雷•布拉德伯裏（1920-2012）Ray Bradbury

生於美國伊利諾伊州的沃基根。自一九四三年開始專業寫作。他七十多年的寫作生涯，激勵瞭數代讀者去幻想、思考和創新。他創作瞭數百篇短篇小說，齣版近五十本書，此外還寫瞭大量的詩歌、隨筆、戲劇、電視和電影劇本。

《華氏451》和《火星編年史》是他最為著名的作品，奠定瞭其科幻小說大師的地位。他被譽為二十世紀最重要的美國作傢之一，“將現代科幻領入主流文學領域最重要的人物”。曾獲二〇〇〇年美國國傢圖書基金會卓越成就奬，二〇〇四年美國國傢藝術奬章和二〇〇七年普利策特彆褒揚奬。

二〇一二年六月六日，九十一歲高齡的布拉德伯裏病逝於洛杉磯。時任美國總統的巴拉剋•奧巴馬親緻悼詞：“他的敘事纔華重塑瞭我們的文化，拓寬瞭我們的世界。”。

Welcome to a land Ray Bradbury calls "the Undiscovered Country" of his imagination--that vast territory of ideas, concepts, notions and conceits where the stories you now hold were born. America's premier living author of short fiction, Bradbury has spent many lifetimes in this remarkable place--strolling through empty, shadow-washed fields at midnight; exploring long-forgotten rooms gathering dust behind doors bolted years ago to keep strangers locked out.. and secrets locked in. The nights are longer in this country. The cold hours of darkness move like autumn mists deeper and deeper toward winter. But the moonlight reveals great magic here--and a breathtaking vista. The October Country is many places: a picturesque Mexican village where death is a tourist attraction; a city beneath the city where drowned lovers are silently reunited; a carnival midway where a tiny man's most cherished fantasy can be fulfilled night after night. The October Country's inhabitants live, dream, work, die--and sometimes live again--discovering, often too late, the high price of citizenship. Here a glass jar can hold memories and nightmares; a woman's newborn child can plot murder; and a man's skeleton can war against him. Here there is no escaping the dark stranger who lives upstairs...or the reaper who wields the world. Each of these stories is a wonder, imagined by an acclaimed tale-teller writing from a place shadows. But there is astonishing beauty in these shadows, born from a prose that enchants and enthralls. Ray Bradbury's The October Country is a land of metaphors that can chill like a long-after-midnight wind...as they lift the reader high above a sleeping Earth on the strange wings of Uncle Einar.