YOU CANT DEPEND ON THINGS BECAUSE...
...like machines, for instance, they fall apart or rust or rot, or maybe never get finished at all... or wind up in garages...
...like tennis shoes, you can only run so far, so fast, and then the earth's got you again...
...like trolleys. Trolleys, big as they are, always come to the end of the line...
YOU CANT DEPEND ON PEOPLE BECAUSE...
...they go away...
strangers die...
people you know fairly well die...
friends die...
people murder people, like in books...
your own folks can die.
So... !
He held onto a double fistful of breath, let it hiss out slow, grabbed more breath, and let it whisper through his tight-gritted teeth.
SO. He finished in huge heavily blocked capitals.
SO IF TROLLEYS AND RUNABOUTS AND FRIENDS AND NEAR FRIENDS CAN GO AWAY FOR A WHILE OR GO AWAY FOREVER, OR RUST, OR FALL APART OR DIE, AND IF PEOPLE CAN BE MURDERED, AND IF SOMEONE LIKE GREAT— GRANDMA, WHO WAS GOING TO LIVE FOREVER, CAN DIE... IF ALL OF THIS IS TRUE... THEN... I, DOUGLAS SPAULDING, SOME DAY... MUST...
Ray Douglas Bradbury (August 22, 1920 – June 5, 2012) was an American author and screenwriter.
He worked in a variety of genres, including fantasy, science fiction, horror, and mystery fiction.
Predominantly known for writing the iconic dystopian novel Fahrenheit 451 (1953), and his science-fiction and horror-story collections, The Martian Chronicles (1950), The Illustrated Man (1951), and I Sing the Body Electric (1969), Bradbury was one of the most celebrated 20th- and 21st-century American writers. While most of his best known work is in fantasy fiction, he also wrote in other genres, such as the coming-of-age novel Dandelion Wine (1957) and the fictionalized memoir Green Shadows, White Whale (1992).
Recipient of numerous awards, including a 2007 Pulitzer Citation, Bradbury also wrote and consulted on screenplays and television scripts, including Moby Dick and It Came from Outer Space. Many of his works were adapted to comic book, television, and film formats.
Upon his death in 2012, The New York Times called Bradbury "the writer most responsible for bringing modern science fiction into the literary mainstream".