Sunday, July 28, 2019

Review: The Pedestrian by Ray Bradbury Review


The plot of the short story "The Pedestrian" by Ray Bradbury takes place in the future  (the year 2053 A.D.) but it references a present issue.


The main character of the story, Mr. Leonard Mead, walks during the night alone, through the empty streets. The planet where he lives doesn’t have enough oxygen to breathe, so he takes with him a container of fresh air.


He had been doing it for years and in all that time, he has never met another person along the way. The city was peaceful and calm, criminality had been completely eradicated. The local parliament voted to keep only one of the three police cars which the city previously had before.


One day Mr. Mead was stopped during his walk by the police, they accused him of breaking rules. The author presents this action and shows how it unexpectedly takes place: his arrest had no valid reasons, outwardly the police performed their role as it should be.


Ray Bradbury described how the bureaucratic machine worked, works and will be working into the future. That's the idea readers should begin to work with.


Here is the text of the story (on page 52 of pdf-file):



No comments:

Post a Comment