Essay On The Veldt By Ray Bradbury

1117 Words3 Pages

As the famous theoretical physicist, Albert Einstein, once said, “Reality is merely an illusion, albeit a very persistent one.” “The Veldt,” written by Ray Bradbury, replicates instances in which technology has overtaken minds, changed realities, and clouded judgment. “The Veldt” is a story set in a technologically advanced world,where the family lives in a high-tech home. One of the machines in the home is the nursery, which transforms the room telepathically after reading the thoughts of a person. As the children are using the nursery, their thoughts become evil, and the nursery is projecting them all too real. Their being in the nursery has become the children lives. When the parents realized this, they attempt to remove the nursery from …show more content…

The hot straw smell of lion grass, the cool green smell of the hidden water hole, the great rusty smell of animals, the smell of dust like a red paprika in the hot air. And now the sounds: the thump of distant antelope feet on grassy sod, the papery rustling of vultures. A shadow passed through the sky. The shadow flickered on George Hadley’s upturned, sweating face” (Bradbury). The nursery uses the thoughts of the children to paint the scene, and the way in which he does it here; he paints the picture of their cynical imagination. As the children are thinking about this, it’s a reflection of their mental health and their thoughts. Lydia, the mother, is worried about this because she believes that the nursery is becoming too real. In the Gale Virtual Reference Library, this is reiterated. An article in Short Stories for Students suggests,“They go to the nursery, and as they stand in the center of the room, the nursery's previously blank walls and ceiling come to life. The room is transformed into a genuine African veldt, complete with a blazing hot sun and all the authentic sensory experiences that would accompany such a setting” (Milne). This explains how the nursery makes whatever environment it shows, feels very real. Another …show more content…

“The Veldt” suggests “The two children were in hysterics. They screamed and pranced and threw things. They yelled and sobbed and swore and jumped at the furniture. ‘You can’t do that to the nursery, you can’t!’ ‘Now, children.’ The children flung themselves onto a couch, weeping” (Bradbury). The children have become so attached, so obsessed with the nursery and its technology, that they believe it’s the most important in their lives. This changes the reality of their parents wanting the best for them, to that the parents are the enemy trying to take away the things they love the most. This is also replicated in the Gale Virtual Reference Library article. Short Stories for Students explains, “George begins switching off the house while the children cry and beg him to stop” (Milne). The nursery is the children’s most prized possessions; it has changed the reality and made the children unable to distinguish reality from illusion. This trait can also be seen as they are controlling, manipulating, and demanding towards their parents on various occasions. In one instance, they attempted to deceive their parents and change the scene of the nursery before they would go see it. After George has reprimanded the children, they change the nursery scene, as seen in “The Veldt”,“There was a green, lovely forest, a lovely river, a purple

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