The Martian Chronicles

by David Cohen

The Martian Chronicles
By Ray Bradbury
Doubleday
1950

Ray Bradbury’s The Martian Chronicles is a compelling series of interrelated short stories about the colonization of our nearest planet. One would expect it to be a tale of brave and heroic astronauts on a mission a journey of exploration in the vein of Star Trek. There are several times that Bradbury makes it seem that that is what it will be. However, it soon becomes apparent that things are not as simple as that when a nation colonizes a land and the heroes are not that clearly defined. The would-be heroes are stifled before they can acheive their destiny in this complex saga. Things on Mars (and Bradbury’s writing) are a lot more ominous than one would think.

While Isaac Asimov played with the possibilities and logistics of robotics in books such as I, Robot, Bradbury does the same with telepathy as the native Martians are adept telepathics. Eventually, the Martian culture is destroyed, however, and there is a clear parallel with the European colonization of North America. A particularly dated oddity is “Way in the Middle of the Air” which is set in June 2003. In this story, the African-Americans in the south band together to flee racial oppression on Earth, of which there is still a tremendous amount, and they start their own colony on Mars. This story was written prior to the civil rights movement and it is very interesting to think that in the late 40s and early 50s, it seemed more likely that the first decade of the 21st century would provide colonization of Mars rather than a Black president.

The buildup to the colonization is exciting, but the story is ultimately a negative view of space exploration. There is not a central character for the reader to hang on to either as the stories, while connected, span several decades and could be read as stand-alones.