SOURCE: "From the Dark Carnival to the Machineries of Joy," in The Washington Post Book World, Vol. X, No. 44, November 2, 1980, pp. 4-5.

In his review of Bradbury's collected Stories, Card briefly discusses the author's subject matter, noting that his short fiction exceeds the boundaries of the science fiction genre.

Fifteen or 20 years ago, high school and college English teachers seized upon the work of Ray Bradbury. Ah! they cried in unison. Here is a science fiction writer whose work is good! Remarkably enough, however, the appeal of Bradbury's short stories has even survived the process of "required reading." Bradbury is that odd thing: a mid-20th-century writer whose literary output has been almost entirely short stories. Of his so-called novels, Dandelion Wine and Something Wicked This Way Comes were cobbled together from short stories; Fahrenheit 451 was an unfortunate expansion of a fine novelette.

In recent years Bradbury seems...