A hero of his was the Italian director Federico Fellini. When they first met, as Bradbury claims, Fellini ran up to Bradbury, embraced him, and said "My twin! My Twin". They became great friends but never collaborated on any projects.
As a bedtime story for each of his daughters, he read (in nightly installments) "Hound of the Baskervilles" by Arthur Conan Doyle.
As a young boy, a friend once ridiculed his collection of science fiction and comic books, and heckled him into throwing them away. A day later, Bradbury was heartbroken, feeling that he had trashed his best friends. He immediately rebuilt his collection!.
As a young man, he once sold newspapers on a Los Angeles street corner.
Despite the anti-censorship message of Farenheit 451, Bradbury has continually had to fight his publisher's censors who want to tamper or alter the language and tone of the book. He says that the irony is obviously lost on them.
Father of 4 daughters: Susan, Ramona, Bettina and Alexandra.
Has never enjoyed driving, and has always used either public transportation, or a bicycle.
He and famed animator Chuck Jones have been close friends for more than 50 years.
He had a series of short stories which his publisher said would never sell, so he linked the stories together, while living at a local YMCA, and created the novel, "The Martian Chronicles." He was paid just $500 for the story.
He is the great-great-great grandson of Mary Bradbury, a woman who was tried in the Salem Witch Trials in 1692, but saved herself from being hanged for witchcraft.
He voiced his displeasure at documentary filmmaker Michael Moore for appropriating the title of his book "Fahrenheit 451" for the documentary Fahrenheit 9/11 (2004). However, Bradbury himself is the author of "Beyond 1984" (title appropriated from George Orwell's "1984") and "Another Tale of Two Cities" (title appropriated from Charles Dickens' "A Tale of Two Cities").
He wrote the original manuscript of "Fahrenheit 451" on a rented typewriter in a public library, from handwritten notes and outlines. It first appeared in print in a shortened form (of about 25,000 words) in Galaxy magazine and later in its present length but in serial format in the just starting out Playboy magazine.
His original title for one of his novels was 'the Fireman'. He called his local fire department and asked them what the temperature at which paper burns at - and was told "451 Fahrenheit". He reversed it to make it the title of his novel 'Fahrenheit 451'.
In Chaplin's Goliath (1996), a documentary about silent film star Eric Campbell, the Rosedale Cemetary spokeswoman mistakenly claims Ray Bradbury is interred there.
In 1950, he discovered that comic book publisher William M. Gaines (later famous for producing Mad Magazine) had published several of his stories without his permission. Bradbury wrote Gaines a letter praising the artwork and treatment of his story, and politely asked for his royalty payment. He got it.
Lifelong friends of Ray Harryhausen and Forrest J Ackerman, ever since they were teenagers and members of the same Los Angeles Science Fiction Club.
National Public Radio's "Bradbury 13" (1984) was a 13-episode program based on many of his stories.
Paid tribute to in the music video "F**k Me, Ray Bradbury" by Rachel Bloom.
Recipient of a 2004 National Medal of Arts, awarded by the National Endowment for the Arts (USA).
Says that he remembers being born.