Section 8. 2-Way Interpreting

In a recent interview with Foxnews.com, Bradbury reflected on Mars, space exploration, the far-reaching impact of his own writing and his predictions about what lies ahead.

Foxnews.com: How did you feel when you saw the NASA Spirit rover’s photographs of Mars?

Ray Bradbury: Well, the 12-year-old boy in me jumped up and down and yelled. That’s how I felt.

Foxnews.com: To what extent do you think science fiction writers like you and other greats have encouraged space exploration?

Bradbury: Oh, yes, indeed, of course we have. We didn’t intend to, but that’s the way it worked out. In small groups of science fiction fans and writers back in 1937, we used to have meetings in Clifton's Cafeteria in downtown L.A. And the students from Cal Tech used to come. They were planning to form rocket societies and dream about going to the moon. So it all began very primitively with love. The important thing is to be in love with something.

Foxnews.com: "The Martian Chronicles" originated as a set of short stories. When were they put together as a whole collection?

Bradbury: In 1949. I went to New York. I had dinner with an editor at Doubleday, and he came up with the idea. He said, "Ray, what about all those martian stories? Wouldn’t they make a tapestry if you sewed them all together and called it something like 'The Martian Chronicles'?" I said, "Oh my God, that’s wonderful." So I went back to the YMCA, where I was staying at 50 cents a night, and I wrote the outline and gave it to the editor the next day at Doubleday, and they gave me a $700 advance on "The Martian Chronicles."

Foxnews.com: Do you think science fiction today still has the same kind of impact that it did back when you were writing "The Martian Chronicles"?

Bradbury: Even more so. It’s in all the schools. When I started writing that book 53 years ago, science fiction was not being taught in the schools. Now every school in the country has a course in science fiction. So we have more power, more influence, more imagination than ever before.

Foxnews.com: What do you think of the American space program?

Bradbury: It’s too late, isn’t it? It’s stupid. We should have stayed on the moon. We should have made moon the base, instead of building space stations, which are fragile and which fly apart. Then we take off from the moon and we go to Mars. But it’s terribly late. We’ve let too much time go by. We’ve been busy with war instead of being busy with peace. And that’s what space travel is all about. It’s all about peace and exploration and wonder and beauty.

Foxnews.com: So you think for a while we were ahead of what you predicted, but since then we've fallen behind?

Bradbury: Today we’ve lost interest. It’s a shame. Most members of Congress are politicians. They’re bores. They’re damn boring. They have no imagination, and they don’t know how to imagine the future. So my word to them is, get out of the way and let me happen. Let me predict it for you.