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    Dandelion Wine
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    Dandelion Wine
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    Dandelion Wine
    Ebook289 pages5 hours

    Dandelion Wine

    By Ray Bradbury

    4/5

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    About this ebook

    An endearing classic of childhood memories of an idyllic midwestern summer from the celebrated author of ‘Farenheit 451’.

    "He stood at the open window in the dark, took a deep breath and exhaled.

    The street lights, like candles on a black cake, went out.

    He exhaled again and again and the stars began to vanish.

    Douglas smiled. He pointed a finger.

    There, and there. Now over here, and here…

    Yellow squares were cut in the dim morning earth as house lights winked slowly on. A sprinkle of windows came suddenly alight miles off in dawn country.

    'Everyone yawn. Everyone up.'"

    In the backwaters of Illinois, Douglas Spaulding's grandfather makes an intoxicating brew from harvested dandelions. ‘Dandelion Wine’ is a quirky, breathtaking coming-of-age story from one of science fiction's greatest writers. Distilling his experiences into "Rites & Ceremonies" and "Discoveries & Revelations", the young Spaulding wistfully ponders over magical tennis shoes, and machines for every purpose from time travel to happiness and silent travel.

    Based upon Bradbury's own experiences growing up in Waukegan in the 1920s, ‘Dandelion Wine’ is a heady mixture of fond memory, forgiveness, magic, the imagination and above all, of summers that seemed to go on forever.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherHarperCollins UK
    Release dateJun 28, 2012
    ISBN9780007496952
    Author

    Ray Bradbury

    Ray Bradbury (22 August 1920 – 5 June 2012) published some 500 short stories, novels, plays and poems since his first story appeared in Weird Tales when he was twenty years old. Among his many famous works are 'Fahrenheit 451,' 'The Illustrated Man,' and 'The Martian Chronicles.'

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    Reviews for Dandelion Wine

    4/5

    157 ratings110 reviews

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    • 5/5
      Bradbury classic story of a small town boy and one magical summer in 1928 when he realizes both that he is alive and that someday he must die, and the word becomes almost unbearably real and immediate to him. Recently re-read this after more than forty years and was stunned anew by the beauty of the writing--I think it's among his very best. It brought back my own memories and feelings of that far off time when summer was freedom and magic, and the world was young.
    • 3/5
      I listened to a radio production of this book, so it wasn't quite the book itself. I can't really give much of a summary beyond that the main character was 12-year old Doug, and it was the summer of 1928. I can't give a summary because I don't quite know what all happened. I know bits and pieces, but it didn't really come together as one story, I didn't think. I am giving it as many stars as I am because the production of it was entertaining, even if I didn't completely "get" what was happening. For a while, I thought I might enjoy it more if I was reading it, so that I understood what was going on, but I also may have liked it less, if I found it boring, because the production itself was so entertaining and in reading the book, I wouldn't have had the entertainment factor. So, it gets points for the production... the story, meh.
    • 3/5
      Great book, but it was a slow read. Some stories have really touched me.However, I found some of Bradbury's effervescent descriptions to be a bit over the top.
    • 4/5
      A delicious book that is as much about childhood as it is about adulthood. A veritable candy shop of nostalgia, wisdom and humour.
    • 5/5
      Ray Bradbury is perhaps best known for his fantasy, horror, science fiction novels; although the author, himself has stated that he does not write science fiction and that only one of his works--Fahrenheit 451--was science fiction while other works like the Martian Chronicles are fantasy.

      Bradbury rarely steps out of those genres, but he did with a wonderful little novel that was one of his first in 1957. Dandelion Wine is a semi-autobiographical novel of Bradbury's childhood. The novel was originally produced as a set of short stories, but Bradbury brought the stories together and fleshed out some of the details to create the novel.

      Dandelion Wine pulls readers into a 12-year old boys summer and reminds us how, for children, everything is magical. Through the eyes of Douglas Spaulding we, as readers, get to experience the magic and wonder of the essence of a well-lived summer when Douglas discovers he is indeed "alive".

      This is easily one of my favorite Bradbury works because Dandelion Wine captures and exemplifies Bradbury's masterful control over and use of prose. There is something fantastic and magical about the words that dance across the page and infuse the fictional town of Green Town, Illinois as Bradbury brings the town and its inhabitants to life. I think this particular text showcases just what a great writer Bradbury is.
    • 3/5
      Strange but almost believable things happen to Douglas Spaulding in the summer of 1928: a neighbors attempts to invent a happiness machine, a young boarder falls in love with someone several times his age, the junkman sells fresh air for nothing, folks leave Green Town willingly and unwillingly. If this genre is magical realism, there's definitely more realism than magic. A willingness-to-suspend-disbelief kind of realism with a good dose of philosophy thrown in, but realism nonetheless.
    • 5/5
      I read this book when I was 13, and it was the book that made me want to become a writer. Bradbury's evocative language changed the way I looked at stories and the use of words. It's been too many years, I need to go back and read it again.
    • 3/5
      I found myself unimpressed, actually. Maybe the book was too hyped up or something. Well, for one thing, my used bookstore had it in the Sci Fi section (as it says on the spine that it is Sci Fi) and it's not. It's so not. So I kept waiting for the sci fi twist that never happened. Plus, I think Bradbury's style is just not for me...he's very verbose, and sometimes I just want him to get to the point, already.
    • 5/5
      I first read Ray Bradbury's miracle of a book, Dandelion Wine, when I was 16, and I have read it every year since. Over time I continue to gain a deeper appreciation for these lovely, strange, often magical vignettes (more properly parables, each one with a little implied moral) that explore the nature of happiness, the magic of love and, above all, what it means to be alive. To me, the overarching intent of the book is to remind all us adults that:* Being alive means maintaining a balance between Discoveries & Revelations and Ceremonies & Rites. Though the latter are important, binding us to our family & our community, our future & our past, it is Discoveries & Revelations that make us think, experience, change, and grow.* Being alive means living in the present. Even if this means giving away the tokens of a beloved past, as happens in one particularly poignant tale.* Being alive means being connected with the world - with family, neighbors, your community, the earth. It's no coincidence that the mysterious murderer haunting Douglas Spaulding's Childhood is called The Lonely One.* Being alive means being able to experience happiness ... not only understanding the nature of happiness, but possessing the wisdom not to let yourself be tricked into pursuing something that can't/won't make you happy.* Being alive means recognizing the presence of magic in our everyday lives. Because magic is out there ... in the spring of a new pair of tennis shoes, in the mysteries of love, in the essence of Dandelion Wine.Contrary to popular opinion, I do not believe Bradbury intended this to be a book about childhood. In fact, his 12yr old narrator, Douglas Spaulding, does not appear in many of the parables. I do think that Bradbury intentionally chose a child as his narrator, however, because children are inherently alive -- always discovering, always filled with wonder, connected to their family and the world and the present in ways that we begin gradually to forget as adults. Dandelion Wine is both nostalgia and a cautionary tale, challenging us to remember what it felt like to be alive and reminding us adults that - unless we take care - we may become so consumed by life that we forget to be alive.As far as I am concerned, this book is a little bit of magic in and of itself: part essence of childhood, part elixir of wisdom. Believe and partake!
    • 4/5
      Excellent writing, back to basics. But many short stories structuress.
    • 5/5
      This book is amazing, to say the least. It's one of those books that's lifts you away to another place each time you open it. If you read it 2 or 3 chapters at a time, you'll know what I mean. (Even the name seems to just roll off your tongue.
    • 5/5
      --At the end of 2009 I returned this Inter-Library Loan book. Themes of boys & summer aren't new but Bradbury's writing is poetic & fresh. He introduces us to memorable characters. DANDELION WINE will remain a classic book for decades. --
    • 4/5
      Bradbury knows boys and the energy of summer. He knows the magic and the mystery, the fear and the free-fall when it is ending.I read this collection years ago, as a teen, and I have to admit that the stories that stayed with me were the stories of innocence, like Sneakers. Those that will stay with me now are more the stories of maturity (including embracing the magic of childhood and realizing it is no longer your magic - Mrs. Bentley).Bradbury, again, weaves the fabric of a town and its citizens and creates a lasting tapestry of beauty, complete with the flaws that make it real.
    • 4/5
      This non-science fiction work of Bradbury's is my favorite of his works. As a Midwesterner, the world depicted in this series of vignettes inspires a sense of nostalgia and warmth. I feel as if I am entering the world of my forbearers when reading his memories of the Midwest in days gone by.
    • 1/5
      Some people adore Bradbury's work. I can take it or leave it. More often than not, I leave it. His early darker fantasy works can be interesting. But as the years went by it looks like he started reading his own reviews and convinced himself he was a "great writer" and a "poet" and from that point his writing went steadily downhill, all of it centering about remembrances of the good old days. One thing's for sure: he wasn't a sci-fi writer. Bradbury became an old man early in life, his work resembling Rod Serling's Twilight Zone where he has to sledgehammer a moral or a message into his prose. Dandelion Wine might make nice reading for a sweet little old ladies sewing circle, but for me it was just bits of pretty fluff strung together around a gossamer center. Cotton candy prose that passes the time but leaves nothing memorable in its aftermath. Still, he has a wide fan base so obviously somebody likes that sort of thing.
    • 5/5
      This was reread as part of the group read in memoriam for Bradbury's death this last week. A lyrical ode to summer and childhood, the language trips off the tongue and the anecdotal episodes sparkle like gems in your memory. One of my favorite books for ages, it was a great pleasure to read it along with others appreciating the writing and the author.
    • 5/5
      If you appreciate poetry. If you were ever a 10-year-old boy in the midwest. This is the best book ever written in the English language.As long ago as I can remember having a favorite book, it's been Dandelion Wine. Martian Chronicles was good sci-fi and Farenheit 451 was a very important book in my life. But Dandelion Wine walks many paths. It's first appeal to me was through the youth of it's hero - the Dennis-the-Menace-like Douglas Spaulding and his well-described childhood frights of abandoned ravines and people hiding in closets. As I grew up and began to admire styles - Ray Bradbury's was the best. No one has ever walked the fine line between poetry and prose any better. His sentences are delicious. For the sheer pleasure of reading something that's been well written, no one else is as satisfying. Now, I'm old and nostalgic. I love the torture and sense of regret in works like Winesburg, Ohio and Spoon River Anthology. My favorite book? Still Dandelion Wine. But now I read it as a chronicle of a long spent childhood. The similarities I have with the hero are now painful reminders that fictional characters don't have to age but I do and I have. But there is still a hope suggested by Bradbury that the memories of my own life can be pressed and bottled, to be enjoyed again when they've been forgotten as my own Dandelion Wine.
    • 5/5
      A fantastic set of stories that are loosely connected. The book is set in a small town, largely by the view of a young boy, and tackles many questions such as childhood, aging, death, mystery, happiness, and culture. It is written really well with incredible prose that feels like it borders on poetry. The stories can be beautiful, funny, haunting, or even sad. Absolutely amazing book.
    • 4/5
      I love the idea of summer in a small town- being able to run around in new tennis shoes, the sounds of lawnmowers, and drinking lemonade with the neighbors.
      I don't remember why I put this book on my "to read" shelf, but I'm glad I did.
    • 3/5
      Generally I enjoy Ray Bradbury - however this kinda felt flat for me. I'm not the greatest fan of realistic fiction, nor am I a real fan of books that have no discernible story.
    • 4/5
      Ray Bradbury proves he is the king of simile, metaphor and imagery in this lightly autobiographical rambling about the summer of 1928 in Green Town, Illinois. The young boys Doug and Tom come to many deep realizations during the summer, not the least of which regard the great mysteries of life, death, happiness, and fear. There is no cohesive plot, but one is hardly missed with such poetic vignettes to take its place. WARNING: This is NOT Science Fiction.
    • 4/5
      This is a novel loosely based on Bradbury's childhood experience-with many of the chapters originating from short stories, all with the recurrent characters of Douglas Spaulding and his family. Most of the book is retold through the eyes of Douglas as he experiences summer and the recurrent symbol of dandelions. One of the central themes of the story revolve around the joy of being alive and acceptance of dying.
    • 5/5
      Bradbury brings childhood and its immortality of summer to vivid memory. Regardless of when you were young, this book will fill you with bittersweet nostalgia for when every day was an eternity, before aging brought the rapid spinning of all alike and transitory days.
    • 5/5
      For this reader, Kansas native and Ohio resident of 20 years, few premises could offer more charm than Ray Bradbury’s quest for the eternal epiphanies of small town life. The style blends homespun and mystical wisdom through encounters with a dying great-grandmother, long-lived Civil War colonel, a mechanical tarot witch, and other colorful characters. In picaresque fashion, these adventures befall a protagonist who conveys boyish innocence as he learns that he is ALIVE and hence must one day DIE—a perennial insight that retains much freshness in Bradbury’s treatment. I loved it!
    • 4/5
      Reading this now for the first time since...when...in my twenties? How does it stand up to time? More after I'm finished...so far, some stands up to all of my initial fond memories, other parts are showing their age.....Ok....now finished.....a lovely piece of classic literature. Glad I took the time to revisit it.
    • 5/5
      The summer of 1928. Bradbury takes us back to his childhood, growing up in a small town in northern Illinois. And what a glorious time. This fictionalized account is centered around twelve year old Douglas Spaulding, as he runs through this warm magical season, encountering a wonderful array of colorful characters and places. There is Mr. Jonas, the junkman, the Tarot Witch, unfurling the future, the murderous Lonely One, stalking the night. There is the Happy Machine and the Green Machine, the scary Ravine and of course, the delightful, intoxicating, dandelion wine. Wonderful.
    • 4/5
      The ultimate in 50's nostalgic childhood pastoralia. I loved this in Jr. High, but have no idea what I would make of it now. In light of what I've learned about Bradbury's reactionary streak, I tend to think I should leave well enough alone.
    • 5/5
      What can I possibly add about this wonderful little book which manages to capture all the best parts of summer along with timeless life lessons about the impermanence of all things, in wonderfully evocative, poetic prose? At first I was a bit doubtful as to whether I could give this little gem the attention it deserved, because it asks the reader to slow right down and drink in the words while paying attention to every nuance and simile. But then with the chapter about the joy of buying new sneakers that so many other reviewers mentioned, I was pulled right in; the irresistible attraction of new sneakers that seem to have the power of making you run faster, jump higher, be almost like a godlike thing for at least a brief period of time before the power of marketing and the smell of newness are replaced with the fact that they're just another pair of shoes... Wonderful. I didn't expect the novel to be broken up into a series of sketches, each exploring different themes, presenting us with different characters and slices of life around Green Town, a quiet midwestern town where tradition sidles along with eccentrics and fantasy and even a touch of depravity and horror. My initial reaction was one of slight disappointment. This book seems to have resonated so deeply with many readers who described it in loving terms in recent months, but I can't say I fell in love with it the way many of you did. Perhaps because I couldn't at all relate to the kind of life and surroundings the Spaulding boys, who are at the heart of it all, enjoyed, having never had a family unit, or stayed in any one place long enough for it to get all that familiar, or get to really know my neighbours, having mostly lived in the city since I was born, so that it all seemed to me like an idealized fantasy and reminded me of all the things I had missed out on. That part wasn't too great. But one of the advantages of taking a week or two after finishing a book before writing about it is that one can let it linger and let various impressions settle and others come to the surface. And what emerges now is that this book isn't so very different from The Martian Chronicles. Whether in Green Town or in Mars, we are shown how very strange life is, the whole cycle of life is explored, along with so many of the oddities it can encompass. And no matter where one comes from, or what kind of childhood one has had, we are all daily witnesses of how strange and wonderful and fun and scary life can be. I liked a lot, and will definitely revisit Green Town in future.
    • 5/5
      Dandelion Wine is perhaps the best book I've ever read; and read and read and read! I first read it as a young teenager, decades ago; I've never stopped rereading it.Early in the book, 12-year-old Douglas Spaulding comes to the shocking realization that he is alive; truly alive! Throughout the rest of the book, Douglas examines the people in his family and his town, trying to learn if and how they deal with this huge thing called Life.The prose is brilliant, and evokes so much color and feeling (both joyous and bittersweet) that it ranks as one of the books I always recommend to others when asked for something to read.
    • 5/5
      There is one word to describe Dandelion Wine - lyrical. I read a lot of Bradbury when I was in high school, and this book reminds me why I fell in love with him all those years ago.It is the summer of 1928 in a small town in Illinois, and Douglas Spaulding - age 12 - makes some big discoveries. Most of them are existential, almost all of them are existential. In his table, Douglas and his brother, Tom, keep track of the things that happen to them and then write what they think something might mean in a larger sense.In Douglas' world, life's unfairness begins to read its ugly head but the adults around him give him support to explore what that might really mean.Two more words: exquisite and poignant