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Martian Chronicles

4.06 of 5 stars 4.06 · rating details · 68,347 ratings · 2,176 reviews

Leaving behind a world on the brink of destruction, man came to the red planet, bringing with him his oldest fears and his deepest desires. The strange new world with its ancient, dying race and vast, red-gold deserts cast a spell on him, settled into his dreams, and changed him forever.

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Published November 2nd 2010 by Blackstone Audiobooks (first published 1950)

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Oct 19, 2012 mark monday rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: futuristik-classik, rain-man-reviews

RIDDLE ME A MARTIAN RIDDLE

۞

A Riddle: What walks on two legs, uses two arms, talks like a human, acts like a human, kills humans, replaces humans, wants to be accepted and loved by a human?

Answer: A Martian!

۞

A Riddle: What walks on two legs, uses two arms, talks like a human, acts like an animal except that's unfair to animals, kills others of its kind, wages war on its own kind, and destroys its own planet?

Answer: A Human!

۞

A Riddle: What is built like a succession of linked stories, feels at tim...more

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Jun 13, 2012 Nataliya rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: favorites, my-childhood-bookshelves, excellent-reads, location-is-the-true-protagonist

"We earth men have a talent for ruining big, beautiful things."

The Martian Chronicles, a perfect example of what I'd call a 'quintessential Bradbury' - fragmentary, at times disjointed, occasionally crossing the line into the realm of surreal, full of his trademark nostalgia and sadness, this account of the failed American Dream approach to the exploration of the ultimate frontier never stops fascinating me and drawing me in with its inexplicable charm.

(Side note: as a person of Russian descent...more

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Apr 28, 2013 Megan Baxter rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Wow. Just...wow. Why have I never read this before? Ray Bradbury has written an amazing, lyrical, spooky-as-hell set of pieces that all add up to something much more. Some are very brief, mere sketches of events. Others are full-length short stories.

Humans come to Mars, and find it inhabited. But first contact goes nothing like they think it will. Neither does second contact. Or third. Or, for that matter, fourth. But humans keep coming, and settle into the Martian landscape. Creepy, creepy thin...more

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Nov 27, 2012 Jonathan rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Recommended to Jonathan by: Nataliya

Shelves: science-fiction, fantasy-sci-fi-challenge, classic-challenge, classic-literature, personal-favourites, fantasy, short-stories

"The way I see it there's a Truth on every planet. All parts of the Big Truth. On a certain day they'll all fit together like the pieces of a jigsaw...For this truth here is as true as Earth's truth, and they lie side by side. "

Ray Bradbury was a great writer whose work speaks volumes (I say this after having read two incredible novels of his, but then you only need one grand novel to touch the reading world). Ray Bradbury was also in my view a poet at heart, if not in his style. Great poets mak...more

"The way I see it there's a Truth on every planet. All parts of the Big Truth. On a certain day they'll all fit together like the pieces of a jigsaw...For this truth here is as true as Earth's truth, and they lie side by side. "

Ray Bradbury was a great writer whose work speaks volumes (I say this after having read two incredible novels of his, but then you only need one grand novel to touch the reading world). Ray Bradbury was also in my view a poet at heart, if not in his style. Great poets make people feel their emotions (it's the reason Sylvia Plath is so great as a poet but also so depressing to read).

The Martian Chronicles, like Fahrenheit 451 is at times disjointed, bizarre, surreal and fantastical, however it is in all degrees a beautiful novel. Made up of multiple short stories layered chronologically and focused around the connection between Earth and Mars this is science fantasy work at its best.

What The Martian Chronicles excels at is in how it takes a foreign idea and expresses familiar ideas. For instance environmentalism, colonisation, the danger of war, alienation, humanity as a collective, religion, society, politics, consumerism and much, much more. I particularly like how he indicates the repetitive nature of history. For such a slim novel Bradbury sure packs in more thought than most of the latest 1000 page epics.

“The rockets set the bony meadows afire, turned rock to lava, turned wood to charcoal, transmuted water to steam, made sand and silica into green glass which lay like shattered mirrors reflecting the invasion, all about. The rockets came like drums, beating in the night. The rockets came like locusts, swarming and settling in blooms of rosy smoke.”

I would recommend this book to anyone interested in science fiction or classic writing. Ray Bradbury was one of the great writers of our time and his expression would be missed save that he continues to speak from volumes like this in intricate ways. I do however, recommend anyone stays away from audiobook versions since I found the one I listened to quite confusing, as it did not convey the short story format well.

Read this for the ideas, read it for the language, read it because you love to read. Just ensure you read this book at some point. It is a true classic in my eyes.

"Is this then how it was so long ago? On the rim of the precipice, on the edge of the cliff of stars, In their time the smell of buffalo, and in our time the smell of the Rocket. Is this then how it was?
And she decided, as sleep assumed the dreaming for her, that yes,yes indeed, very much so, irrevocably, this was how it had always been and would forever continue to be." (less)

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Mar 26, 2012 Gaijinmama rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: fiction

Whether you read SF or not, Ray Bradbury writes beautifully. His style is dreamy and lyrical, satirical and funny, and at times creepy as hell.
This book is interconnected short stories, rather than a novel in the traditional sense. It describes the imagined human colonization of Mars. Some parts are extremely dated: all the men smoke cigars and shoot things; the women bake gingerbread. I guess cell phones and YouTube were beyond the realm of
possibility in 1950, too; Bradbury had people still usi...more

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Jul 11, 2012 Elijah Kinch Spector added it · review of another edition

And the voices wailed Fire, fire, run, run, like a tragic nursery rhyme, a dozen voices, high, low, like children dying in a forest, alone, alone.
p. 171

If The Martian Chronicles wasn't a collection of short stories and vignettes, I think I'd put it in my running for The Great American Novel. For as much as a phrase like "The Great American Novel" means fuck-all of anything. Still, I'm happy for the serendipity that caused me to read this right after The Great Gatsby , because I found the two qui...more

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Jun 06, 2012 Emily rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: classics, fiction

When I heard this morning of Ray Bradbury's death, I went straight to my bookshelf and pulled my old trade paperback copy of The Martian Chronicles out and sat down to re-read it.

And it's still just as magical as it was the first time I picked it up and every time since (there have been several).

The remarkable quality of Mr. Bradbury's writing is its lyricism. It's almost poetry and it's undeniably beautiful. I stopped to read several sections aloud just because I love the sound of the words Mr....more

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Jun 23, 2008 Christy rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: readinglist2-sf, science-fiction-and-fantasy

Ray Bradbury's Martian Chronicles is a lovely, lyrical collection of short pieces about the human colonization of Mars and its consequences, beginning just before first contact and ending after the death and destruction of most of the population of both Mars and Earth.

Since this is a collection of stories and vignettes instead of a novel, the central, guiding element of the book is not a character or set of characters; instead it is the setting and the emotion evoked by Bradbury's prose. His ma...more Ray Bradbury's Martian Chronicles is a lovely, lyrical collection of short pieces about the human colonization of Mars and its consequences, beginning just before first contact and ending after the death and destruction of most of the population of both Mars and Earth.

Since this is a collection of stories and vignettes instead of a novel, the central, guiding element of the book is not a character or set of characters; instead it is the setting and the emotion evoked by Bradbury's prose. His main concern is Mars itself, as a place separate from human intentions. As one character, a member of an early expedition to Mars, says, "Ask me, then, if I believe in the spirit of the things as they were used, and I'll say yes. They're all here. All the things which had uses. All the mountains which had names. And we'll never be able to use them without feeling uncomfortable. And somehow the mountains will never sound right to us; we'll give them new names, but the old names are there, somewhere in time, and the mountains were shaped and seen under those names. The names we'll give to the canals and mountains and cities will fall like so much water on the back of a mallard. No matter how we touch Mars, we'll never touch it. And then we'll get mad at it, and you know what we'll do? We'll rip it up, rip the skin off, and change it to fit ourselves" (53-4).

"There Will Come Soft Rains" takes this emphasis on place over people to its furthest conclusion, perhaps, telling the story of a house that continues running even after its human inhabitants have abandoned it: "The house was an altar with ten thousand attendants, big, small, servicing, attending, in choirs. But the gods had gone away, and the ritual of the religion continued senselessly, uselessly" (167). The house itself takes on life, described as trying to "save itself" when it catches fire (170): "The house shuddered, oak bone on bone, its bared skeleton cringing from the heat, its wire, its nerves revealed as if a surgeon had torn the skin off to let the red veins and capillaries quiver in the scalded air" (171). Bradbury drives this point home with a poem by Sara Teasdale that states, "Not one would mind, neither bird nor tree, / If mankind perished utterly; / And Spring herself, when she woke at dawn / Would scarcely know that we were gone" (169).

The book is absolutely suffused with what is best described as a sense of nostalgia for the future. Bradbury romanticizes the Mars of future decades (1999-2026; the book was published in 1950) and distances the reader from Earth itself. Mars is a place of wonders, a place of great civilizations and developed individuals; it is a place to protect. And in The Martian Chronicles, what Mars needs protecting from is us. We bring with us violence, war, advanced technologies that we have yet to master, mining, and ideas about ownership and colonization that, if allowed to spread, would destroy Martian civilization as surely as they destroyed Native American societies, African cultures, and countless other ways of life on Earth. This is a future that has yet to happen, a place we have yet to see, but we, as readers, are meant to sympathize with Martians, with Mars, and root against humans. We are meant to see in conquering humanity the same problems we face here on Earth and in Mars a haven for freethinkers, former slaves, and survivors (c.f., "Usher II," "Way in the Middle of the Air," and "Million-Year Picnic"). This makes The Martian Chronicles both conservative in the way that the nostalgic mode is typically conservative and progressive in its subversive critique of the Earth way of life, specifically the American way of life.

In "The Million-Year Picnic," Bradbury's nostalgia for the future turns against human science and scientific progress as the father of a family who has left Earth after the wars to live, practically alone, on Mars, says to his family, "Science ran too far ahead of us too quickly, and the people got lost in a mechanical wilderness, like children making over pretty things, gadgets, helicopters, rockets; emphasizing the wrong items, emphasizing machines instead of how to run the machines. Wars got bigger and better and finally killed Earth. That's what the silent radio means. That's what we ran away from" (179-80). In this anti-technology statement, Bradbury provides little hope for the future of humanity and of Earth and little faith or interest in science. However, elsewhere in The Martian Chronicles, he does afford a small glimmer of hope in a different kind of future, a different attitude toward science, religion, and art. He gives us this in the Martian civilization:

"The Martians discovered the secret of life among animals. The animal does not question life. It lives. Its very reason for living is life; it enjoys and relishes life. . . . And the men of Mars realized that in order to survive they would have to forgo asking that one question any longer: Why live? Life was its own answer. Life was the propagation of more life and the living of as good a life as possible. . . . They quit trying too hard to destroy everything, to humble everything. They blended religion and art and science because, at base, science is no more than an investigation of a miracle we can never explain, and art is an interpretation of that miracle. They never let science crush the aesthetic and the beautiful" (66-7).

Following this model of science, one that does not separate science and technology from art and religion and humanity, there is hope for a future for humankind. The question Bradbury leaves us with, then, is whether or not we will be able to heed this warning.(less)

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Feb 21, 2011 Cheryl rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Provokes conversation regarding the boundaries of humanity & the less distinguished moments of Western history. What we came across in bookclub were varying chapter chronologies depending on edition. I'd be curious to know why certain martian chronicles were either added or omitted. Also, the time periods were revised for modern relevance. I'm not sure I embrace the deviation from the original chronology (1999-2026). The theme of planetary destruction (environment & civilization) is (sad...more

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Jun 30, 2012 Matt rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Yup... decided I needed to read a little Bradbury with his recent passing...

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Apr 25, 2013 Vanda rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Reconhecimento seja feito! Este livro (outrora crónicas, escritas entre 1946/1950) foi-me recomendado por um amigo do GR, a quem, desde já, muito agradeço.
Trata-se de uma manta de retalhos, bem cosidos,bem quentinhos, que nos aquecem a alma.

Foi a minha primeira incursão pelo género de ciência/ficção, contudo atrevo-me a dizer que pensava que teria encontros imediatos de 3º grau dentro das suas páginas, muito embora me tivessem esclarecido que não. Nele não habitam tecnologias demasiado bizarras...more Reconhecimento seja feito! Este livro (outrora crónicas, escritas entre 1946/1950) foi-me recomendado por um amigo do GR, a quem, desde já, muito agradeço.
Trata-se de uma manta de retalhos, bem cosidos,bem quentinhos, que nos aquecem a alma.

Foi a minha primeira incursão pelo género de ciência/ficção, contudo atrevo-me a dizer que pensava que teria encontros imediatos de 3º grau dentro das suas páginas, muito embora me tivessem esclarecido que não. Nele não habitam tecnologias demasiado bizarras ou já muito exploradas - as pistolas de lazer, os discos voadores, os marcianos verduchos com olhos esbugalhados, guerras interestalares e por aí fora...
Os senhores marcianos, porque o são e assim devem ser tratados, são seres diferentes dos habituais e que por isso mesmo gozam do mérito, para mim, de heróis, ao contrário dos humanos, que ao invadirem e ocuparem Marte são os vilãos. É, digamos, uma história de pernas para o ar.

Ray Brabury deliciou-me com as suas descrições singelamente tecidas, tanto exteriores, como interiores, às vezes, quase timidamente suspensas no meio da acção. Todavia, a minha plena entrega a este escritor ficou a dever-se ao seu discurso poético que nos lança, é caso para dizer, para além do espaço.

Há como que duas equipas em campo (adversárias? cúmplices?)- os terráqueos e os marcianos num jogo que não chega a ser de poder. São culturas diferentes, adaptações a modos de vida distintos, maneiras de agir e pensares divergentes... que nos catapultam para o universo da filosofia.

A mensagem fulcral destas 26 narrativas é intemporal - um presente actual, coberto com um papel de embrulho muito bonito, cheio de palavras bem escolhidas e musicais, mas que depois de rasgado mostra o seu interior: uma crítica, nas entrelinhas, à sociedade americana do pós-guerra.

O Homem chega a Marte, já em extinção, para fugir do mal que já fez à Terra - a destruição pela guerra. Aí, procura encontrar respostas para as eternas perguntas de todos - de onde vim? Quem sou eu? Para onde vou?

Do princípio ao fim, Ray Bradbury inunda-nos com uma amálgama de beleza, de "sentires" e de pequenos tratados filosóficos, imbuídos por vezes de um subtil humor.

A cegueira pelo poder, a ambição desmedida, a cumplicidade da religião com a ciência, como forma de se enriquecerem uma à outra, e não de se anularem, nem deixando que a ciência esmague a estética ou o belo (milagre da vida), a ideia preconceituosa das maiorias que, por o serem, se julgam detentoras do direito à razão e à verdade, e que terão de se sobrepôr às minorias... são temas tocados e lançados para o ar rarefeito de Marte e de todo o mundo, por meio de uma luz que se vem a mostrar reveladora para quem os lê.
São-nos colocadas interrogações e não há nada melhor num livro, quando nos deixa a cabeça quente.
Quem são aquelas bolas azuis que surgem no ar? Almas? Deus? Marcianos? Foi Deus que os criou? Então, a imagem de Deus será semelhante à da sua criação? Então, Deus está, realmente, em todo o lado e pode ter formas diferentes?
Sem dúvida, um livro de cabeceira para olhar, abrir, acariciar e tornar a ler um dia.
Deixo aqui um excerto que considero muito bonito:
"E os homens de Marte perceberam que, para sobreviver, precisariam de parar de se perguntar: por que viver? A vida era a própria resposta(...) A vida estava tão boa e não carecia de argumentação."(less)

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Apr 09, 2013 José-contemplates-Saturn's Aurora rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: sci-fi

Prologue

Back in the late nineties I was a member of The Planetary Society. I used to receive, at home, their magazine. I always took notice of that name: Ray Bradbury, among the long list of other famous names as board of directors and Advisory Council members: Carl Sagan (co -founder), Bruce Murray,David Brin,Arthur Clarke …. Maybe I knew one day I would read the Martian Chronicles. And now I had the chance. For some time I still held in my mind the names of the missions (to Mars) and the photo...more

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Jul 08, 2012 Apatt rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: sf-f, sf-top-20, top-20, favorites

Since Ray Bradbury passed away (about a month ago at the time of writing) it occurred to me to reread his books that I have read before, and read the others that I have missed. After rereading Something Wicked This Eat Comes last month I thought I'd read Fahrenheit 451 but as it turned out The Reddit SF Book Club chose The Martian Chronicles as book of the month (July 2012) so in order to keep up with the Joneses here we are! How about that for a useless intrro?

This book is a fix-up novel which...more

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Aug 23, 2008 Sharon Mollerus rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Ray Bradbury's book The Martian Chronicles may be a sci-fi thriller, but it's rated as a classic for decades. This was my first time through, and the prose was fresh and beautiful. The stories, strung together, recount the colonization of Mars in the 21st century, a New World populated and provided for by Earth with all the comforts and confusion of home.

The Mars and Earth Men are trapped in mentalities that don't allow them to really meet each other. The violence is unremitting from the first...more

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Dec 29, 2006 Elizabeth rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: fiction, sciencefiction, classics, alltimefavorites

I vividly remember reading this book. I was in 8th grade and I read it in Mrs. Zimmerman's class. She was this bizarre ageless woman who wore her jet-black hair in a crusty bee-hive and had gobs of pastel green eye shadow on her eyelids. She also had a rusty voice-like an ex-smoker, and spoke really slowly. She could have been a character in Martian Chronicles. I still kind of wonder if she was human.

Anyway, I read this book over and over. There was something so pristine about the world that Br...more

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Sep 19, 2007 Dorothy rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition Recommends it for: scifi fans

Oh I just love this book. I actually remember that this was the book that got be back into avid reading again after a very long dry spell.

The earth has been devastated by atomic war and humans head out to Mars to make a new world for themselves, which appears to already have sentient life living on it. These are the chronicles of that contact and conflict. It is worth mentioning that The Martian Chronicles is a short story cycle rather than a novel proper. Each story can conceivably be read on...more

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Nov 10, 2011 Heidi rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Ray Bradbury's stunning prose and innovative ideas bring Mars to life. Written in the late 1940s, at a time when Mars was reachable but still mysterious, when intelligent life on Mars was possible, and when the Space Race was just beginning, The Martian Chronicles abounds with optimism about mankind's great technological future. But at the same time, written by a man heavily influenced by two great wars, the book almost weeps with worry about mankind's eventual end.

The prose is excellent. It's a...more

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Jan 18, 2011 Casey rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I read this a few years ago and whenever I think about this book, I remember how cool it was when the Martians used telepathy to trick the visiting humans into thinking that Mars was populated by their dead relatives.

"Where do you think you are going?"
"For a drink of water."
"But you're not thirsty."

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Apr 14, 2013 Olga rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: read-in-2013

This collection of short stories is considered to be one of the best examples of science fiction, yet Ray Bradbury himself says that it is not science fiction but fantasy. Pretty curious, isn't it? After some deliberation I decided that it is sci-fi after all - in this bibliophile's universe fantasy has magic and while Bradbury's Martians have some nifty abilities they do not have magic. Sorry, Mr. Bradbury, but that's how you wrote them.
The book is organized as a collection of separate episodes...more This collection of short stories is considered to be one of the best examples of science fiction, yet Ray Bradbury himself says that it is not science fiction but fantasy. Pretty curious, isn't it? After some deliberation I decided that it is sci-fi after all - in this bibliophile's universe fantasy has magic and while Bradbury's Martians have some nifty abilities they do not have magic. Sorry, Mr. Bradbury, but that's how you wrote them.
The book is organized as a collection of separate episodes from several decades in the future when humans applied themselves to colonizing Mars, and an attentive reader will see clear parallels with the history of the North-American continent in these stories. In some cases they couldn't be any more obvious. Chicken pox, need I say more? Some characters make multiple appearances which contributes to the cohesiveness of the book, but mostly it's episodes from lives of people who've never met, which makes the account more well-rounded than it would've been with just one or two protagonists and their limited perspectives.
My impression of the book as a whole is not too enthusiastic, although several stories made a strong impression on me. One, There Will Come Soft Rains, doesn't have any characters at all and it reminded me of the 19th century literature where so much is inferred as opposed to being clearly stated. Others, such as Night Meeting and Ylla, are incredibly full of humanity despite the fact that Martians are the key players. And one, The Off Season, left me incredulous: I simply couldn't understand why the Martians would effectively give half the planet to the guy who would destroy their heritage given the right mood. I'm still wondering if they thought his greed would keep him on the planet when everybody else left.
Another reason I liked this book was because of terribly obvious things stated in a beautiful way, making the reader think about the obvious with a fresh mind. In almost every story there was a "couldn't have said it better" moment, all because of passages like this:
"We Earth Men have a talent for ruining big, beautiful things. The only reason we didn't set up hot-dog stands in the midst of the Egyptian temple of Karnak is because it was out of the way and served no large commercial purpose."
This particular passage reflects a common theme for the collection and by the end of the book I had a deep sense of regret when it comes to the destructive nature of humanity because after all it is true, we'll ruin anything with no regard for its history and value beyond the obvious as long as it suits our profit-hungry nature. A sad state of affairs, really, especially if you consider that when all's said and done this book is about humanity, Mars is just an unreal enough place to tell the truth without riling up the masses.
I would have liked The Martian Chronicles a lot more if the stories weren't so obviously deliberately polished, which, strange as it is, is my only real complaint about the book. All the clever turns of phrase and the unexpected similes were great individually but when considered together made it impossible for me to lose myself in most of the stories: I was simply too busy noticing all the cleverness. Bradbury's works are highly esteemed in the field of science fiction and I would recommend this book, especially if the said friend is exploring sci-fi literature.(less)

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Jan 12, 2013 Liz rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: 2013, classics

What an utter pleasure to spend a week swimming in Bradbury's prose. The Martian Chronicles is the first Bradbury I've read in a long time, and this was the first time I read this collection of related stories about humans from Earth colonizing Mars.. Both of-its-time and completely timeless, Bradbury wrestles with intriguing themes of loneliness, misunderstandings among cultures, the oppression and destruction of native people, and many more. At times funny and often times crushingly sad, this...more

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Apr 28, 2011 Mary rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Recommended to Mary by: Book club

In this collection of stories, Bradbury proposes some ideas of what reaching and colonizing another planet might look like. His ideas are interesting but his writing is pretty weak. The characters are thin and behave strangely at times, and he doesn't choose to offer explanations of the larger issues at work, such as the technology that would make the travel possible or the issues that cause his political conflicts. His ideas are clearly more important to him than the way he expresses them. Of c...more

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Dec 29, 2009 Josh Elam rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition Recommends it for: Everyone

Recommended to Josh by: Fellow Beach Bum

This book is a real treat. It's a beautiful blend of philosophical insight, imagination, and Ray Bradbury's poetic imagery. I think everyone should read this book at least once a year.

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Mar 01, 2011 Steffanie rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

What a strange book. Strange enough, where my imagination could barely handle it. But that's a great thing!

The beginning was a bit of a struggle, because it was absolutely nothing new. Simple writing, cliques and it was just too obvious. I did try to put myself in the mindset of someone reading it when it was published, before Sputnik ever launched. The simplistic obviousness that bothered me a little, wouldn't have bothered me before being used to Doctor Who, Stargate, and all my sci-fi stuff....more What a strange book. Strange enough, where my imagination could barely handle it. But that's a great thing!

The beginning was a bit of a struggle, because it was absolutely nothing new. Simple writing, cliques and it was just too obvious. I did try to put myself in the mindset of someone reading it when it was published, before Sputnik ever launched. The simplistic obviousness that bothered me a little, wouldn't have bothered me before being used to Doctor Who, Stargate, and all my sci-fi stuff. Heck, this "book" (it's format is more like a serialization) was written a decade before The Twilight Zone! So the ideas, for the time, were big!!

But after reading further, I came to appreciate it not just for it's being ahead of it's time....but for it actually being thought-provoking and startling! Today!

Much of the book seems to be a commentary on colonization and 'manifest destiny'. Bradbury writes: "The men of Earth came to Mars. They came because they were afraid or unafraid, because they were happy or unhappy, because they felt like Pilgrims or did not feel like Pilgrims..."
and it was extremely interesting to really get a sense of how evil it can be to go somewhere and meddle, without a purpose, without a plan, without a reason to make it noble.

Much of the book also seems to deal with the our psychology and the thin line between reality and fantasy. Martians may have some telepathic tricks up their sleeves, but they would never work if it weren't human nature to want to accept a good lie rather than admit a bad truth.

Another major theme is simply loneliness. Loneliness is so expertly explored by Bradbury. Loneliness on Earth, loneliness on mars. Loneliness when you are the last man standing. Loneliness when you have everything you could want.

There are many other themes too. It's easy for this "book" to have many many different themes, when Bradbury himself called he Martian Chronicles: "a book of stories pretending to be a novel".

A great read. I'm still weirded out by the strangeness of some of the stories. And I'm happy that the things predicted from about 1975 to 2026 have not come true! Read it, for no other reason to see what people were afraid of in the future in the early 1950's [censorship!].

(less)

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Sep 17, 2012 Veerle rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition Recommends it for: Science fiction fans, historicians, Deep thinkers, high school reading

Shelves: sci-fi, dystopian, favorites

“We earth men have a talent for ruining big, beautiful things.”

The Martian Chronicles is a collection of short stories which center around the attempts of earthlings to colonize Mars, leaving devastation on two planets and destroying their own race as well as the Martians.

It is not, however, a vision our future, but of our past. Ray Bradbury thought of these stories in a post-second world war climate, and the uncertainty about what's to come clearly shows. Written between 1945 and 1950, The Martian Chronicles paint a grim picture of the world, where atomic wars are still a part of life in 1999, the moment when the first manned expedition to Mars leaves. The destruction of the human race is a very real possibility. Race relations are no different than in the 40's. Bradbury envisions no social progress but decline or stagnation.

In stark contrast to this social pessimism is Bradbury's overly optimistic view on scientific progress, a trait most westerners of his time possessed. Discovery seemed to have no limit, and the idea of man venturing into space was a certainty in people's minds. In The Martian Chronicles, manned expeditions to Mars with a travel time of less than a year, medical procedures which make 80 year olds look and feel 40 again, robots indistinguishable from human beings and family spacevehicles are a given in this version of the year 1999. In spite of the language, which includes outdated words like 'robots' or 'rockets', which were brand new back then but somehow feel wrong today (being replaced by 'cyborgs' or 'spaceships'), TMC's earth is clearly a very advanced civilisation.

Another thing evident in this book is a certain naivité about space and how different life could be on other planets. Spacetravel doesn't seem to take any significant time. Martians are humanoid in form but look different from earthlings because of their eye-, hair- en skincolor. Mars has oxigen, but less of it. Their social structures seem to be very like our own, except maybe in names. Martians named Mr. Aaa, Bbb and Ccc agree that earth names such as 'Nathaniel York' are quite silly indeed. There is only one truly alien aspect about them, which I won't spoil, concerns their way of communication.

But all these things have little to do with the actual story about ordinary people trying out their luck on Mars. An astronaut having a casual conversation with a Martian. A man opening a hot dog stand on the newly colonised planet. People complaining about the first tourists. This book is not about big story telling but about different situations for various people, which would be only slightly altered if it hadn't happened on Mars, 'the New Frontier'. Just as the discovery of America in the fifteenth century, the local population suffers for it, immigrants have a hard life creating civilisation, feel threatened by the newcomers and start differentiating themselves from earthlings.

The first few chapters give the impression of a humoristic work about absurd situations, but it gets dark fast. Dark and beautiful. Death is one of the main themes in these stories, in which ghosts op the past hunt the protagonists. Some chapters are 10 pages long, others only half a page, but all of them are pure poetry. It's a great book for anyone who loves scifi, but also readers of historical fiction. It provides a window to the past, which also makes it interesting for high school students in history classes about the post-war period or in english classes. Deep thinkers and philosophers should also put it on their to-read list. The Martian Chronicles is a haunting story about life, death and morals, and it left me feeling quite sad. But, as Sally Sparrow said, "Sad is happy for deep people". (less)

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Jan 30, 2011 David Kubicek rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

When Ray Bradbury was young, he was fascinated with the planet Mars. Many kids--and even many adults--in the early 20th Century were fascinated with Mars. It was our nearest neighbor, coming as close as 35 million miles of Earth. It had green patches that could be vegetation, it had white polar caps (ice?) that appeared to shrink and grow with the seasons, and some astronomers claimed to see lines (straight lines, indicating that they were made by intelligent beings) which they called canals. Wh...more When Ray Bradbury was young, he was fascinated with the planet Mars. Many kids--and even many adults--in the early 20th Century were fascinated with Mars. It was our nearest neighbor, coming as close as 35 million miles of Earth. It had green patches that could be vegetation, it had white polar caps (ice?) that appeared to shrink and grow with the seasons, and some astronomers claimed to see lines (straight lines, indicating that they were made by intelligent beings) which they called canals. What a wealth of imagination for young boys--and science fiction writers.

During the 1940s, Bradbury expressed his fascination with Mars in a series of stories, several of which he later collected into The Martian Chronicles (1950). But The Martian Chronicles is more than a collection of related stories. It is an allegory depicting the settlement of a world, obviously paralleling the settlement of the New World by the Europeans, conquering the Native Americans and taming the western wilderness. The novel also depicts the decline of human settlement on Mars. To help this collection of stories work as a novel with a unified theme, Bradbury wrote a number of bridge passages to ease the transition between stories.

I won't say too much about the plot. For those of you who haven't read it, I don't want to give anything away. I wouldn't call The Martian Chronicles science fiction. Even at the time Bradbury wrote these stories, scientists were pretty much in agreement that the Martian environment was too harsh to support human life. Bradbury never cared much about the science, which is probably why some hard core science fiction readers don't care for him. He has always been more interested in showing what kind of trouble we can get into if we don't use technology responsibly. Bradbury said:

"It is all too easy for an emotionalist to go astray in the eyes of the scientific, and surely my work could never serve as a handbook for mathematicians. Somehow, though, I am compensated by allowing myself to believe that while the scientific expert can tell you the exact size, location, pulse, musculature and color of the heart, we emotionalists can find and touch it quicker."*

So if you can get past the fudging over the science and enjoy the fantasy/allegorical aspect of The Martian Chronicles, this book is a must read.

*From The Ray Bradbury Companion by William F. Nolan (Detroit: Gale Research, 1975), p. 70.(less)

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May 01, 2010 Brendan rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: 2010, classics, fantasy, fiction, scifi

I hadn’t read this book yet — I know, that’s sad — so I thought I’d give it a whirl. Bradbury tells a series of stories that document the rise and fall of humankind on Mars. It’s a compelling collection, with good lessons about the dark side of humankind and our tendencies toward new things (particularly the American approach to the world). Some thoughts:

* The book actually comes off as more of a fantasy of “another planet” than of Mars itself, since we’ve now mapped enough of Mars that we’re s...more

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Oct 22, 2011 Nicolas rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: rayon-fantasy-et-sf, mars, nouvelles

Encore une lecture récente, des Chroniques Martiennes, de Bradbury (à moins que ce ne soit Spinrad).
Est-il encore nécessaire de présenter ce roman d'une poésie bouleversante ?
Est-il encore besoin d'en dire la très profonde réflexion sur le genre humain et sur la modernité ?
Je ne le crois pas. C'est l'un des plus authentiques chef-d'oeuvres de la sf, peut-être même le plus beau roman de sf. Certes, l'action n'y est pas palpitante, il n'y a pas de héros, au sens traditionnel de l'histoire, et l...more

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Nov 19, 2010 Greg Heaney rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: science-fiction

The Martian Chronicles is like a magic trick: the more times I read it, the better it gets. It is wonderful, beautiful, moving, and heartbreaking unlike any other science fiction novel I’ve ever read, possibly any novel of any genre. Sure, it’s going on 60 years old. The technological inconsistencies with today’s world of space flight are a product of that. But, in short, it just doesn’t matter. Like all good novels, The Martian Chronicles aren’t about what the title and cover illustration show....more The Martian Chronicles is like a magic trick: the more times I read it, the better it gets. It is wonderful, beautiful, moving, and heartbreaking unlike any other science fiction novel I’ve ever read, possibly any novel of any genre. Sure, it’s going on 60 years old. The technological inconsistencies with today’s world of space flight are a product of that. But, in short, it just doesn’t matter. Like all good novels, The Martian Chronicles aren’t about what the title and cover illustration show. The science fiction is just a medium Bradbury uses to reach something incredibly basic about human nature and our need to grow, expand, build and destroy. And yes, that destruction is usually self-centered. Perhaps it is the guilt that we feel about our own need for space. Perhaps it is the genuine anger we feel towards those who interrupt our manifest destiny. Perhaps it’s all a tug of war between the part of us that wants so terribly to be left alone and the part that would rather die than face loneliness. Either way, The Martian Chronicles are a testament of our human nature.

The underlying theme between each individual episode of the Chronicles is our almost complete inability to deal with our differences. Even those who attempt to embrace the foreignness of Mars ultimately give it up for home again. No amount of human intervention or understanding can bridge the gap between the Martians and us, the aliens. Diplomacy fails, communication is nearly impossible; murder leads to genocide. And still their ghosts haunt us. Even within humanity, the gaps are too wide. We still murder each other, we still fight for power, for land, for cultural supremacy. Mars, the great equalizer, the modern American West, cannot make peace prevail.

There is a somberness to this novel that I’ve felt very few other places. I think readers of Tolkien’s novella Smith of Wooton Major, or even Roverandom, will know what I’m talking about. Mars is a beautiful land, breathtaking, really. The Martian ruins (are they truly “ruins” at all?) have a pull that places on Earth do not. And yet, for all of its glory, it is a dead land. It is past its prime, and humanity will never be able to see Mars for what is was, or for what it should have been. Bardbury’s Mars is a place that I long to know, to see, just as other novels have characters that we long to meet and become friends with. Like Smith or Rover, I feel a real sense of sadness, bereavement all most, at leaving Mars forever. Bradbury makes us want to stay on Mars and experience it for ourselves. That, I believe, is something few writers accomplish. I feel sadness at leaving a fictional place and fictional characters behind. That is true talent.

This is a keystone work of science fiction, of Bradbury’s work, and Americana. It cannot be passed up, for its cultural significance as well as literary. I cannot properly express my love for this book in words. The only way for me to explain it is to beg you to read The Martian Chronicles and feel it for yourself. I promise you, you will never look up at the sky in the same way again.
(less)

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Apr 23, 2009 Anne K. rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: favorites, speculative-fiction-scifi

This is, without any doubt, my favorite book. Not just my favorite book in the sci fi genre, not just my favorite Bradbury, no, this book is the top of the class.

From the first story, the book draws you into a Martian world in an undetermined future that could be a past. For those of us in the age of post-"Firefly", the setting rings particularly true. It's a collection of stories but they work together, each one flows into the next, each one follows in a sequence to form one whole. The stories...more

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Nov 19, 2008 Jonathan added it · review of another edition

"Who are we anyway? The majority? Is that the answer? The majority is always holy is it not? Always, always; just never wrong for one little insignificant moment, is it? Never ever wrong in ten million years? He thought: What is this majority and who is in it? And what do they think and how did they get that way and will they ever change and how the devil did I get caught in this rotten majority? I don't feel comfortable. Is it claustrophobia, fear of crowds, or common sense? Can one man be righ...more

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About Ray Bradbury

American novelist, short story writer, essayist, playwright, screenwriter and poet, was born August 22, 1920 in Waukegan, Illinois. He graduated from a Los Angeles high school in 1938. Although his formal education ended there, he became a "student of life," selling newspapers on L.A. street corners from 1938 to 1942, spending his nights in the public library and his days at the typewriter. He bec...more American novelist, short story writer, essayist, playwright, screenwriter and poet, was born August 22, 1920 in Waukegan, Illinois. He graduated from a Los Angeles high school in 1938. Although his formal education ended there, he became a "student of life," selling newspapers on L.A. street corners from 1938 to 1942, spending his nights in the public library and his days at the typewriter. He became a full-time writer in 1943, and contributed numerous short stories to periodicals before publishing a collection of them, Dark Carnival, in 1947.

His reputation as a writer of courage and vision was established with the publication of The Martian Chronicles in 1950, which describes the first attempts of Earth people to conquer and colonize Mars, and the unintended consequences. Next came The Illustrated Man and then, in 1953, Fahrenheit 451, which many consider to be Bradbury's masterpiece, a scathing indictment of censorship set in a future world where the written word is forbidden. In an attempt to salvage their history and culture, a group of rebels memorize entire works of literature and philosophy as their books are burned by the totalitarian state. Other works include The October Country, Dandelion Wine, A Medicine for Melancholy, Something Wicked This Way Comes, I Sing the Body Electric!, Quicker Than the Eye, and Driving Blind. In all, Bradbury has published more than thirty books, close to 600 short stories, and numerous poems, essays, and plays. His short stories have appeared in more than 1,000 school curriculum "recommended reading" anthologies.

Ray Bradbury's work has been included in four Best American Short Story collections. He has been awarded the O. Henry Memorial Award, the Benjamin Franklin Award, the World Fantasy Award for Lifetime Achievement, the Grand Master Award from the Science Fiction Writers of America, the PEN Center USA West Lifetime Achievement Award, among others. In November 2000, the National Book Foundation Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters was conferred upon Mr. Bradbury at the 2000 National Book Awards Ceremony in New York City.

Ray Bradbury has never confined his vision to the purely literary. He has been nominated for an Academy Award (for his animated film Icarus Montgolfier Wright), and has won an Emmy Award (for his teleplay of The Halloween Tree). He adapted sixty-five of his stories for television's Ray Bradbury Theater. He was the creative consultant on the United States Pavilion at the 1964 New York World's Fair. In 1982 he created the interior metaphors for the Spaceship Earth display at Epcot Center, Disney World, and later contributed to the conception of the Orbitron space ride at Euro-Disney, France.

Married since 1947, Mr. Bradbury and his wife Maggie lived in Los Angeles with their numerous cats. Together, they raised four daughters and had eight grandchildren. Sadly, Maggie passed away in November of 2003.

On the occasion of his 80th birthday in August 2000, Bradbury said, "The great fun in my life has been getting up every morning and rushing to the typewriter because some new idea has hit me. The feeling I have every day is very much the same as it was when I was twelve. In any event, here I am, eighty years old, feeling no different, full of a great sense of joy, and glad for the long life that has been allowed me. I have good plans for the next ten or twenty years, and I hope you'll come along."(less)

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“Science is no more than an investigation of a miracle we can never explain, and art is an interpretation of that miracle.” — 96 people liked it

“There was a smell of Time in the air tonight. He smiled and turned the fancy in his mind. There was a thought. What did time smell like? Like dust and clocks and people. And if you wondered what Time sounded like it sounded like water running in a dark cave and voices crying and dirt dropping down upon hollow box lids, and rain. And, going further, what did Time look like? Time look like snow dropping silently into a black room or it looked like a silent film in an ancient theater, 100 billion faces falling like those New Year balloons, down and down into nothing. That was how Time smelled and looked and sounded. And tonight-Tomas shoved a hand into the wind outside the truck-tonight you could almost taste time.” — 59 people liked it

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