Bradbury 100 - Celebrating the Life and Work of American Writer Ray Bradbury

In this episode of Bradbury 100, I review an old magazine published as a tribute to Ray Bradbury. Back in May 1963, the award-winning Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction (which is still running today) published its second-ever author special, and it focused on Ray Bradbury. Join me in skimming through this landmark publication. You can find the full issue of the magazine for free on the Internet...

Another celebration of the 60th anniversary of the release of the feature film version of FAHRENHEIT 451... In a previous episode (https://bradburymedia.blogspot.com/2026/03/new-podcast-episode-fahrenheit-451-film.html), I detailed how Francois Truffaut's film had an impact on Ray Bradbury. In THIS episode I go back a few steps, and look at how Truffaut became connected to Ray in the first place....

Bradbury 100 returns with another "Chronological" episode, this time continuing with the year 1945. In this year, Ray published no fewer than thirteen stories. In this episode, I cover the next five stories: Skeleton (first version), The Watchers, Dead Men Rise Up Never, Corpse Carnival, and The Dead Man. This batch of stories is once again a mix of crime stories and weird fantasy, clearly Ray's p...

Francois Truffaut's film of FAHRENHEIT 451 is sixty years old! In this episode I revisit the film and talk about how it came to be made, and then move on to discussing Ray Bradbury's reactions to the film. Not only did Ray review the film for the LA Times, but he also borrowed elements from the film when he later developed his own stage play of F451. Check out the full show notes at www.bradburyme...

In this episode, a reading of Ray Bradbury's story "Skeleton" - but perhaps not the story you are familiar with... In 1945, Ray published TWO short stories with the same title, "Skeleton". The more famous of the two went on to be collected in his books Dark Carnival, The October Country, and The Stories Of Ray Bradbury. The less well known "Skeleton" just appeared in an obscure magazine and has on...

Bradbury 100 returns for 2026 with another "Chronological" episode, this time starting us off with the year 1945. In this year, Ray published no fewer than thirteen stories. In this episode, I cover the first four stories: The Poems, I’m Not So Dumb, Hell’s Half Hour, and The Tombstone. There's a mixture here of two genres still favoured as a professional short story writer, namely the detective s...

Coming Soon: a new season of Bradbury 100. This short trailer gives you an idea of what to expect when the new season begins on 26 February 2026. As always, find more information on my website at www.bradburymedia.co.uk

My Chronological Bradbury series continues with the third and final look at the year 1944 - which sees Ray continue to dabble with crime fiction, but still turning his hand to SF and fantasy, completing the NINETEEN short stories he had published in that single year. The most notable story of the batch is the timeless "The Jar", a creepy yet amusing fantasy set in the Lousiana swamps. Written when...

This is the audio version of a live talk I did for Ray Bradbury's 105th birthday (22 August 2025). For more info, check out the show notes at: https://bradburymedia.blogspot.com/2025/08/new-podcast-episode-laurel-and-hardy.html

Time for another in my "Chronological Bradbury" strand, where I work through Ray Bradbury's stories in the order they were published. This time, we continue with the year 1944, which sees Ray publishing a string of crime stories alongside the more familiar fantasy and science fiction tales. As you will recall from last time, there are too many stories from 1944 for me to cover in a single episode,...

Time for another podcast episode - and another in my "Chronological Bradbury" strand, where I work through Ray Bradbury's stories in the order they were published. This time, we reach the year 1944, which sees Ray publishing "The Lake" - which he always said was the first "good" story that he ever wrote. It's also the year of "I, Rocket", the story which nabbed him a posthumous Retro Hugo Award fo...

Here's another new podcast episode, picking up the "Chronological Bradbury" thread once more, with the remaining Ray Bradbury stories which were first published in the latter part of 1943. I cover five stories in this episode, completing the total of eleven stories Ray published in that year. All of the stories are available online within archived copies of the original pulp magazines. The stories...

This episode of the Bradbury 100 podcast is something of a partner to the last episode where I looked at Ray Bradbury's stories from the year 1943. You may recall I talked about "The Wind". Well, in this episode, I look at that story in more detail - and give a reading of the entire, original version. What you will hear is the first-ever published version of the story, taken from Weird Tales magaz...

Bradbury 100 podcast time! And it's another of my "Chronological Bradbury" series, this time covering the year 1943. This is the year when Ray broke all his previous records, by having no fewer than eleven stories published in professional magazines - in contrast to the mere two published in 1942. This is also the year that Ray became 23 years old. It's remarkable to me that a 22-year-old could wr...

Bradbury 100 - episode 65 - Radio Classics: Dimension X / X Minus One by Bradbury 100 podcast by bradburymedia.co.uk

Sometimes the podstreams just cross, and this episode is a prime example. When Colin Kuskie, co-host of my other podcast suggested reviewing It Came From Outer Space, the classic 1953 science fiction movie created by Ray Bradbury, it was right up my alley - and so this new episode of Bradbury 100 is a crossover with the new episode of Science Fiction 101! The discussion ranges from Bradbury's cont...

Bradbury 100 is back with a new batch of episodes! This time: an interview with Orty Ortwein, author of THE FIRST GEEKS, which examines the early days of organised science fiction fandom. And guess who was there? Ray Bradbury, of course. At around eighteen years of age, he joined the Los Angeles chapter of the Science Fiction League, and became firm friends with animator Ray Harryhausen and super-...

Bradbury 100 Returns - 1st May 2025! by Bradbury 100 podcast by bradburymedia.co.uk

In this episode, I look at the relationship between two greats of genre fiction: Ray Bradbury and his friend Leigh Brackett. Brackett is perhaps best remembered today as one of the screenwriters of STAR WARS: THE EMPIRE STRIKES BACK - but long before that she co-wrote THE BIG SLEEP and RIO BRAVO for Howard Hawks. Earlier still, she was a prolific writer of science fiction and crime fiction. And, c...

Here's another new episode of my Bradbury 100 podcast. This time, I look at the early years of Ray Bradbury's professional career, which saw him not only mastering the craft of short story writing and putting together his first book, but branching out into media - in particular, getting his stories and scripts onto national radio shows such as CBS's SUSPENSE. Over a span of a dozen years, Suspense...

A few weeks ago, there was a new episode of The Simpsons which was entirely based on the works of Ray Bradbury. "Simpsons Wicked This Way Comes" is not the first time Ray has been referenced by the show. In fact, the number of Bradbury allusions across all of The Simpsons (i.e. on TV, in comics, and in books) now totals: thirteen. In this episode I detail them all! Many of them are represented by...

"Lazarus Come Forth" (1944) is one of a handful of early Ray Bradbury stories to have slipped into the public domain. It's also one of two Bradbury stories set on board a "morgue ship" - a space ship that cleans up after space battles, collecting dead astronauts to (presumably) bring them back home for proper burial or cremation. In this episode, I bring you the background behind the story, and a...

As well as writing his famous novels and short stories, Ray Bradbury wrote extensively for the stage. In this episode I explore Ray Bradbury as playwright, looking at his one-act plays and his full-llength adaptations of his own novels. You can find the full shownotes on my blog, here: https://bradburymedia.blogspot.com/2024/11/new-podcast-episode-ray-bradbury-on.html

This is the audio from my 2024 livestreamed version of the podcast, which went out over Facebook and Youtube. If you want the full effect, you can find the VIDEO recording of the livestream on YouTube, at: https://youtube.com/live/SBGtfPQZYBw

Ray Bradbury's first-ever book, DARK CARNIVAL (1947) has been re-published. For the first time, it is available in paperback and ebook editions. In this episode I go through the story behind Dark Carnival, and review the new editions. For more information, check out the show notes at https://bradburymedia.blogspot.com/2024/03/new-bradbury-100-episode-dark-carnival.html