The Pedestrian

The Pedestrian by Ray Bradbury Utopia an ideal place (fictional) This short fabrication is an character of Dystopian fiction dealing with a friendship that embodies a flawed perfection achieved at a cost. In the story, Ray Bradbury attacks a society which is, in effect, a police submit a undemocratic regime. The sole representative of the regime is, appropriately, the police car. Mead is a non-conformist whose crime is to crack for entertainment a some elementary and natural activity.The oppressive nature of the regime is emphasised by the fact that such a basic hu human activity is prohibited and has been eradicated as indicated by the disused sidewalks. The nature of this soulless society is emphasised again and again by numerous images connected with death dark windows not strange manner of walking through a graveyard tomb-like buildings and grey phantomsBy teleph iodin line the vivid sensory description of Meads walk is conveyed through crisp natural images whic h evoke the aesthesiss and show his de calorie-free in simple pleasures and sensations breathing in the cold November air and its crystal frost makes his lungs blaze like a Christmas head inside the branches filled with invisible snow. This is a society which (it is implied) is kept docile and uninformed by a diet of poor quality TV plans (which, we assume from the Police Cars indecision when Mead explains that he has no TV, atomic number 18 controlled by the State).The minds of the population have been dulled by the TV they atomic number 18 incessantly and acceptingly fed. Only Mead can see through the banality and predictability of the programmes Where are the cowboys rushing? A xii assorted murders A comedian falling off the stage There is nothing to stimulate the sense of the population here. Despite the (large) number of channels, there is a complete absence of any political programme which might challenge the government. Possibly suggesting brain-washing.If not, it is clear from the way that the population is described that they are not exposed intellectually of challenging the government they are portrayed as automatons unthinking, unchallenging, uninformed. The suggestion is that the minds of this population are enchained and dulled by the governments actions. Informed, intelligent, alert people would pose a threat and engage awkward questions. Mead is the last of such people and his nightly covert walks are, we presume a way to control like-minded people.His rebellion, if we can call it that, is hardly the most active he seems to have accepted or resigned himself to the fact that he can no longer pursue his career and seems a broken man at the end of the story. Setting In contrast to the rest of the population, the individuality and free-thinking nature of Meads mind is emphasised by natural images. The simile only his nighttime moving like the shadow of a hawk conveys both an impression of a hunter and an image of soaring freedom.The fact that he could imagine himself upon the centre of a plain, a wintry, windless Arizona desert high laxs his individuality and the sense of dresser that he feels in a society that is, effectively, dead. The rest of the population and the city itself are portrayed as being dead. The buildings and city are architecturally dead the buckling concrete walk suggesting decay and tomb-like buildings suggesting that those inside are dead. Even Nature itself seemed outraged by the setting and tried, it seemed, to bury it like cement was vanishing under flowers and sensThe Police Car The imagery associated with the police car is harsh, cold, threatening, oppressive, that of hunter and its paralysed prey flashed a fierce white cone of light upon him It smelled of riveted steel. It smelled of harsh antiseptic Images which mirror the nature of the regime which is personified and represented by the car. betray use of word-choice linked to metallic, robotic, mechanical ideas. The voice of t he police car also sounds robotic short, sharp peremptory commands contrast with Meads fuller to a greater extent warm and personal replies.The clearest indication of the nature of the regime comes in the interrogative sentence The lack of recognition of Meads profession and the incredulity that he does not have a TV set hint strongly at rural area control. In this dystopian society, anything connected with the arts creativity, beauty, the senses is not recognised. Only that which is manufactured is recognised. Books and writing have no place in this regime. In a equal manner, the police car is unable to comprehend that Mead was simply walking for its own pleasurable sake. Walking, just walking, walking? The repetition of walking gives the impression of the cars brain malfunction. It cannot grasp that anyone would do something simply for the pleasure of it, not without a reason. Only Mead is capable of wry humour (a human quality) Are you married, Mr Mead No zilch wanted me, sai d Leonard Mead with a Smile. Irony Mead is to be taken to an asylum To the Psychiatric Centre for investigate on Regressive Tendencies. Note the use of official sounding language a euphemism designed to handle the true purpose of such a place echoing SovietAsylums in which those who actively opposed the states political ideals were sent to an asylum to be re-educated brain-washed until they did accept what the state wanted them to believe. The great jeering here is that Mead the only sane man in this insane society is being sent to an asylum. Symbolism. On their way to the asylum through, they pass Meads house. It is ablaze with lights in contrast to the dark city. electric light brilliantly lit, every window a loud yellow flare. It is a symbol of hope of spirited life light is a universal symbol of hope, but the car is swallowed up once more into the darkness (literally and figuratively). The car moved down the empty river-bed streets natural images of decay and life-les sness. Structure Meads secure is represented in stages. Contrast the positive, empowering image of him as a hawk conveying a sense of freedom with his reaction to the car not unlike a night moth, stunned by the illumination The short story remains fairly uneventful throughout, therefore the structure reflects this.However, the featurelessness of structure (which in childs play reflects the bleakness of the landscape) is broken by the tension created by the interrogation of the police car. The apparent tedium of the walk through the grey town is transformed into a gripping tense episode. Near the end, the short story bursts into another high point of hope with the wonderful climactic symbol of the house ablaze with light a symbol of hope. Nevertheless, we are again plunged into dark anti-climax as we realise that the house is only one lone point of hope, soon to be submerged within the blanket of darkness everywhere.Themes 1. The distrust and last-ditch destruction of the indivi dual in a totalitarian state 2. Bradbury considers such a police state to be alien to the natural laws of Mankind man should be free to voice his feelings. 3. He points to the dangers of collectivist media which can brainwash a nation, State-controlled TV programmes being, effectively, propaganda. 4. He points to the dangers of a docile, unquestioning society. 5. Glancing euphemistic references to psychiatric hospitals. 6. Pessimistic the light in the darkness is extinguished.