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Technology In The Pedestrian By Ray Bradbury

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The theme of The Pedestrian by Ray Bradbury is that advances in technology can lead to an isolated, inconceivable society. This means that doing something out of “the normal” will raise questions. One way in which the author is able to convey this message is through vivid imagery, especially when describing the houses in his town while he walked home. Bradbury describes the experience by stating “it was not unequal to walking through a graveyard where only the faintest glimmers of firefly light appeared in flickers behind the windows. Sudden gray phantoms seemed to manifest upon inner room walls where a curtin was still undrawn against the night or there were whispering and murmurs where a window in a tomblike building was still open” (pg 1 par. …show more content…

This creates a well imaginable zombie like, deserted feeling in the town. As a reader, you can infer the glimmer of firefly light behind the window to be a TV, furthering the isolated feeling the town gives off. The soulless imagery conflicts to the readers’ natural image of how a town/community of people normally interact, demonstrating how much different Mr. Mead’s town is because of technology. This allows the reader to better picture how isolated the town is and reveal the main conflict, society vs technology, thus conveying the theme that this technology advancement leads to isolationism. Bradbury also works to convey this theme of the story by placing emphasis on how dependent society is on technology. Bradbury does this by using a sarcastic hypophora when the police car stops Mr. Mead on his walk. The police car asks the question while Mr. Mead responds, “Walking where? For what? ‘Walking for air. Walking to see.’ And there is air in your house, you have an air conditioner, Mr. Mead? ‘Yes.’ And you have a viewing screen in your house to see with? ‘No.’ No? There was a crackling quiet that in itself was an accusation” (pg 2 par.

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