Editing Ray Bradbury (section)

==Writing==
Bradbury attributed his lifelong habit of writing every day to two incidents. The first, when he was three years old, was his mother's taking him to see [[Lon Chaney, Sr.|Lon Chaney]] in the 1923 silent film ''[[The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1923 film)|The Hunchback of Notre Dame]]''.<ref>Paradowski, Robert J. "Ray Bradbury". Critical Survey of Short Fiction, Second Revised Edition (2001): UFO. November 10, 2010.</ref> The second occurred in 1932, when a carnival entertainer, one Mr. Electrico, knighted the young man with an electrified sword and intoned: "Live forever!"<ref name="IHW">{{cite web|url=http://www.raybradbury.com/inhiswords02.html|title=In His Words|publisher=RayBradbury.com|access-date=December 9, 2009|archive-date=June 16, 2012|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120616140758/http://www.raybradbury.com/inhiswords02.html|url-status=dead}}</ref> Bradbury remarked: "I felt that something strange and wonderful had happened to me because of my encounter with Mr.&nbsp;Electrico&nbsp;... [he] gave me a future&nbsp;... I began to write, full-time. I have written every single day of my life since that day 69 years ago."<ref name="IHW"/> At that age, Bradbury first started to do [[Magic (illusion)|magic]], which was his first great love. He said that had he not discovered writing, he would have become a magician.<ref>Terry Sanders's film Ray Bradbury: Story of a Writer (1963)</ref>

Bradbury claimed a wide variety of influences, and described discussions he might have had with his favorite writers, among them [[Robert Frost]], [[William Shakespeare]], [[John Steinbeck]], [[Aldous Huxley]], and [[Thomas Wolfe]]. From Steinbeck, he learned "how to write objectively and yet insert all of the insights without too much extra comment." He studied [[Eudora Welty]] for her "remarkable ability to give you atmosphere, character, and motion in a single line."<ref name="Paris Review"/>

Bradbury was once described as a "[[Midwest]] [[surrealism|surrealist]]" and is often labeled a science-fiction writer. He resisted that categorization, however, defining science fiction as "the art of the possible."<ref>{{Cite web|title=A Conversation with Ray Bradbury (2001) &#124; CosmoLearning English|url=https://cosmolearning.org/videos/a-conversation-with-ray-bradbury-2001-1131/|access-date=December 29, 2022|website=CosmoLearning|language=en|archive-date=December 29, 2022|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221229072114/https://cosmolearning.org/videos/a-conversation-with-ray-bradbury-2001-1131/|url-status=dead}}</ref><ref>[http://lists.topica.com/lists/gsn-newsday-list/read/message.html?sort=t&mid=911788456 Ray Bradbury interview] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130205075553/http://lists.topica.com/lists/gsn-newsday-list/read/message.html?sort=t&mid=911788456 |date=February 5, 2013 }} "I am not a science fiction writer. I am a fantasy writer. But the label got put on me and stuck." March 23, 2005.</ref>

{{Blockquote|First of all, I don't write science fiction. I've only done one science fiction book and that's ''[[Fahrenheit 451]]'', based on reality. Science fiction is a depiction of the real. Fantasy is a depiction of the unreal. So ''[[Martian Chronicles]]'' is not science fiction, it's fantasy. It couldn't happen, you see? That's the reason it's going to be around a long time—because it's a [[Greek myth]], and myths have staying power.<ref>{{cite web|author1=Wil Gerken |author2=Nathan Hendler |author3=Doug Floyd |author4=John Banks |url=http://weeklywire.com/ww/09-27-99/alibi_feat1.html |title=Books: Grandfather Time (Weekly Alibi . 09-27-99) |publisher=Weeklywire.com |access-date=February 14, 2010}}</ref>|sign=|source=}}

Bradbury recounted when he came into his own as a writer, the afternoon he wrote a short story about his first encounter with death. When he was a boy, he met a young girl at a lake edge and she went out into the water and never came back. Years later, as he wrote about it in "[[The Lake (short story)|The Lake]]", tears flowed from him. He recognized he had taken the leap from emulating the many writers he admired to connecting with his voice as a writer.<ref>{{cite book|title=Zen in the Art of Writing|first=Ray|last=Bradbury|date=1990}}</ref>

When later asked about source of the lyrical power of his prose, he replied: "From reading so much poetry every day of my life. My favorite writers have been those who've said things well." He said: "If you're reluctant to weep, you won't live a full and complete life."<ref>{{Cite web|author=Guest Columnist |date=June 7, 2012|title=Personal lessons from futurist Ray Bradbury on crying, escaping, laughing |url=https://www.oregonlive.com/opinion/2012/06/personal_lessons_from_futurist.html |department=Opinion |work=[[The Oregonian]] |location=Portland, OR |access-date=December 29, 2022 |language=en}}</ref>

In high school, Bradbury was active in the poetry and drama clubs. Planning to become an actor, he became serious about writing as his high-school years progressed. He graduated from Los Angeles High School, where he took poetry classes with Snow Longley Housh and short-story writing courses taught by Jeannet Johnson.<ref>[http://www.spaceagecity.com/bradbury/bio.htm Ray Bradbury Biography] Ray Bradbury Online {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120502055029/http://www.spaceagecity.com/bradbury/bio.htm |date=May 2, 2012 }}</ref> The teachers recognized his talent and furthered his interest in writing,<ref>Litz, A. Walton, and Molly Weigel, eds. ''American Writers'' (Supp. 4, Pt. 1). New York: Macmillan Library Reference. 1996. Print.</ref> but he did not attend college. Instead, he sold newspapers at the corner of South Norton Avenue and Olympic Boulevard. In regard to his education, Bradbury said:

{{Blockquote|Libraries raised me. I don't believe in colleges and universities. I believe in libraries because most students don't have any money. When I graduated from high school, it was during the [[Great Depression|Depression]] and we had no money. I couldn't go to college, so I went to the library three days a week for 10 years.<ref name="NYTimes 2009-06-19">{{Cite news|first=Jennifer|last=Steinhauer|title=A Literary Legend Fights for a Local Library|date=June 19, 2009|work=[[The New York Times]]|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/20/us/20ventura.html|access-date=December 9, 2009}}</ref><ref name=lat-1988oct01>{{Cite web|last=Harris|first=Scott|date=October 1, 1988|title=Mayor, Author Launch Library Funding Drive|url=https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1988-10-01-me-4256-story.html|access-date=December 29, 2022|website=Los Angeles Times|language=en-US}}</ref> So I graduated from the library when I was twenty-eight years old.<ref>{{cite web |title=I Graduated from the Library: An Interview with Ray Bradbury - Public Libraries Online |url=https://publiclibrariesonline.org/2013/05/i-graduated-from-the-library-an-interview-with-ray-bradbury/ |website=Public Libraries Online - A Publication of the Public Library Association |access-date=28 June 2024 |language=en |date=20 May 2013}}</ref><ref name=lat-1988oct01/>}}

He told ''[[The Paris Review]]'': "You can't learn to write in college. It's a very bad place for writers because the teachers always think they know more than you do—and they don't."<ref name="Paris Review"/>

He considered science to be 'incidental' to his writing. He claimed not to be interested in the development of science, but hoped to use it as a form of social commentary and as an allegorical technique.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Museum |first=American Writers |date=August 22, 2021 |title=Ray Bradbury 101 |url=https://americanwritersmuseum.org/ray-bradbury-101/ |access-date=July 26, 2022 |website=The American Writers Museum |language=en-US}}</ref>

He described his inspiration: "My stories run up and bite me in the leg—I respond by writing them down—everything that goes on during the bite. When I finish, the idea lets go and runs off".<ref>{{Cite web |last=Garg |first=Anu |date=August 22, 2017 |title=A.Word.A.Day--deterge |url=https://wordsmith.org/awad/archives/0817 |work=A Word a Day |department=wordsmith.org |access-date=July 10, 2022}}</ref>

==="Green Town"===
An imagined version of Waukegan, Green Town is a symbol of safety and home, which is often the setting for tales of the macabre and the dark fantastic. It serves as the setting of his semiautobiographical classics ''[[Dandelion Wine]]'', ''[[Something Wicked This Way Comes (novel)|Something Wicked This Way Comes]]'', and ''[[Farewell Summer]]'', as well as many of his short stories. In Green Town, Bradbury's favorite uncle sprouts wings, traveling carnivals conceal supernatural powers, and his grandparents provide room and board to [[Charles Dickens]].<ref>{{cite web|title=Summer Morning, Summer Night by Ray Bradbury|url=https://subterraneanpress.com/store/product_detail/summer_morning_summer_night|website=Subterranean Press|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150822143044/http://subterraneanpress.com/store/product_detail/summer_morning_summer_night|archive-date=August 22, 2015}}</ref> Perhaps the definitive use of Green Town is in ''[[Summer Morning, Summer Night]]'', a collection of short stories and vignettes exclusively set in the town. Bradbury returns to the signature locale as a look back at the rapidly disappearing small-town world of the American heartland, which was the foundation of his roots.<ref>Sites from these works which still exist in Waukegan include his boyhood home, his grandparents' home next door (and their connecting lawns where he gathered dandelions with his grandfather to make wine) and, less than a block away, the famous ravine which Bradbury used as a [[metaphor]] throughout his career.</ref>