"The Cat's Pajamas" by Ray Bradbury

Read a page from the book...
http://www.harpercollins.com/catalog/excerpt_xml.asp?isbn=006058565X

Ahh...
Thanks, I needed that.
Absolutely, inimitably RB.
Now if I can get one of my kids to buy it for my birthday...

I just bought it today, and I can't wait to start it after work today...

I'm waiting for my copy of Cat's Pajamas to arrive. Could anyone who has already got a copy please post a list of the stories contained within?

- Phil

Okay, question. Is this a new compilation of old stories, or is it completely new?

Groon, it is a combination of both old and new stories; however, many of the "old" stories have never seen print before. philnic, here is a list of the stories in the collection, with the year(s) in which they were written:

1. Chrysalis: 1946-1947
2. The Island: 1952
3. Sometime Before Dawn: 1950
4. Hail to the Chief: 2003-2004
5. We'll Just Act Natural: 1948-1949
6. Ole, Orozco! Siqueiros, Si!: 2003-2004
7. The House: 1947
8. The John Wilkes Booth/Warner Brothers/MGM/NBC Funeral Train: 2003
9. A Careful Man Dies: 1946
10. The Cat's Pajamas: 2003
11. Triangle: 1951
12. The Mafioso Cement-Mixing Machine: 2003
13. The Ghosts: 1950-1952
14. Where's My Hat, What's My Hurry: 2003
15. The Transformation: 1948-1949
16. Sixty-Six: 2003
17. A Matter of Taste: 1952
18. I Get the Blues When it Rains (A Remembrance): 1980
19. All My Enemies Are Dead: 2003
20. The Completist: 2003-2004
21. Epilogue: The R.B., G.K.C. and G.B.S. Orient Express: 1996-1997

[This message has been edited by Richard (edited 07-19-2004).]

Titles 'Chrysalis' and 'A Careful Man Dies' are similar to me.

Epilogue: R.B. - means Ray Bradbury, G.B.S. - George Bernard Shaw, G.K.C. - ???

In his introduction, Ray explains that the story "Chrysalis" in THE CAT'S PAJAMAS "is different from the short story of the same name that was published in AMAZING STORIES and later collected in S IS FOR SPACE. I just liked the title so much that I used it twice."

"A Careful Man Dies" appears in the collection A MEMORY OF MURDER, and has appeared in at least one anthology as well since its original publication in 1946 in NEW DETECTIVE MAGAZINE.

G.K.C.= George K. Chesterton!

Ray's interest in his early unpublished story manuscripts is evident in every story collection since Long After Midnight in 1976. Bill Nolan encouraged this impulse for LAM, and Donn Albright has continued to revisit and recommend the best of these manuscripts to Ray for inclusion in every subsequent collection. Chapter seven of Ray Bradbury: The Life of Fiction offers a detailed narrative discussion of this phenomenon, as well as tables that track Ray's use of older materials in the six collections prior to the Cat's Pajamas. I might also mention that there is a table of contents error in this volume - it does not mention 'Triangle.'

Richard, many thanks for posting the table of contents. I've copied this information to the Cat's Pajamas page on my website

"A Careful Man Dies" is the only story that leaps out at me as familiar. Have any of the other stories been published before?

Prof. Touponce, you've finally convinced me that I must buy your book!

- Phil

[This message has been edited by philnic (edited 07-20-2004).]

"Sixty-Six" was first published in the October, 2003-January, 2004 (Issue XI, 2003) of THE STRAND MAGAZINE. The poem, "The R.B., G.K.C. and G.B.S. Forever Orient Express", was orginally published as a stand-alone chapbook (circa 1994) by Joshua Odell Editions to publicize a forthcoming book of Ray's essays entitled JOURNEY TO FAR METAPHOR; unfortunately, that book was never published. The only reason I say "circa 1994" is because August, 1994 is noted on the back of the chapbook as the anticipated publication date for the collection of essays. This appears to be inconsistent with the date noted in THE CAT'S PAJAMAS. However, while I have not compared the poem in the chapbook word-for-word with the version that appears in THE CAT'S PAJAMAS, it is possible Ray revised the poem after the chapbook was published. I suppose it's also possible that the date on the back of the chapbook, or the date in THE CAT'S PAJAMAS, may be mistaken. It's details like this that makes a bibliographer's job so enjoyable.(?)

[This message has been edited by Richard (edited 07-20-2004).]

Remembering how my school's library had "Let's All Kill Constance" very shortly after its release (I was the first to check it out), I checked the computer yesterday for "the Cat's Pajamas." Sure enough, they had it, but I couldn't find it on the shelf. It turns out that it was so new that even though they had catalogued it, they had yet to bring it out to the library proper! The library staff was helpful, and retrieved it for me. I took it up to the checkout desk, smelling the pages of new print in anxious excitement only to discover the horror that I did not have my school ID!? Well, luckily they held it for me until today, when I picked it up first thing this morning! I've read the forward and most of the first story between my classes, and I'm still excited. It's pretty good so far! Can't wait to get home and read more! Later!

I bought it a couple of nights ago, and was reading it yesterday before being picked up for work. I really love it, and I'm only five stories into it. I'm really enjoying reading his brand new stuff; it's kind of like a peek into his world as it is now.
His introduction, when he mentioned Marguerite, made me cry...

Nova_Perfect,

I know what you mean about reading of Marguerite in Ray's introduction. It seemed that about half of the times that I called Ray, Marguerite would answer the phone. I had the opportunity at different times to chat with her briefly before Ray came on and it was a delight to visit with her.

On one occasion I asked about an Oscar statue that was on their mantle. I knew that Ray had won an Emmy for The Holloween Tree, in fact I saw it as well on an end table, but I had never known anything about an Oscar, so she told me story behind it.

Their next door neighbor (she didn't mention his name)was the cinematopgrapher on the original King Solomon's Mines movie. When he died he bequeathed the Oscar to Ray and that is why it was on his manltle. When I visited in 1996 I had taken pictures of his living room with the various awards that he has received, sent him a set, and later lost the set I had. I have been kicking myself ever since.

I only met Marguerite back in 1967 when I also met Ray. The other times when I visited I just heard her voice from another room. I think that it was only two or three weeks before she deid that I last had the opportunity to speak with her when I was calling for Ray.

I just finished "The Cat's Pajamas" in its entirety this weekend. As always, Bradbury's stories are fantastic.

Anybody have a favorite so far? Mine was definitely "A Matter of Taste." "A Careful Man Dies" was also great.