Because of this, you’ll find me taking this ride again and again and again, forever riding these waves of pure inspiration.

These literary, almost spiritual, winds never fail in reigniting my passion for the written word.įor a man whose most famous line is, “it was a pleasure to burn,” this seems fitting.Įven now, I’m rushing through this review so I can get started on a few new stories that have been percolating since I first started this book, sometime last week. At their highest, though, I am reminded once again of being a child, eagerly leaping into these wonderful new worlds in wide-eyed wonder and anxiously awaiting my next adventure.ĭuring these highs, Bradbury’s words rush across the smoldering fields of creativity deep within me, like a cool gust of wind weaving through a dwindling campfire, instantly transforming those tiny flames, those hopelessly fragmented thoughts, into an unbridled and raging blaze. Bradbury gives an almost surreal glimpse into this. The stories, at their lowest, are dull and boring and really just don’t seem to serve any meaningful purpose. The first theme, which centers around those fleeing civilization, is the fear and destruction of atomic war. Up and down, up and down we go, giving us just enough of a balance to keep us interested from cover to cover. Reading with more experienced eyes, I now see the faults in these stories, how some of them read as if they were written on less inspired nights, and even strategically placed within the book so that the reader is riding along on a sort of roller coaster of quality storytelling. Unlike the frantic group in The Highway, the characters. The first time I read this, I was around 10 or 11 years old and every last one of these 18+* stories blew my young, adolescent mind. 'The Highway' was published in the collection, The Illustrated Man, which was published in 1951. This allows readers to realize how modern society is just as desensitized when it comes to violence.

The illustrated man the highway