There Will Come Soft Rains

Science-fiction texts often use vivid storytelling so as to allow the reader to grasp an overall idea and gain an insight into a world that is often filled with chaos and disorder. There Will Come Soft Rains by Ray Bradbury is a story that takes place in the future but takes its name from a 19th century writer. It is a story that takes a science-fiction plot and embroils it with real life moral and philosophical concerns. Bradbury’s protagonist is a house standing alone in a world destroyed by nuclear war in the 1950’s. When the story was written, the fear of devastating effects of nuclear war was painfully clear in peoples’ minds. With the use of narrative elements such as setting, language conventions, tone and structure, Bradbury is able to communicate his representation of an event, as well as his argument about the concern of humanity being brought to an end by our own ignorance. He is able to communicate this message to the reader whilst depicting a world in which human beings have been destroyed, rather than saved, by their own technology after the event of a
nuclear war.

Setting can greatly affect the overall message that is perceived by the reader.
There Will Come Soft Rains has a post-apocalyptic - inspired by World War 1- and technological setting – a futuristic house. The house can be seen as somewhat of a ‘protector’ of the family and Bradbury uses lively descriptions for the setting ‘...books that talked, beds that warmed and made themselves, fires that built themselves in the fireplaces of evenings, were in the house and living there was a contentment.’ Bradbury has used this technique to show humans’ dependence on technology – the house does simple things like making a bed – and eventually how they were destroyed by their own technology. Further to this, the house can also be seen to be the master and the family its’ willing slaves. This shows how humans are becoming so dependent on technology that they are no longer able to perform simple tasks for
themselves.

Language conventions, such as imagery, point of view and personification are used in a number of ways throughout the story. Bradbury’s use of imagery, for example ‘the wild plum trees in tremulous white,’ creates a specific picture in the reader’s mind, helping the story to unfold and become more believable and convincing. Bradbury has portrayed the story in third person omniscient point of view. This allows him to show the reader his overarching message, as we are made aware of everything that is happening in the world of the story. Writing this way allows him to make the reader aware of things they otherwise wouldn’t know. Personification is used in the text to create a sense of emptiness, for example, ‘and the rain tapped on the empty house echoing’ and ‘in the living room the voice clock sang.’ Giving the house human traits makes the reader feel sorry for its pathetic, needless existence. It forces the reader to remember that there are no humans in the house and the robotic mice are a tragic reminder of human’s obsession with technology.

Structure of detail in There Will Come Soft Rains runs in chronological order, in fact we learn what happens from one hour to the next. This allows for foreshadowing, which Bradbury used to hint later events, ‘as the voice clock worriedly sings, Tick Tock 7A.M O’clock, time to get up! As if it were afraid nobody would.’ This shows the house was sensing something would be different today, it foreshadows something tragic may happen. The poem chosen by the house is an important part of the story that depicts the irony of how humanity will so quickly be forgotten and not missed after the effects of a war they caused. It shows the insignificance of our achievements, technologies and weapons if they can be wiped out in a split second. ‘There will come soft rains and the smell of the ground, and swallows circling with their shimmering sound; And frogs in the pools singing at night, and wild plum trees in tremulous white.’ It is ironic, too, that nature itself ultimately destroys the house. The structure of the story shows the initial incident of a falling tree crashing through the window of the house, a fire starts and ultimately burns it to the ground. Conscience-stricken, the reader is left feeling sorry for the house, the only known survivor of the human’s mass destruction, only to be ultimately destroyed by nature itself.

The style in which the story is told is very important. Bradbury does not appear to have used any specific tone, it is told very simply much like a fairytale. There Will Come Soft Rains concerns technology’s effect on our society, how it isolates us from one another. It talks of the only house left on a desolate, ruined street that is still running to capacity even though its inhabitants remain only as shadows embedded on its walls. ‘The five spots of paint – the man, the woman, the boy, the girl, the ball – remained. The rest was a thin layer of charcoal.’ The reader is reminded of the family that once lived in the house, they remain only as silhouettes of people that once were but are now gone forever. The use of this technique confronts the reader with the harsh reality of humanity’s inevitable collapse after the devastation of nuclear war.

Bradbury is conveying to the reader his concern that humans will one day be destroyed by their own technology. The world’s technologies designed to enhance our quality of life and weapons to protect us will eventually contravene those very ideas and destroy all of humanity. The spectacular and disturbing way a house is destroyed and a family obliterated by nuclear warfare is a comment on mankind’s pending demise. It is interesting and ironic how he has been able to illustrate the marvels of technology, a house that can clean itself and take care of its family, but the family destroyed by technology itself. It is the disharmony between human beings and their machines that seems to be at the heart of There Will Come Soft Rains and Bradbury’s use of techniques, particularly setting, language conventions, tone and structure bring it all to life.