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A review by kchiappone
A Medicine for Melancholy and Other Stories by Ray Bradbury
4.0
Love this story, though I'm in conflict about the ending. I teach this with my eighth graders, and they routinely like the ending better for the Ray Bradbury Theatre version, which I have to say I've come to like better as well.
Character Critique: "Do the scientists really know? Will it happen today, will it?" The way the only adult in the room denies that the sun is going to come out drives me crazy. And how she doesn't stop the children from locking Margot in the closet. She has one job here and it's to watch these children. Ugh!
Other critique: "It had been raining for seven years; thousands upon thousands of days compounded and filled from one end to the other with rain." I wish Bradbury had done some math here because seven years is just 2,555 days. I don't know if that qualifies as "thousands upon thousands." And if we use Venus years, that's just 1,785 days. I know, I know. It doesn't rain in the real Venus like it does in the story, and the pressure alone would be enough to kill everyone on here, but...I don't know. Those are the things I could let go. Maybe just a passing line about how Venus's path around the sun is very slow. Not that I'm one to tell Bradbury how to write.
Other than my critiques, I do love this story. Makes me feel things, and it makes my students feel things, too. Isn't that what a good story should do?
Character Critique: "Do the scientists really know? Will it happen today, will it?" The way the only adult in the room denies that the sun is going to come out drives me crazy. And how she doesn't stop the children from locking Margot in the closet. She has one job here and it's to watch these children. Ugh!
Other critique: "It had been raining for seven years; thousands upon thousands of days compounded and filled from one end to the other with rain." I wish Bradbury had done some math here because seven years is just 2,555 days. I don't know if that qualifies as "thousands upon thousands." And if we use Venus years, that's just 1,785 days. I know, I know. It doesn't rain in the real Venus like it does in the story, and the pressure alone would be enough to kill everyone on here, but...I don't know. Those are the things I could let go. Maybe just a passing line about how Venus's path around the sun is very slow. Not that I'm one to tell Bradbury how to write.
Other than my critiques, I do love this story. Makes me feel things, and it makes my students feel things, too. Isn't that what a good story should do?