How we cite our quotes: ("Story Name," Paragraph)
Quote #1
[H]e saw the red fire and heard the big sound and felt the huge tremor as the silver rocket shot up and left him behind on an ordinary Monday morning on the ordinary planet Earth. ("The Taxpayer," 7)
The Taxpayer is surrounded by people (well, mostly cops right now), but he's still isolated, left behind by the rocket he thinks he should be on. This is a good example of Bradbury's point that isolation isn't always about literally being alone.
Quote #2
The captain had to join the dance. He didn't want to. His face was solemn. Spender watched, thinking: You poor man, what a night this is! ("—And the Moon Be Still as Bright," 53)
It looks like you can be emotionally isolated, too. All the other Earth Men are happy, while Wilder is always solemn. He won't throw his lot in with Spender or with Parkhill; and then, finally, he's sent off to explore the solar system. Talk about isolated.
Quote #3
"... you've a different way of seeing things, Spender." ("—And the Moon Be Still as Bright," 67)
Like the Taxpayer, Spender is lonely in the crowd. It turns out that he's right about humans destroying Mars—but he's also crazy. Maybe there's something to be said for agreeing with the majority.
Quote #4
The majority is always holy, is it not? Always, always; just never wrong for one little insignificant tiny moment, is it? Never ever wrong in ten million years? He thought: What is this majority and who are in it? ("—And the Moon Be Still as Bright," 287)
In "—And The Moon Be Still As Bright," we get a lot of direct access to Wilder's thoughts, like here, when he's bitterly thinking about how the majority steamrolls over the minority. But does Bradbury agree with Wilder? We'd probably have to say—yes.
Quote #5
There was comfort in numbers. But the first Lonely Ones had to stand by themselves. ("The Settlers," 3)
The first settlers on Mars are referred to as "Lonely Ones" (see Spender for another use of "lonely one"). And yet this interchapter always uses the plural—lonely ones. If this is a group movement, how is it lonely?
Quote #6
"Men are men, unfortunately, no matter what their shape, and inclined to sin." ("The Fire Balloons," 122)
Father Peregrine is another example of a Spender-like figure who stands alone against a group of his comrades who don't see things the way he does. (Luckily, Peregrine doesn't kill anyone.) At heart, Peregrine sees all intelligent living creatures as sharing this important bond: they all sin. That's awfully pessimistic for a playful priest.
Quote #7
Who is this, he thought, in need of love as much as we? Who is he and what is he that, out of loneliness, he comes into the alien camp and assumes the voice and face of memory and stands among us, accepted and happy at last? ("The Martian," 109)
Here LaFarge imagines that loneliness is so bad that the Martian would pretend to be someone else just to avoid it. But here's the question: do we have to change who we are to avoid being lonely?
Quote #8
Now, tonight, he drifted up and down, seeing the wax women in every colorful shop window, pink and beautiful. For the first time he knew how dead the town was. He drew a glass of beer and sobbed gently. ("The Silent Towns," 12)
Poor Walter Gripp. So many women, and all of them are wax. But we do feel sorry for the guy, even if we wouldn't want to marry him. It's probably even lonelier (and super creepy) to look around an empty town and see a bunch of statues.
Quote #9
He looked across the long-dead sea bottoms. Not another living thing on this entire planet, he thought. Just myself. And them. ("The Long Years," 4)
By the end of the story we learn who Hathaway means by "them" and why they don't entirely count as people. (Hint: because they're robots.) But when you first read this, you don't know who "them" refers to, and it creepily makes him seem even more alone.
Quote #10
Until this day, how well the house had kept its peace. How carefully it had inquired, "Who goes there? What's the password?" and, getting no answer from lonely foxes and whining cats, it had shut up its windows and drawn shades in an old-maidenly preoccupation with self-protection which bordered on a mechanical paranoia. ("There Will Come Soft Rains," 14)
"There Will Come Soft Rains" presents a people-less house. All the other houses have turned to rubble, so this one is totally isolated. But the way the house sees it, isolation keeps it safe. And that, Bradbury says, is nothing more than paranoia.