Ray Bradbury (born August 22, 1920) is an American fantasy, horror, science fi ction, and mystery writer. He is one of the greatest and most popular American writers of science of the twentieth century. He often said, “I don’t ...

Ray Bradbury (born August 22, 1920) is an American fantasy, horror, science fi ction, and mystery writer. He is one of the greatest and most popular American writers of science of the twentieth century. He often said, “I don’t write science fi ction. Science fi ction is a description of the real. Fantasy is a description of the unreal. I’m a magician”. Bradbury was always a reader and writer, throughout his youth, spending much time in the library of his home town. Libraries raised me. I don’t believe in colleges and universities. Most students don’t have money to go there. I couldn’t go to college either, so I went to the library three days a week for 10 years. Read the passage from the story the Smile by R. Bradbury and do the exercise. Context Here is a science fi ction story about distant future. People of the Earth move to another planet. They hate everything connected with the planet they came from. They destroy all the masterpieces that might remind of the civilization of the earth. That day when the boy came to town they were to put an end to a Portrait of a Woman with a Smile. When the crowd started destroying the picture, the boy managed to tear a piece and ran away. Without a word, sobbing, Tom ran. He ran out and down the bomb-pitted road1 , into a fi eld across a shining stream, not looking back, his hand under his coat. At sunset he 1 bomb-pitted road – éáõÙµÇó ù³Ý¹í³Í ׳ݳå³ñÑ 64 reached the small village and passed on through. By nine o’clock he came to the ruined farm house. Around back, in the part that still remained upright he heard the sound of sleeping, the family – his mother, father and brother. He slipped quietly, silently through the small door and lay down panting. “Tom?” called his mother in the dark. “Yes.” “Where’ve you been?” asked his father. “In town? If I learn that you were in the town, I’ll beat you in the morning.” Tom lay down getting his breath. All was quiet. His hand was pushed to his chest, tight, tight. He lay for half an hour in this way, eyes closed. Then he felt something and it was a cold white light. The moon rose very high and the little square of light crept slowly over Tom’s body. Then, and only then, did his hand relax. Slowly, carefully, listening to those who slept around him, Tom drew his hand forth. He hesitated, keeping his breath for a while, and then, waiting, opened his hand on which lay a piece of painted painting. All the world was asleep in the night. And their in his hand was the Smile. He looked at it in the white light from the midnight sky, and he thought, over to himself, quickly, the Smile, the lovely Smile. An hour later he could still see it, even after he had carefully hidden it. He shut his eyes and the Smile was there in the darkness. And it was still there, warm and gentle when he went to sleep and the world was silent and the moon sailed up and then down the cold sky towards morning. Comprehension question 1. Can you guess what picture they were going to destroy that day? 2. Who is the author of that picture? 3. Which part of the story describes the magical smile? 4. Why are there no commas in the last sentence, to your mind? 5. Why was the boy so excited? 6. What is the story about? 7. What does the writer warn us about?