![]() ![]() Especially in early episodes, the violence might be off-screen and tongue-in-cheek, making Hitchcock seem no more subversive than a revival of Arsenic And Old Lace. If you like short stories full of little twists and touches of fantasy, please check out my book The Madness of Art: Short Stories available on Amazon.Then there was the slippery point of view in the series. ![]() The man wrote so much I could read his stuff my whole life and not read the same tale twice. I don’t think I could go more than a few months at a time without reading anything by Bradbury, and thankfully, I’ll never have to. Overall, The Machineries of Joy was a satisfying read by a man whose stories never cease to fascinate me. Ray Harryhausen helped make The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms, a film very loosely based on theBradbury story of the same name (now renamed as The Fog). If you have a little more time at your disposal, make sure to check out “So Died Riabinouchska” which was made into a classic Twilight Zone episode, “The Anthem Runners” which features a very funny conclusion, and “Tyrannosaurus Rex” which is a nice homage to Ray Bradbury’s friend Ray Harryhausen, the master of stop-motion animation. If you have limited time, just read those two. “The Chicago Abyss” is a wonderfully gloomy story about a dystopian future where a ruminant man who can’t help waxing nostalgic becomes a menace to the repressive regime who are out to keep life bland and manageable. It was also the most exciting in the collection. The premise is a bit like Invasion of the Pod People with a subtle anti-drug message built in. The two amazing stories were titled “Boys! Grow Giant Mushrooms in Your Cellar” and “The Chicago Abyss.” In “Boys…”, members of a wholesome suburban community start acting strangely when one of the local boys starts growing mushrooms in his basement. Out of the 20 or so stories collected here, a handful didn’t faze me, a good many amused me, and two were amazing. If you want something that’s deep and sometimes quite bleak while remaining down-to-earth this is the collection for you. If you’re looking for excitement, I’d sooner recommend you find a “Bradbury Best Of” style book or go find The Martian Chronicles. This is a change of pace from his daring leads who will pilot a rocket into the sun or leave Earth for Mars like in his other books. The stories here feature mainly introspective main characters who experience something bizarre, but don’t necessarily do much. The Machineries of Joy though is written by an altogether moodier writer.īy moodier, I don’t mean worse. I associate Ray Bradbury with fantastic ideas and adventurous storytelling. When I think of his work, it’s usually stories like The Sound of Thunder that come to mind (that’s the story that gave us the term “Butterfly effect”). I was surprised by the nature of most of the stories included here. The Machineries of Joy, a collection of stories written in the early 60s, isn’t by the same Ray Bradbury we all know and love. There’s one more reason why the blurb doesn’t belong on the cover: many of the stories barely resemble science-fiction at all. Part of Ray Bradbury’s reason for disdaining of science-fiction as a label is that it’d mean he’d be taken less seriously. Clarke much better exemplify the idea of science fiction. Calling him a “science” fiction writer then is a mistake. When he describes spaceships, he rarely uses words more complex than “rocket.” In The Martian Chronicles, he gives one character a gun that shoots out bees. Apart from that brief instance, Ray Bradbury’s fiction is the product of pure imagination. ![]() The closest thing to a real scientific term or theory is found in the title Farenheit 451, referring to the heat at which paper burns. For one thing, there’s little or no science in any of the stories by him I’ve ever read. The term “science fiction” doesn’t much apply to him. I bring this up because Ray Bradbury himself doesn’t like to be called a science-fiction writer. But is he the greatest living science-fiction writer? No, for one big reason: he’s not a science-fiction writer. The flaw I have in mind is the blurb “The world’s greatest living science-fiction writer.” Is Ray Bradbury one of the greatest writers now living? I think so. I don’t mean the illustration, which I rather like, or the font and design, which are both well-executed. ![]() Before I get started on reviewing the stories featured in The Machineries of Joy by Ray Bradbury, take a moment to look at the cover. ![]()
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