The Flying Machine (short story)

1953 short story by Ray Bradbury

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"The Flying Machine"

Short story by Ray Bradbury
Country| United States
Language| English
Genre(s)| Speculative fiction
Publication
Published in| 1953 (1953)

"The Flying Machine" is a short story written by Ray Bradbury in 1953. Bradbury also adapted the tale into a short play that same year.

## Plot

[edit]

China, 400 AD. The Emperor Yuan notices a man who has created a contraption for flying. Emperor Yuan is not at all happy when he asks the inventor his purpose in creating such a device and the inventor replies that his motivation was merely the desire for innovation. Thus Yuan orders that the inventor shall be executed because, while his flying machine may be a beautiful creation, the emperor sees the devastating potential for those who "have an evil face and an evil heart" and will seek to use it for purposes other than the enjoyment of flight, namely flying over the Great Wall of China and destroying it. For this reason, the inventor is executed, the flying machine is burned, and all who saw it are silenced. But in the last line the Emperor mourns the loss of the machine, the marvel of which he appreciates but the danger of which is too great to allow its survival.

## External links

[edit]

* The Flying Machine title listing at the Internet Speculative Fiction Database
* Golden Apples of the Sun, a short story collection by Ray Bradbury
* The Flying Machine: A One-Act Play for Three Men by Ray Bradbury

* v
* t
* e

Ray Bradbury

Bibliography (Short fiction)

Novels|

* The Martian Chronicles (1950)
* Fahrenheit 451 (1953)
* Dandelion Wine (1957)
* Something Wicked This Way Comes (1962)
* The Halloween Tree (1972)
* Death Is a Lonely Business (1985)
* A Graveyard for Lunatics (1990)
* Green Shadows, White Whale (1992)
* From the Dust Returned (2001)
* Let's All Kill Constance (2002)
* Farewell Summer (2006)

Short stories|

* "Hollerbochen's Dilemma" (1938)
* "The Scythe" (1943)
* "I, Rocket" (1944)
* "The Lake" (1944)
* "Frost and Fire" (1946)
* "The Million Year Picnic" (1946)
* "The Small Assassin" (1946)
* "I See You Never" (1947)
* "Fever Dream" (1948)
* "The Fruit at the Bottom of the Bowl" (1948)
* "The Long Years" (1948)
* "Mars Is Heaven!" (1948)
* "Dark They Were, and Golden-Eyed" (1949)
* "The Exiles" (1949)
* "Marionettes, Inc." (1949)
* "The Long Rain" (1950)
* "The Rocket" (1950)
* "There Will Come Soft Rains" (1950)
* "The Veldt" (1950)
* "Ylla" (1950)
* "Embroidery" (1951)
* "The Fog Horn" (1951)
* "Here There Be Tygers" (1951)
* "The Pedestrian" (1951)
* "The April Witch" (1952)
* "A Sound of Thunder" (1952)
* "The Wilderness" (1952)
* "The Flying Machine" (1953)
* "The Golden Kite, the Silver Wind" (1953)
* "The Meadow" (1953)
* "The Murderer" (1953)
* "Sun and Shadow" (1953)
* "All Summer in a Day" (1954)
* "The Dragon" (1955)
* "The Aqueduct" (1979)
* "Banshee" (1984)
* "The Toynbee Convector" (1984)
* "Is That You, Herb?" (2003)

Collections|

* Dark Carnival (1947)
* The Illustrated Man (1951)
* The Golden Apples of the Sun (1953)
* The October Country (1955)
* A Medicine for Melancholy (1959)
* The Day It Rained Forever (1959)
* The Small Assassin (1962)
* R Is for Rocket (1962)
* The Machineries of Joy (1964)
* The Vintage Bradbury (1965)
* S Is for Space (1966)
* Twice 22 (1966)
* I Sing the Body Electric! (1969)
* Ray Bradbury (1975)
* Long After Midnight (1976)
* The Fog Horn & Other Stories (1979)
* The Last Circus and the Electrocution (1980)
* The Stories of Ray Bradbury (1980)
* The Fog Horn and Other Stories (1980)
* Dinosaur Tales (1983)
* A Memory of Murder (1984)
* The Toynbee Convector (1988)
* Classic Stories 1 (1990)
* Classic Stories 2 (1990)
* The Parrot Who Met Papa (1991)
* Selected from Dark They Were, and Golden-Eyed (1991)
* Quicker Than the Eye (1996)
* Driving Blind (1997)
* Ray Bradbury Collected Short Stories (2001)
* One More for the Road (2002)
* Bradbury Stories: 100 of His Most Celebrated Tales (2003)
* The Cat's Pajamas: Stories (2004)
* A Sound of Thunder and Other Stories (2005)
* The Dragon Who Ate His Tail (2007)
* Summer Morning, Summer Night (2007)
* A Pleasure to Burn (2010)
* The Collected Stories of Ray Bradbury (2011, 2014)

Plays|

* The Meadow (1947)
* The Flying Machine: A One-Act Play for Three Men (1953)
* The Wonderful Ice Cream Suit and Other Plays (1972)
* Pillar of Fire and Other Plays (1975)
* The Martian Chronicles (1986)
* The Wonderful Ice Cream Suit (1986)
* Fahrenheit 451 (1986)
* Dandelion Wine (1988)
* The Veldt (1988)

Adaptations|

* It Came from Outer Space (1953)
* Moby Dick (1956 screenplay)
* "I Sing the Body Electric" (1962)
* The Autumn People (1965)
* Tomorrow Midnight (1966)
* Fahrenheit 451 (1966)
* The Picasso Summer (1969)
* The Illustrated Man (1969)
* The Martian Chronicles (1980 miniseries)
* The Electric Grandmother (1982)
* Something Wicked This Way Comes (1983)
* Bradbury 13 (radio series, 1983–84)
* Fahrenheit 451 (1984)
* "The Burning Man" (1985)
* The Veldt (1987)
* The Ray Bradbury Theater (TV series, 1985–86, 1988-1992)
* The Halloween Tree (1993)
* Dandelion Wine (1997)
* The Wonderful Ice Cream Suit (1998)
* A Sound of Thunder (2005)
* Ray Bradbury's Chrysalis (2008)
* The Whispers (2015)
* Fahrenheit 451 (2018)

Miscellaneous|

* Futuria Fantasia (1939–1940)
* The Mummies of Guanajuato (1978)
* Zen in the Art of Writing (1990)
* It Came from Outer Space (2003 book)

Characters|

* Guy Montag

Related|

* Bettina F. Bradbury (daughter)
* Spaceship Earth
* Ray Bradbury Center
* Bradbury Landing
* Ray Bradbury Award
* Fuck Me, Ray Bradbury
* Dandelion crater

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