THE MAN WHO CHRONICLED LIFE ON MARS DECADES AGO IS DEAD AT AGE 91.

FROM:  U.S. LIBRARY OF CONGRESS
"Ray Bradbury and Pogo
June 6th, 2012 by Jennifer Gavin
Ray Bradbury, the towering writer of science fiction, died today at age 91. Talk about an author who will be missed …

In the United States, our lives been steeped in science fiction, from the days of “Buck Rogers” and the cheesy B-movies of the 1950s to the phenomena of “Star Trek,” “The Matrix” and more recent films based on a variety of sci-fi and fantasy works.  Yet, for many decades, the genre was sneered at.

Ray Bradbury turned that around.
He elevated the form to literature.  He packed it with humanity, and he pointed out – to paraphrase the cartoon character Pogo – that we humans had “met the enemy, and he is us.”

An uncomfortable portion of the world Bradbury created, in novels such as “Fahrenheit 451,” has come to pass.  Every time I see someone shambling down the street, staring blankly into a hand-held device, I visualize those two telescreen figures from the movie version of “Fahrenheit 451” looking down at Julie Christie and saying, “Linda, you’re absolutely fantastic!”

And I visualize her, staring back, vacuously."