I Sing the Body Electric! And Other Stories (Paperback)

~ (Author) "I arrived in the truck very early in the morning..." (more)
Key Phrases: blue pyramid, Peter Horn, Ralph Underhill, Shelley Capon (more...)

Editorial Reviews

From Library Journal

Besides the title story, this collection includes 28 of the great Bradbury's other stories, including "Heavy Set," "The Parrot Who Met Papa," and "The Lost City of Mars." The selections represent a nice array of Bradbury's work from the 1940s to the 1970s, with some straight sf mixed with more lighthearted fare.
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Product Description

The mind of Ray Bradbury is a wonder-filled carnival of delight and terror that stretches from the verdant Irish countryside to the coldest reaches of outer space. Yet all his work is united by one common thread: a vivid and profound understanding of the vast seet of emotionsthat bring strength and mythic resonance to our frail species.Ray Bradbury characters may find themselves anywhere and anywhen. A horrified mother may give birth to a strange blue pyramid. A man may take Abraham Linkoln out of the grave--and meet another who puts him back. An amazing Electrical Grandmother may come to live with a grieving family. An old parrort may have learned over long evenings to imitate the voice of Ernest Hemingway, and become the last link to the last link to the great man. A priest on Mars may confront his fondest dream: to meet the Messiah. Each of these magnificient creations has something to tell us about our own humanity--and all of their fates await you in this new trade edition of twenty-eight classic Bradbury stories and one luscious poem. Travel on an unpredictable and unforgettable literary journey--safe in the hands of the century's great men of imagination.

The mind of Ray Bradbury is a wonder-filled carnival of delight and terror that stretches from the verdant Irish countryside to the coldest reaches of outer space. Yet all his work is united by one common thread: a vivid and profound understanding of the vast set of emotions that bring strength and mythic resonance to our frail species. Ray Bradbury characters may find themselves anywhere and anywhen. A horrified mother may give birth to a strange blue pyramid. A man may take Abraham Lincoln out of the grave--and meet another who puts him back. An amazing Electrical Grandmother may come to live with a grieving family. An old parrot may have learned over long evenings to imitate the voice of Ernest Hemingway, and became the last link to the great man. A priest on Mars may confront his fondest dream: to meet the Messiah. Each of these magnificent creations has something to tell us about our humanity--and all of their fates await you in this new trade edition of twenty-eight classic Bradbury stories and one luscious poem. Travel on an unpredictable and unforgettable literary journey--safe in the hands of one the century's great men of imagination.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 336 pages
• Publisher: Harper Perennial (May 1, 1998)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0380789620
• ISBN-13: 978-0380789627
• Product Dimensions: 8.2 x 5.3 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 9 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (14 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #69,159 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

  Popular in these categories: (What's this?)

  #13 in	Books > Science Fiction & Fantasy > Authors, A-Z > ( B ) > Bradbury, Ray
  #62 in	Books > Science Fiction & Fantasy > Science Fiction > Short Stories

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

17 of 18 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Not forgetting the Pekingnese dog troupe..., February 3, 2002

By	Michele L. Worley (Kingdom of the Mouse, United States) - See all my reviews (TOP 500 REVIEWER)

A lovely short story + 1 poem collection, with some Martian and Royal Hibernian cheek by jowl. My review is in alphabetical order rather than presentation order, for ease of reference.

"Any Friend of Nicholas Nickleby's is a Friend of Mine" - One fine summer's day, a man arrived at the train station in Green Town, Illinois - giving the name Charles Dickens.

"Christus Apollo" - A poem, speculating on how many worlds in the wide universe have seen the birth of a Christ child.

"The Cold Wind and the Warm" - The Royal Hibernian Hotel in Dublin is having a dull winter, when six male ballet dancers descend out of the blue for a 24 hour stay, looking for an unlikely new place.

"Downwind from Gettysburg" - Phipps says that's where we must stand, the only hearing place. (He's always dreamed of making a movie with a farmer and his son standing at the edge of the crowd listening to Lincoln's address.). Instead, he built a tourist attraction in Illinois with a robot Lincoln - and someone has now 'assassinated' the robot.

"The Haunting of the New" - Another story near Dublin's Royal Hibernian Hotel, but not with the same characters. Nora's family has lived at Grynwood for the last 200 years, each generation wilder than the last. (On Charlie's first visit, two rival ballet mobs, separated by a language barrier (Manhattan vs. Hamburg) were visiting, along with a Duchess. Nora greeted Charlie stark-naked at the front door, only to have the Duchess strip down in response as she came in.) Sometimes Marion brings his Pekingnese dog troupe, which always gets drunker and sicker than he. Now (years later) Nora offers to sell Grynwood to Charlie - and for the first time, the house has no weekend guests. What happened?

"Heavy-Set" - That's one of his nicknames, as well as Sammy (for Samson). He spends all his free time bodybuilding, but there's something not quite right about him.

"Henry the Ninth" - He's the last man in Britain, this December, because everyone else has finally given up, left the island, and relocated south. (Obviously written, I must say, by somebody who never lived through a Florida summer, but I love it anyway.)

"The Inspired Chicken Motel" - The family stayed there while looking for work in the Depression. The motel chicken laid eggs "right out of Revelation".

"I Sing the Body Electric!" - This was turned into an episode on the original Twilight Zone, which was OK, but the source is better. It begins the week the world ended - the day Tim, Tom, Agatha, and Father returned from Mother's funeral. So Father picked up a Fantoccini brochure on buying an Electrical Grandmother...

"The Kilimanjaro Device" - The narrator is one of the loyal readers of an old man who died in the wrong place at the wrong time; they've all chipped in to try to change that. The writer isn't named. If you don't recognize him from the context, look up Ernest Hemingway and start reading.

"The Lost City of Mars" - This really ought to have been in The Martian Chronicles; it explains how the dry canals were reborn. A very rich man, looking for the fabled lost city of Dia-Sao, had the canals refilled so that he could search for it by water (air and land expeditions having failed). Wilder and Parkhill (from the 4th Expedition) are invited to join the canal yacht party. Nobody quite knows why the city was abandoned.

"The Man in the Rorschach Shirt" - The doctor's shirts were an easy talking point with total strangers - designed by Jackson Pollack.

"Night Call, Collect" - When Mars was evacuated at the beginning of the war, Emil Barton was left behind in one of the Martian cities, alone. He recorded messages and set up the computers to call him at random, so he could hear a human voice. But at eighty, messages left by twenty-year-olds can be hard to take.

"The Terrible Conflagration Up at the Place" - A gang of Dublin men show up at Lord Kilgotten's place to burn it down (some of them also appear in 'The Cold Wind and the Warm'). But the old lord himself answers the door, invites them in, and offers them a drink (asking them to wipe their feet, which they do). And nothing is ever as easy at you think it will be.

"The Tombling Day" - As the bodies of the old cemetery are moved to the new, Grandma has come to see William Simmons one last time. And the real tragedies of the deaths of the young are explored.

"Tomorrow's Child" - The baby was born healthy, but in the wrong dimension - he looked like a blue pyramid. A terrible problem for his parents, who can't communicate with him, and for him - he doesn't know what the 'normal' world looks like, never having seen it that way.

"The Women" - One of the 'women' is the ocean, luring the husband of the other woman to his doom.

"Yes, We'll Gather at the River" - A line from a hymn, which springs to mind since "the Lord giveth, and the Highway Commissioner taketh away." The new highway is being built 300 yards from the tiny hamlet of Oak Lane. (If you like this, read the opening chapters of Douglas Adams' The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, particularly the definition of a bypass).

10 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The Real Stuff, April 12, 2000

By	C. Fletcher (California) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

I've been a big fan of Ray Bradbury for ten years now, since my high school American Lit teacher gave me "Dandelion Wine" to take home over Christmas break. It wasn't assigned reading, but he knew I liked to read, as he did, and he thought I might like it. He was right. Actually, I loved it. In the years since I've read almost all of Bradbury's writing and I've been consistently impressed. Bradbury is a short-story-writing poet whose subject is the intangible wonder we all experience in our finest moments of living and dreaming. Those moments are often far-too-fleeting, but Ray Bradbury knows how to chase them down with his typewriter. I've never read a Ray Bradbury book that didn't make me feel wonderfully alive.

When I began reading "I Sing the Body Electric" I was a little worried that it wasn't up to the par of his other short story collections. Bradbury sometimes writes in broad strokes that result in unfulfilling caricature. I felt this was true of the first couple stories. But after that, the book really took off, and I felt he was firing on all cylinders again and again. "Yes, We'll Gather at the River" has to be one of my favorite Bradbury stories. "Night Call, Collect," the title story, "Any Friend of Nicholas Nickleby's Is a Friend of Mine," and "The Man in the Rorschach Shirt" are other high points in the collection. He also takes some stylistic excursions in this book. "Heavy-Set" is an excellent prose portrait, but is not really like anything else he's written. There is also a poem included as the last entry in the book. If you've never read anything by Ray Bradbury, I highly recommend you pick up one of his many fine books. "I Sing the Body Electric" is right up with the best of them.

9 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A book of magic and wonder, December 1, 1998

By A Customer

I remember reading this collection for the first time about 25 years ago. I was in maybe 7th or 8th grade and was going through a Bradbury period, reading everything of his I could get my hands on. To this day, Mr. Bradbury's writing touches me as few other writers ever have or will. Right now, as I write this small review, I can remember vividly, as if I were there right at this moment, lying in my bed and reading the title story. I remember the grace and humanity at its core and I remember reading the final sentence and weeping.

This is a magnificent book. I highly recommend it to anyone who loves stories and life.