The Martian Chronicles by Ray Bradbury
Page 29
Publication Date: May 4, 1950; 56th Printing
If you’ve never read Ray Bradbury’s loosely connected collection of stories about mankind’s journey to Mars, perhaps you have experienced the often anthologized There Will Come Soft Rains, not realizing it’s part of The Martian Chronicles.
In the living room the voice-clock sang, Tick-tock, seven o’clock, time to get up, time to get up, seven o’clock! as if it were afraid that nobody would. The morning house lay empty. The clock ticked on, repeating and repeating its sounds into the emptiness. Seven-nine, breakfast time, seven-nine!
But There Will Come Soft Rains enters much later in this seminal volume. Bradbury opens the collection with a short scene, less than one page, that takes place in January 1999: Rocket Summer.
One Minute it was Ohio winter, with doors closed, windows locked, the panes blind with frost, icicles fringing every roof, children skiing on slopes, housewives lumbering like great black bears in their furs along the icy streets.
In the table of contents and the beginning of each story, we are given the date, which helps give the reader the feeling of cohesiveness to the overarching collection. There are stories of great triumph, stories of awe, and stories of terror. If you choose to read from The Martian Chronicles before bedtime, you’ve been forewarned that sleep may not come easy. And if you are able drift off to slumberland, your dreams may change to nightmares, thanks to stories such as April 2000: The Third Expedition.
“Here’s to our health.” Grandma tipped her glass to her porcelain teeth.
“How long you been here, Grandma?” said Lustig.
“Ever since we died,” she said tartly.
If I’m not mistaken, The Martian Chronicles was my introduction to Bradbury. He’s a skilled crafter of wondrous tales, and it’s hard to go wrong with any of his books and stories. My current copy, which I have pictured above, is not the one I first read. Again, if memory serves, the book belonged to my older sister. She was a great influencer in my life when it came to speculative fiction, and I’m all the richer for it.
For those who enjoy collections of works by a single author, the Library of America recently released a volume of Bradbury works that contains The Martian Chronicles, Fahrenheit 451, Dandelion Wine, and Something Wicked This Way Comes. As a subscriber, I receive the boxed sets, which I consider invaluable additions to my personal library.
Astute observers may have noticed from the first image that my second-hand, well-loved paperback copy shows us a scene from the 1980 TV miniseries The Martian Chronicles. The special effects are nothing to write home about, and like all film versions, there are differences, but there is a certain charm to the show, and especially so when it comes to some of the actors, such as Rock Hudson, Darren McGavin, Bernadette Peters, Roddy McDowall, and Fritz Weaver.
If you choose only one, book or TV mini-series, the book is the far better choice.
Stay tuned for Page 30, coming soon!
From the excitement of buying shiny new comic books to collecting older issues for those nostalgic leanings of yesteryear, my weekly blog Cool Comics In My Collection showcases something for everyone at edgosney.com.