Yes, the title of this post says “woman”, not “man.” No, that’s not a typo. Most people who read this blog are familiar with The Illustrated Man, a short story collection in which the framing device is a tattooed man whose tattoos show the stories. That’s not what this post is about. Bradbury also wrote a short story titled “The Illustrated Man” which probably served as the inspiration for the framing device in the collection of the same name.
Patience, please. We’ll get there. Just not yet.
Ray Douglas Bradbury (1920-2012) was born on this date, August 22. For his birthday I wanted to do something a little different. That’s why I chose to look at the illustrated woman/man short stories.
“The Illustrated Woman” is psychological horror. It was first published in 1961. I’m not sure exactly where. The ISFDB lists it appearing in an anthology edited by Bradbury’s agent Don Congdon, Tales of Love and Horror, and in the March issue of Playboy. There’s no publication month listed on the anthology.
“The Illustrated Woman” deals with one of Bradbury’s favorite themes, the circus. The guess-your-weight is secretly a tattoo artist searching for the perfect canvas. When he finds her, he marries her and spends years decorating her body. Only now that he’s covered her body, he’s starting to look for a new canvas. The woman goes to a psychiatrist for help. The horror comes in on the last few pages. I won’t spoil it for you, even though you can probably guess what the horrific twist is.
I found “The Illustrated Woman” to be an entertaining little tale, although it is a minor work by the standards of Bradbury’s other stories.
Not so, “The Illustrated Man”. This is one of my favorites of Bradbury’s horror stories, and I think it’s one of his best. It’s not nearly as well known as it should be. As I said above, this is not directly related to the short story collection, The Illustrated Man. It was first published in the July 1950 issue of Esquire.
Again, the theme is the circus or carnival. In this one two carnies get married. The man soon realizes his mistake. The woman is a termagant. He seeks solace in food and soon has put on so much weight that he can’t fulfill his job responsibilities and is about to be fired. The carnival already has a fat man, so he decides to become a tattooed man. The carnival needs one of those. He hears about an old woman out in the sticks who does tattoos.
He gets more than he bargains for. The woman is sitting in a shack. Her eyes, nostrils, and ears are sewn shut. He is about to leave when she tells him to come in. She shows him her palm. There’s a tattoo on it of him being tattooed by her. She tells him he’s expected.
The old woman tattoos his entire body, minus his face. The tattoos on his chest and back she covers with bandages with the instructions that the images will finalize in one week for the chest and two weeks for the one on his back. He is not to remove the bandages before then, and hes to leave and not come back.
The carnival owner hypes the unveiling of the tattoo on the man’s chest. Much to his regret. The scene shown there is tattooed man strangling his wife. The story implies the tattoo moves.
Horrified, they try to remove the tattoo. The tattoo won’t come off by any means.
Then there’s what is tattooed on his back..
You’ll have to read the story to find out what that is.
I loved the ending of this story. It’s powerful and chilling. Much of its power comes from the witch who applies the tattoos. Who is she? Why does she tattoo what she does on his back? Can she see the future or do the tattoos determine the future once they are applied?
“The Illustrated Man” wasn’t included in the early editions of the short story collection of the same name, but according the ISFDB, it has been included in some editions. Those are a British paperback in the 80s and some hardcover editions in the US starting in 1997. It doesn’t appear to be in any of the paperback editions in the US.
“The Illustrated Man” is currently available in Bradbury: 100 of his Most Celebrated Tales. It’s worth seeking out.