Just received my copy, through Amazon.com, the other day (Vol. 1, 1938-1943). WOW! I continue to be in awe of the contributions and scholarship of William Touponce and Jonathan Eller. I have also pre-ordered Eller's new work on Bradbury and hope to get it soon. Need to get out to the Center for Ray Bradbury Studies. It is such a cool time to be a Bradbury fan. You can just read for fun and insight, or you can immerse yourself in scholarly studies. Or, of course, you can do both. Bradbury scholarship has finally hit a mature stride--largely thanks to the work of Touponce and Eller.

One of the prizsed elements of my Bradbury collection is an early copy of William F. Nolan's "The Ray Bradbury Companion," 1975--perhaps the earliest comprehensive analysis of Bradbury's writing. by coincidence, I got my copy on Ray's birthday in 2003.

Could you please post a table of contents so the Complete Story Listings thread can be updated as to what (may be, currently) still uncollected? Thanks.

Just finished Becoming Ray Bradbury last evening. Superlatively informative. The more I read about Mr. B, even after all of these years on board, teaching his works, receiving articles from numerous librarian friends, and doing my own sit-down-and-reads, the more I am amazed at his insights, magical expressions, and home-grown literary genius.

Originally posted by dandelion:

quote:

Could you please post a table of contents so the Complete Story Listings thread can be updated as to what (may be, currently) still uncollected?

The post(13th) by Prof. Touponce on this thread has the content listing: https://raybradburyboard.com/ev...91083901/m/966103281

Thanks, will get on this when possible.

Is there an estimated date for volume 2?

I'm thinking about picking up this volume. From reading more about it online and here in particular, it sounds like the plan was initially for five volumes and for the moment has been reduced to three, but either way it sounds like that may not be enough. Realistically, how many volumes would there have to be to collect every Bradbury story with this level of scholarly attention. I do hope it eventually comes to pass.

Hi pablo, and welcome to the board. There are over 300 Bradbury short stories, and the first volume of THE COLLECTED STORIES contains 32 stories (if you include the "selected amateur publications"). By rought estimate, then, it might take about ten volumes to do the whole run of stories!

The dust flap of volume 1 refers to "the proposed three-volume edition". I would hope that this reflects the publisher's initial cautious plan, and that its success will lead to an extension of the series. If you look around these message boards, you will find some postings by co-editor Bill Touponce discussing the plans for the series.

I understand a few stories were left off the first volume. Is there any specific reason? Might they be added in an appendix in a later volume? A complete scholarly edition of all short stories can't really exclude anything, it seems to me. As I'm a completist at heart, I really hope this project goes on to completion, however long it takes. The first volume is ordered and already shipped, so I can't wait to delve into the stories and the academic commentary. As this came out over a year ago, has there been any word on the second volume yet?

My understanding is that volume one contains all of Bradbury's professional stories from the period covered, and it has an appendix which includes a selection of his amateur stories. As far as I know (from my flicking through the book earlier today as a reminder of its contents), the only omissions are amateur stories and unpublished works.

This seems a reasonable approach. After all, the aim is to present a study of Bradbury's professional career, not of everything he has ever written.

Bill Touponce gave us an early rationale for the project in this post from 2009:
https://raybradburyboard.com/ev...901/m/5511015873/p/3

I don't recall seeing any specific date given for volume 2, only that the work is already underway and ongoing. I'll try to remember to ask Jon Eller when next we speak.

Thanks for your replies, Phil. I do hope, once the project is finished, that these initial amateur attempts will be the only omissions.