Fiction Review: The Illustrated Man

At the end of January, I decided to read another book on my over-crowded TBR bookcase and get a good start on my 2022 Back to the Classics Challenge, since I didn't do so well last year! I picked up The Illustrated Man by Ray Bradbury, a book my husband gave me for my birthday last year. Ray and I go way back. When I was a teenager, I read every single book of his on the shelves of my public library! That was a long time ago, so in recent years, I have been rediscovering why I loved his books so much (see my review of The Martian Chronicles from 2018). This loosely-linked collection of short stories did not disappoint; it was engrossing, clever, and thought-provoking.

The illustrated man of the title is described in the prologue and forms the basis for the rest of the collection. He's a large man covered with tattoos that come to life at night. Each one tells a story with sound and moving pictures, like a tiny movie playing on his skin. The illustrated man is traveling in rural Wisconsin and meets up with another man on the road. The two decide to camp together for the night, and the other man stays awake all night, enthralled, watching the illustrated man's tattoos tell their stories. The rest of the book is those stories, each entirely unique. They are all science fiction stories, though as is typical with Bradbury, they are mostly about human nature. Many of them take place in the future, in space, and/or on other planets. In The Other Foot, a community of Black humans is living peacefully on Mars when a rocket arrives that disrupts their quiet society. As with many Bradbury stories, the twist here is incredibly clever and filled with irony. The Long Rain features a military group from Earth that has a very difficult time adjusting to life on Venus. In The Rocket Man, a typical family on Earth struggles with the father's job as an astronaut, which takes him away for long periods of time, as he struggles to adjust to normal life when he is at home on leave. Missionaries from Earth meet a whole new life form on Mars (familiar if you read The Martian Chronicles) in The Fire Balloons that resists their efforts to introduce Christianity and maybe teaches the priests something. The Last Night of the World presents a very simple concept with mind-boggling implications that will leave you thinking. My favorite story was The Exiles, which is so clever that to describe it would ruin the fun of the surprise but that has an important message.

Those are just a few brief examples of the 18 stories in this collection, but every single one is imaginative, twisty, and thoughtful. This book was published in 1948, and it is mind-boggling to realize that he wrote most of these stories in the 40's (and perhaps earlier) because their ingenious meanings are still so very relevant today. While a lot of science fiction from back then seems dated now (like the "instant messaging" using pneumatic tubes in homes in one story here!), Bradbury writes about racism, classism, the way people treat others, the dangers of censorship, and more in ways that are just as applicable and important today. Perhaps that's a bit depressing that we haven't progressed more as a human race, but Bradbury has so much fun in each of these stories that we go along for the ride and then have the pleasure of recognizing a truism hidden inside the entertainment. I thoroughly enjoyed every one of these stories that left me thinking, and I look forward to my next foray into Bradbury's backlist.

281 pages, Simon & Schuster

Tantor Audio

This book fit in the following Reading Challenges:

Mount TBR Challenge

Back to the Classics Challenge 2022 - Short Story Collection

I in the 2022 Alphabet Soup Challenge

Diversity Challenge

Travel the World in Books Challenge - Do Mars and Venus count??

 

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Listen to a sample of the audiobook here and/or download it from Audible. The sample features an introduction by Ray Bradbury (that was not included in my paperback copy), explaining why and how he wrote some of these intriguing stories.

 

You can buy the book through Bookshop.org, where your purchase will support the indie bookstore of your choice (or all indie bookstores)--the convenience of shopping online while still buying local!

 
  

Or you can order The Illustrated Man from Book Depository, with free shipping worldwide.