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A review by rickwren
Dandelion Wine by Ray Bradbury
5.0
Sometimes you just need to get smacked on the head. What I mean is there is a reason that writers get a reputation and sometimes you look at those old writers and you think there are probably better works out there, or perhaps you think that dude's stuff is dated. Well here I am having read another Ray Bradbury novel and I'm thinking to myself, “Self, you should've read this one a long time ago.”
Dandelion Wine is an amazing story. But what's amazing is hidden inside what's mundane. Douglas Spaulding is having the greatest summer of his life – at least that's his intention. He's a 12-year-old boy living in a small town in Illinois and has a whole summer with his best friend, his brother, and a town full of fun.
But what seems like an autobiographical piece by Ray Bradbury about what it's like to grow up in Illinois in the 1920s turns out to be a question about whether life should be simple or whether life should be interesting. The story brings up questions of happiness. The biggest question is whether you can force yourself to be happy or whether happiness is always something that was better in the past. For no matter what Douglas tries to do it seems that the summer is getting away from the and yet Bradbury carefully shows in the future Douglas is still don't wish for the summer back more than any other in his life. That part of the reason for that wish is a Douglas is going to try to correct mistakes, but the other part is because Douglas realizes that avoids summer is something he can never get back.
Even though everything in this small town seems perfect, Bradbury shows that everyone is in some way dissatisfied with their lives and the happiness is always around the next corner. That's what I love about the idea with childhood that he paid – it's a representation of what he wishes could have been.
I look back at the stories that I've written about my own childhood and realize that the subtleties of in this story are masterful in comparison to the ham-handedness that I've employed.
About why I haven't read the story before? There are probably thousands that have never made it onto my reading list that ought to.
Dandelion Wine is an amazing story. But what's amazing is hidden inside what's mundane. Douglas Spaulding is having the greatest summer of his life – at least that's his intention. He's a 12-year-old boy living in a small town in Illinois and has a whole summer with his best friend, his brother, and a town full of fun.
But what seems like an autobiographical piece by Ray Bradbury about what it's like to grow up in Illinois in the 1920s turns out to be a question about whether life should be simple or whether life should be interesting. The story brings up questions of happiness. The biggest question is whether you can force yourself to be happy or whether happiness is always something that was better in the past. For no matter what Douglas tries to do it seems that the summer is getting away from the and yet Bradbury carefully shows in the future Douglas is still don't wish for the summer back more than any other in his life. That part of the reason for that wish is a Douglas is going to try to correct mistakes, but the other part is because Douglas realizes that avoids summer is something he can never get back.
Even though everything in this small town seems perfect, Bradbury shows that everyone is in some way dissatisfied with their lives and the happiness is always around the next corner. That's what I love about the idea with childhood that he paid – it's a representation of what he wishes could have been.
I look back at the stories that I've written about my own childhood and realize that the subtleties of in this story are masterful in comparison to the ham-handedness that I've employed.
About why I haven't read the story before? There are probably thousands that have never made it onto my reading list that ought to.