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Bradbury Speaks

ray bradbury

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He is an American treasure, a clear-eyed fantasist without peer, and a literary icon who has created wonder for the better part of seven decades. On subjects as diverse as fiction, the future, film, famous personalities, and more, Ray Bradbury has much to say, as only he can say it. Collected between these covers are memories, ruminations, opinions, prophecies, and philosophies from one of the most influential and admired writers of our time. As unique, unabashed, and irrepressible as the artist himself, here is an intimate portrait, painted with the master's own words, of the one and only Ray Bradbury—far more revealing than any mere memoir, for it opens windows not only into his life and work but also into his mind and heart.

256 pages, Paperback

First published July 26,2005

This edition

Format
256 pages, Paperback
Published
August 15, 2006 by William Morrow Paperbacks
ISBN
9780060585693
ASIN
0060585692
Language
English

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About the author

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ray bradbury

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Ray Douglas Bradbury was an American author and screenwriter. One of the most celebrated 20th-century American writers, he worked in a variety of genres, including fantasy, science fiction, horror, mystery, and realistic fiction.
Bradbury is best known for his novel Fahrenheit 451 (1953) and his short-story collections The Martian Chronicles (1950), The Illustrated Man (1951), and The October Country (1955). Other notable works include the coming of age novel Dandelion Wine (1957), the dark fantasy Something Wicked This Way Comes (1962) and the fictionalized memoir Green Shadows, White Whale (1992). He also wrote and consulted on screenplays and television scripts, including Moby Dick and It Came from Outer Space. Many of his works were adapted into television and film productions as well as comic books. Bradbury also wrote poetry which has been published in several collections, such as They Have Not Seen the Stars (2001).
The New York Times called Bradbury "An author whose fanciful imagination, poetic prose, and mature understanding of human character have won him an international reputation" and "the writer most responsible for bringing modern science fiction into the literary mainstream".

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Community Reviews

Rating(4 / 5.0, 65 votes)
5 stars
24(37%)
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17(26%)
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24(37%)
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65 reviews All reviews
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Kenshina
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
April 26,2025
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Third attempt. Cherrypicked. Read the first 67 pages and the Wizard of Oz essay (the specific reason I checked it out for the long Memorial Day weekend). Suffers from repetition and goofiness... I wish Bradbury didn't feel the need to present himself as a constantly perky kid at heart, like some sort of sci- fi Willie Wonka tour guide at a neverending 1938 World Expo. His claims to being a go-to consultant and a Hollywood insider is cringe.
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HailBritannia_
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
April 26,2025
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Un libro muy entretenido que cuenta algunos hechos no muy conocidos sobre su vida como su amistad con Bertrand Russell o Walt Disney. Contiene al menos una veintena de ensayos, en su gran mayoría ya publicados en diarios y revistas y unos pocos inéditos. A mi humilde parecer peca de escasa profundidad y la extensión del libro no ayuda mucho ( edición suma de letras tiene apenas 288 pp)la vida de un personaje tan rico e interesante como el en la literatura universal hubiese merecido varios cientos de paginas mas. Por esos dos motivos mi calificación es de solo 3 estrellas.
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SamIHellaAm
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
April 26,2025
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Returned to library. Not enough time to read it during the lending period allowed.
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WilfredoPineda
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
April 26,2025
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Got old after awhile. I realize these essays were written in the dark ages before women "did" anything, but Bradbury is so chauvanistic it makes my teeth ache.
And he is such a God-botherer.
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Happy_Mask
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
April 26,2025
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i love ray bradbury. i love his sense of description, the way he views the world...the sense of wonder he brings to most proceedings. it's much better suited for fiction, however.

that isn't to say that this collection of essays doesn't have its own insights or merits. hearing bradbury describe the book store of his dreams, or the joys of trains and bad weather is just as enlightening and enriching as reading his short stories. it's just that, for one, he repeats himself a whole lot, using the same phrases and even telling the same stories several different times. it's great to know the origins of the martian chronicles, or about how he conquered the script for moby dick (by becoming herman melville, of course...), but we don't need to know those things several times throughout the course of a 240-page book.

this is less a criticism of bradbury's writing, though, than it is a criticism of the way this book was put together. i blame the editors. each of the culprit anecdotes make sense within the context of the essay he writes them in, it's just that having those essays in such close quarters lessens the impact through repetition.

if already a great fan of the man and his work, this book is a nice way to learn a little more about him, straight from the horse's mouth. otherwise, consider it unnecessary.
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bedtimechopper
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
April 26,2025
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Every couple of years, I start to feel a bit of self-deprecation regarding the fluffy, entertaining nature embodied in most of what I read. At these times, I'll pick up something non-fiction, or something old and hallowed, and begin reading. Then I get distracted by something newer, fluffy, and fun, and interrupt my serious book while I read that. Then I try to get back into the serious book, but find myself not actually reading but instead spending more time goofing around online, until I get distracted by another entertaining distraction before trying once more to get into the serious book.
A couple years ago, I came across a group of non-fiction titles written by popular sci-fi/fiction authors and I thought, "Wow! I can read serious writings by the authors I find most entertaining!" and promptly acquired a handful of these titles, and dove into this collection of essays from Ray Bradbury.
That was a couple of years ago. Now, after many, many distractions and other books, I've completed this nonfiction collection from a great fiction author. I kind of enjoyed it, and I'm glad I read it, but I didn't find it entertaining.
This collection includes short non-fiction writings with no overall cohesion. Some were previously published, others weren't, but they're all general musings without much point. I learned some fascinating things about Bradbury (such as his lack of a driver's license, his love of Paris, and the fact that he knew everyone). I gained some insights into his writing process. I learned that the man was a relentless dreamer with cross-discipline interests (especially into film and architecture) and very much a product of his time and place - 20th century American west.
This book left me halfway curious to learn more about Bradbury himself and interested in reading more of his works.
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