I know this is highly unorthodox, and many of you might not want to post, but all im hearing lately is "i like this, i was inspired by that." Well, lets have a change! the question is this: what is your LEAST favorite RB story? I personally have none, but, well, lets say, its..........................i think ill have to take a long time to think about this.........

"A Wild Night in Galway"--Depressing

"Junior"--Annoying

Just about anything with Heber Finn and his pub in it.

Here's one from Ray's #1 fan, Donn Albright. Several people here have mentioned loving "The Parrot Who Met Papa." Well, Donn hated it, called it "The Parrot Who Ate Papa."

REMEMBERING HIS BIRTH.

DRIVES ME CRAZY, WHEN HE TELLS THE STORY, AT LECTURES,

Take care
Patrick

As novels go, my least favorite is THE HALLOWEEN TREE.

As for short stories hmmm...

Well, I can't seem to be able to single one out. It's odd that I can think of some which I didn't like as much as others, but each one has a redeeming quality, lasting image, or profound moment that won't allow me to single it out. Maybe I'll go out on the limb and just throw one out there. A TOUCH OF PETULANCE.

There, I did it. Are you happy now?

The reason I didn't like it so much is because my expectations were too great. The Horror/Suspense anthology DARK FORCES was marketed as the genres answer to Harlan Ellison's DANGEROUS VISIONS SF anthology. When I found out Bradbury contributed a story, as well as a novella by Stephen King, I rushed out and bought it. RB's story wasn't the "edge of your seat" page-turner I was expecting it to be.

Yeah, some of those Irish stories too.



[This message has been edited by grasstains (edited 05-19-2004).]

I didn't like "Junior" either.

Some of the later stories with long titles don't work - "Colonel Stonesteel's ..." and "Besides a Dinosaur ...", for example.

Yes, a touch of petulance was a story that really got me into it, wondering where it was leading, only to leave me feeling confused and disappointed at the end.
A sound of thunder, while I did not dislike it, I felt that there was much more that could have been explored. Hopefully the movie will do that to some extent, but obviously, without going too far.

My big gripe is when I would listen to Ray talk about his alternate ending for the movie, ''The King of Kings.''

Being unhappy with how the movie ended (Ray did the narration, by the way)...he came up with this ending that he liked to talk about during lectures. Well, as far as I was concerned, it wasn't bibical. So one day, I tore out the page in my Bible and handed it to Ray, denoting the passage and scene in question with an ''arrow'', and told him...'Here...here is how it is!!'

But, lo...and behold... again, in later lectures of this discussion...there was Ray telling his version, and not the scriptural one. I gave up badgering him about it after that...

FH451: REMEMBERING HIS BIRTH.

Lol, I was just thinking about how when I was reading FH451 in junior high, I told one of my teachers how Ray Bradbury remembered his birth and she said, "That's a laugh."

Nard,

I have heard Ray say that when he was writing the Moby Dick screenplay he looked at himself in a mirror and declared "I am Herman Melville!" - but it never occurred to me that he would want to re-write the New Testament!

(However, I'd love to know what his alternate ending was... can you tell us?)

- Phil

"Powerhouse!" What's going on there?

And if Patrick comes up with "his birth" as for his #1, that says volumes on how often it is told.

hey, I really liked a sound of thunder. anyway, i think i have a least favorite (book) now: Dandelion Wine. WAIT! dont get me wrong, it is an excellent excellent excellent book, i loved it, leaving other books in the dust, but since its least favorite RB its the only i can think of now. i probably have one i like less but i cant remember it. anyway, i said DW because i like sci fi and rockets and mars and junk more than fantasy.

Some short stories from the Illustrated Man are not up to par. Some are just freakin' great, though. I liked all the books I've read by him so far.
Cheers, Transaltor

Phil: Have you read "Green Shadows, White Whale"? The film ending and his process for arriving at it are pretty well summed-up near the end...or maybe I'm thinking of "Moby-Dick"--but it seems to me that "King of Kings" was also described in one of the books of that series. I do have the film on tape, haven't watched it lately, but as I remember it ends with the words about going into all nations to preach the gospel, which are either from the Bible or a close paraphrase.

Ettil: Have YOU read "Green Shadows, White Whale"? Do so, and you may have a new "least favorite."

FJ: The first time I read "Powerhouse" I TOTALLY DID NOT GET what the HECK was supposed to be going on! I said, "Huh?" and flipped the page. Since then I have read it at least twice more and it's become a huge favorite. The message may still be lost on people who recognize only traditional religions taught by traditional methods and reject newer means of communication and forms of thought changed due to those means--wouldn't think *those* people would be online, but ya never know.
"Powerhouse" makes me think of how many Bible Belt fundamentalists warned about new aspects of culture corrupting society--motion pictures would rot your child's brain, comic books would rot your child's brain, rock and roll would rot your child's brain. Certainly, ample evidence exists of the rotting of many brains, particularly since the 1960s, but there were always rotten brains going back to the beginning. It's a matter of poor character, poorly used, more than cultural influences.

What properly-prepared, well brought up young people do on being exposed to these new ideas/forms is incorporate aspects (hopefully the better aspects) of them into their OWN mythology. A motion picture/comic book/rock and roll hero can represent a virtue without children imitating his every vice. Some pretty bad guys at first can even reform--look at the transformation of Barnabas Collins on "Dark Shadows" once he became a great symbol to a lot of kids.

Mmm...Barnabas Collins....

Hey, who brought that soapbox in here?

yeah no i havent read that yet. im starting to feel sorry for DW saying its my least fav so im looking for another one to be me least favorite.

dandelion,

yes, I have read Green Shadows, and that whole sequence when Ray describes how the story fell into place for him, and the script virtually wrote itself, is the best part of the book. When I get the time, I would really love to do the following, in this order:

Read Moby Dick
Re-read Green Shadows
Re-watch Moby Dick

Alas, life is too short.

This thread is proving to be quite revealing. I'm another who can't stand the Irish stories. After suffering through most of them, I did once go to Dublin. And now the stories seem worse.

Now that it's come up, I can imagine that there is some reference to King of Kings somewhere in one of those novels. Presumably Graeyard for Lunatics. No doubt Fritz Wong would have been the director. Anyone remember for sure?

- Phil