Can Anyone Recommend A RB Science/Extrapolative Fiction Story, Other Than F451, With An Interesting Female Character Who's Not Pitiful Or A Bitch?

Tall Order There.

The electric grandmother in I Sing the Body Electric! is pretty cool as is The Old Lady in The Invisible Boy.

Helen Loomis comes to mind. Also Ylla from Martian Chronicles, and Doug Spauldings Great-grandma (Old Ladies may be special cases in Bradbury's universe)

There are plenty in the "Dandelion Wine"-type stories, but speaking strictly of the sci-fi and fantasy genres it becomes more difficult to identify many.

There's also the robotic "wife" of the old astronaut in Martian Chronicles. Might there be a trend with the mechanization of people(but maybe women in particular- also in ..Body Electric) that equates with some of the dystopian possibilities in his more science-fiction work?

Why Stop With Clarisse? With Her He Proved That He Could Create An Interesting, Heroic And Essentially Good Female Character.

Sorry About The B-Word, I Just Realized There's Children Present. I'll Get The Hang Of This Internet/www. Thing Yet.

The harp player in "The Day It Rained Forever", one of my favorite stories, is a fine female character.

Richard,
is that the same harp player as in Getting Through Sunday Somehow?

No, the characters are different. "The Day It Rained Forever" appears in Ray's collection A MEDICINE FOR MELANCHOLY. The story to which you refer, "Getting Through Sunday Somehow", one of Ray's wonderful Irish stories, appears in his collection LONG AFTER MIDNIGHT. However, both stories are great!

Not a science fiction story, but not "Dandelion Wine," either. Aimee, in the short story, "The Dwarf" is a great, kind, active person who has a heart of gold and the abilities to feel others' pain and to put herself in their position. But she doesn't only feel, she actively tries to make things better. She openly challenges those who are cruel, and sacrifices from her own limited means to make others' lives better.

Cecy, in "The April Witch," is another sympathetic female character. Like Clarisse, in F451, she is younger. Cecy wants to feel real love, but her magical powers will be sacrificed if she were to marry a "normal" person. Although you can argue that she shouldn't inhabit the bodies of others and make them do things against their own will; it is not hard to understand the yearning for love that she feels.


[This message has been edited by Mr. Dark (edited 05-04-2003).]

If I had to pick a favorite HUMAN female Bradbury character--meaning, the Electric Grandmother is out and Cecy is questionable--it would have to be Lavinia Nebbs in "Dandelion Wine." Clarisse in "Fahrenheit 451" is one of Bradbury's best female characters, and one of relatively few tolerable females in his Sci Fi and Fantasy works.

[This message has been edited by dandelion (edited 09-02-2004).]