, one day when he was roller-skating down a street, as he would often do to find famous people to meet. This opened up Bradbury’s eyes and he really wanted to start getting serious about his writing, and he saw a perfect opportunity in a club called the Los Angeles Science Fiction Society. This club met every Thursday night and they would meet and talk about different science fiction works. Bradbury used the things he saw in this club and other influences to start writing short stories for pay. He started writing for magazines, and he submitted one of his short stories named, “Homecoming,” to Mademoiselle Magazine. It looked like the story didn’t have a future, but it was plucked out of a pile of papers that was going to the trash by Truman Capote, who was an editorial assistant at the time. This story later was rewarded with a place in the O. Henry Short Stories of 1947.

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