Mysterious Mondays: "The Fog Horn" by Ray Bradbury

From SlideServe

"The Fog Horn" (1951) is a very short story by American author Ray Bradbury.  As in my first Mysterious Mondays post of the month, a lighthouse and its occupants are endangered, but this time instead of arriving via shipwreck the threat appears from the bottom of the sea.  Although the creature is certainly destructive, the two main characters seem to feel more empathy than fear, even when it becomes apparent that the lighthouse will not withstand the gigantic beast's arrival.   The senior lighthouse keeper even waxes philosophical about the animal's motives for approaching the lighthouse, and goes so far as to lie about the cause of their lighthouse's collapse, presumably to keep anyone from attempting to locate this ancient creature from the ocean depths.  In a way, the giant beast is more like a third main character than a dangerous adversary in the story.

Allegedly this unique tale caught the attention of director John Huston, who then asked Bradbury to write the screenplay for the 1956 movie "Moby Dick", based on Herman Melville's novel of the same name.  Huston must have thought the story was truly remarkable, as Ray Bradbury supposedly confessed to the director that he had never been able to finish reading Melville's book!  You can read "The Fog Horn" here, or listen to an audio version on YouTube: