Monday, July 21, 2014

Can someone explain how the author uses narrative voice and characterization to provide social commentary in "The Veldt"?

I think the biggest way in which Bradbury uses
characterisation and narrative voice to present the social commentary of the story is
through the presentation of the children and what we are told about them. Clearly,
Bradbury is presenting us in this story with a futuristic world which has become so
advanced that individuals are able to become more fixated on an unreal world than their
real world. Note the children's obsession with the nursery and the illusions that it
creates for them. Note what McClean says to George about the importance of the nursery
for the children:


readability="7">

You've let this room and this house replace you
and your wife in your children's affections. This room is their mother and father, far
more important in their lives than their real parents.



Peter and Wendy are
presented as being so dependent upon the Nursery that they are unable to cope with even
the idea of being deprived from it. Note how Peter responds when he is told that the
Nursery is to be closed:


readability="9">

"Don't let them do it!" wailed Peter at the
ceiling, as if he was talking to the house, to the nursery. "Don't let Father kill
everything." He turned to his father. "Oh, I hate you!"



McClean's observation about
what the Hadley's have allowed to happen is thus justified through the way in which
Peter turns against his own father. Thus it is that the characterisation of the
children, and the way that the Nursery has become more important and real to them than
reality and their parents, thus is used to present Bradbury's grim message about
technology. We must ensure that we do not become so dependent on technology that we
forget how to actually live without it.

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