Kaleidoscope by Ray Bradbury

Plot

Quotes

Plot

Setting

"I'm right in the middle. It's like a big kaleidoscope. you get all kinds of colors and shapes and sizes. God, it's beautiful, all that metal" - Stone (Bradbury, 37).

This quote shows how Stone is mesmerized by how beautiful the Myrmidone cluster is floating towards him through space. He compares it to looking through a kaleidoscope.

Hollis loses a hand and an ankle from the rocket

explosion. Hollis is the only one that makes it to Earth but dies while entering the atmosphere. All the other characters experienced something fatal throughout space. Before dying they all lost communication with each other.

Quote

In the story, the spaceship

blows up and all the characters are talking about their lives while spread out in different parts of space from being blown away during the explosion.

" He fell swiftly, like a bullet, like a pebble, like an iron weight, objective, objective all of the time now, not sad or happy or anything, but only wishing he could do a good thing now that everything was gone, a good thing for himself to know about."

He feels despair because he knows there is nothing he can change about the life he lived or even what is happening to him now. He still wishes he could have done something to help his situation now, and be happy with the person he was.

Theme

Characters

The setting is in different parts throughout

space. Each character is going to a different

area of space because of a tragic event.

" And it was not. It was gone. When life is over it is like a flicker of bright film, an instant on the screen, all of its prejudices and passions condensed and illumined for an instant on space, and before you could cry out, There was a happy day, there a bad one, there an evil face, there a good one. The film burned to a cinder, the screen went dark."

Life is too short and you can't take things for granted. Life flashes before your eyes, and you want to be happy with how your life turns out. The kaleidoscope is a metaphor for when you look back on your life you see your true colors through a way you have never seen it before.

Connecting the Theme

In The Great Gatsby, Jay Gatsby made up an elaborate lie to have Daisy fall in love with him again. But the green light at Gatsby's house showed Daisy's longing to have always wanted to be with Gatsby and the light shows what they have always wanted but never could have. They both look back on their lives and regret not being together.

Vocab

Kaleidoscope: a succession of changing phases or actions and colors.

Blackballed: to exclude socially.

Faltering: to speak brokenly or weakly.

Connection

This story applies to the life of a high school senior coming close to the end of their high school career and looking back on the things they did or didnt do and realizing that none of it matters because we all leave Earth the same way.

Main character: Hollis

Supporting Characters:

Barkley, Woode, Captain,

Stone, Lespere, Applegate, Stimson, and

the rest of the space crew.

The Kaleidoscope

By: Ray Bradbury