If he’d written any sf, he’d be eligible.
Fabulous writer, one of the most evocative of the 20th. But not sf.
I think the <slow pitch> bracketing means we’ve been whooshed, here…
Ever hear of The Martian Chronicles of Fahrenheit 451? Or, for that matter, “There Will Come Soft Rains”?
You may not like the work, but by any sane definition of science fiction, they qualify.
And, of course, many grandmasters, like Zelazny, also wrote fantasy. The two genres are not mutually exclusive.
Thanks.
ObSimpsons: I’m aware of his work.
<slow pitch has been hit>
One late work, Stars in My Pockets Like Grains of Sand is of note. I didn’t always understand it, and it took me a long time to read, but somehow I still enjoyed it. I should reread it.
He wrote some wonderful books and stories, although I’ve not read much that he wrote since the early 80s.
And not just sf; I wish I still had his book of essays about sf, The Jewel-Hinged Jaw. And his autobiographical Heavenly Breakfast… Actually, I’m sure I do still have that one - should re-read it.
I’d certainly have had him as a Grand Master before one or two of the more recent inductees.
Minor nitpick; there are now four GMs born later than Niven, not three.
Oops. I missed Michael Moorcock.
And, honestly, if A Sound Of Thunder didn’t exist, we’d have to invent it.
Not so easy to do! 
If you regard Martian Chronicles as sf, there’s not much more to say.
Yes, it has rockets and aliens and ray guns in 1940s/50s writing… but it’s pure fantasy from cover to cover. It was called sf only because of the limited number of slots for literature in that era; fantasy was Lewis Carroll.
Bradbury certainly wrote a number of sf stories, but then, so did hundreds of writers not generally known as “sf writers.” The vast bulk of his work is somewhere between fantasy and mainstream, and that’s how I see him. His best work - and I admire all but a small handful of his output - is far more at the fantasy and mainstream end than sf. “There Will Come Soft Rains” is in the very short list of what I would call my favorite short stories, as is “Kaleidoscope” (recently filmed as “Gravity” ).
(ETA: Zelazny would be a ghod if only for “Lucifer” and “Divine Madness,” IMVHO.)
But barring less than one percent of his prolific output, none of it was sf except by the most inclusive, adamant argument. There have been many mainstream novels far more “sf-y” than Fahrenheit 451 - see The Handmaid’s Tale or almost anything Crichton wrote. It’s lightly fantastic mainstream.
Despite its belovedness by many, probably because it’s been anthologized in a thousand junior high readers, I think “A Sound of Thunder” is a lumpy, simplistic and badly-written story. Fabulous idea that’s been stolen a hundred times, but far from even the middle of RB’s writing quality.
I’m pretty sure this is what Biffy was looking for.
I agree. For those of you arguing that Bradbury wasn’t a science fiction author: you may have a point, but he was the tenth Grand Master.
This thread prompted me to check the list of Science Fiction Grand Masters. None of the names were at all unfamiliar to me, and most of them I’ve read. By contrast, the Mystery Writers’ Grand Master list includes quite a few names I’m completely unfamiliar with.
Which might say more about the nature of the award than the recipients. 
Next up, Nobel Prize for Lit winners. If you recognize even 50% of the names, you are well ahead of the pack.
This made me think about justifying that statement. So I went to the shelves and pulled off 70 Years of Best Sellers 1895-1965 by Alice Payne Hackett. She did one more in the series, 80 Years 1895-1975, which would be better for the purpose, but I don’t own that one. (Wait. There’s a book I don’t own?)
There’s a listing of every book that had reported sales of 1,000,000 or more covering 18 pages, close to 500 titles. It’s a fascinating slice of social science: I hope some dissertations have been done on it. Would anyone like to guess who has by far the most books on the list, more than the next half dozen names combined?
Erle Stanley Gardner, with 61 Perry Mason books and another 13 under the pseudonym A. A. Fair. Fair alone would rank third, with the now mostly forgotten mystery writer Richard A. Prather in second with 16 titles. Mickey Spillane, Ian Fleming, and Ellery Queen had 12. Erksine Caldwell had 11. There were also a bunch of Dennis the Menace books. Charles Schulz? A nobody, who sneaked one onto the bottom of the list.
Anyway, no genre book of fantasy or science fiction made the list. None. Brave New World and *1984 *were on it, though not Animal Farm. A handful of techno-thrillers like Fail-Safe, Seven Days in May, and On the Beach were there. The Wonderful Wizard of Oz if you want to count that.
Even Hackett notes the absence:
It’s not science fiction: it’s about people!
Happiness Is a Warm Puppy?
Yep.
How is Bradbury’s Mars any less science fiction that Heinlein’s in Stranger in a Strange Land? Both postulate a civilization on Mars (as did nearly all SF writers of the 40s – Clarke did, too) and a breathable atmosphere.
And Fahrenheit 451 is SF by any measure. They are his two most famous works, and both are SF.
Bradbury was not interested in hard sf, because it barely existed when he was writing The Martian Chronicles. He self identified as an SF writer, and was considered one by professionals in the field (who are far less dogmatic in their definition than most fans). His stories weren’t dealing with the nuts and bolts and world building; it was dealing to how human beings react. Like all great SF, they are works of imagination, not of how things are. But he’s clearly a science fiction writer, and he’s a writer who others in the field tried to emulate, which is a pretty damn good reason for making him a Grand Master.
Didn’t Bradbury also say something to the effect that Fahrenheit 451 was the only one of his works that was science fiction?
I wouldn’t class Stranger as sf, either. Heinlein didn’t.
I’d encapsulate the tedious and unwinnable argument as this: including nominally stfnal elements does not make a work science fiction. Bradbury’s writings about Mars, at least, those included in Chronicles, are only incidentally and passingly about Mars, Martians, rocket ships and ray guns. Those are window dressing and making-strange for some beautiful, luminous and thoughtful stories about the nature of humanity. Even the “hard” elements are fantastical.
But the argument about sf-v-fantasy-v-mainstream has been going on a while, is unlikely to be settled any time soon, and contains about one and a half as many viewpoints as there are observers.
I see Bradbury as a mainstream fiction writer, leaning towards fantasy and magicalism, who dabbled in sf themes just as did Shelley, Twain, Poe and (if I’m remembering the right story) Faulkner. Not to mention Thurber, Atwood and about half of today’s novelists. You see him as a stalwart of sf? Okay.
I’d be curious who** in sf **you think was strongly influenced by Bradbury, to the degree that there are scores obviously and openly influenced by RAH.
Every person in sf who grew up wanting to write a beautiful sentence. I admit that the followers of Heinlein outnumber them.
Tad general, there.
I can’t think of anyone who is an obvious acolyte of Bradbury.
And no, you won’t catch me defending Heinlein’s writing style. “Workmanlike and literate” is all I will ever say.