Themes In The Veldt

The theme of abandonment is prevalent throughout the entire short story “The Veldt” by Ray Bradbury. The theme of abandonment victimizes the children in the story by the parents figuratively abandoning them through the nursery. The parents, George and Lydia, leave their children to be cared for by a technologically advanced room. George and Lydia turn their backs on the children forcing the kids to create an unhealthy emotional attachment to the nursery which provides them with the happiness and comfort they need from another person. In the short story “The Veldt,” David McClean states, “You’ve let this room and this house replace you and your wife in your children’s affections” (Bradbury 10). This quote shows the reader that the children no

Two battles take place in the theme of man versus machine: the battle between the parents and the machine and the machine stealing the children’s humanity. The parents must be able to control and manage the machine to limit its destructive tendencies. The struggle between the control of the nursery by the parents and the children is the driving plot of the short story. Each party strives to obtain the power of the nursery. However, the children gain the power of the nursery first thus leading to the downfall of their biological parents. In the short story “The Veldt,” Ray Bradbury states, “They ran into the nursery. The veldt was empty save for the lions waiting, looking at them” (Bradbury 12). The children and the machine won the battle against George and Lydia, but the machine also managed to steal the children’s humanity by making them kill their own parents. In the article “The Veldt,” Ira Mark Milne states, “They feel no guilt, remorse or regret when their parents die, and it is clear that they have become as cold and emotionless as the machinery that controls the nursery” (Milne 274). The children no longer have any feeling which leaves them empty like the machine that made them into what they are