I Sing the Body Electric! (1969)

I'm apparently in the minority on this one, but I didn't think this was one of Bradbury's better short story collections. The title story is the most significant one here, and while it's interesting that Bradbury, contrary to what might seem to be implied in some of his other stories, here praises technology (hence the title), he does so in a rather muddled fashion. It's about a family that gets a robot "mother" to replace their recently-deceased real mother---but it goes farther than merely saying that machines are good in their place and strongly suggests that an artificial replacement could actually be far superior to a real mother. This is so bizarre that you have to suspect that Bradbury is being satirical, but to the contrary there is every indication that he's playing it straight.

"How many times have you heard how inhuman machines are, in your life? How many bright fine people have you heard spouting the same tired truths which are in reality lies; all machines destroy, all machines are cold, thoughtless, awful. There's a seed of truth there. But only a seed...most machines are amoral, neither bad nor good. But by the way you built and shaped them you in turn shaped men, women, and children to be bad or good." This is all fine and good as far as it goes, but Bradbury goes on to have the children declare in the end, "You've always been alive to us!"---which, in the context of the story about their real mother being dead, is somewhat disturbing.

There aren't any other stories here that really stood out for me, and most of them were just not up to Bradbury's usual standards and I thought were far from his best. But they weren't his worst either, and almost anything he writes is worth reading. These probably are too, but perhaps only if you're a real Bradbury fan; otherwise, you might want to read some of his more classic books instead, such as Fahrenheit 451, Dandelion Wine, The Martian Chronicles, The Illustrated Man, or even We'll Always Have Paris. I would put this one fairly low on the list. ( )

There are a few outstanding short stories in this collection, including the titular “I Sing the Body Electric!”. The collection, however, seemed erratic and random, and would have been better served by combining stories from Bradbury’s vast collection in a more cohesive manner. ( )

My favorite collection of Bradbury short stories. ( )

Another collection of masterful science fiction stories. This is perhaps Bradbury's 4th best known collection, after The Martian Chronicles, The Illustrated Man and S is for Space. ( )

the man in the rorschach shirt is a short story worth reading. the post-Freudian psychologist who is reminiscent of so many wise thinkers confesses all his prior faults and his new future while finding pleasures in the small aspects of life. he also notes that the writer has an imagination that the historian can't match. ( )