In a 1950 classic Science Fiction short writing, Ray Bradbury describes a post-apocalyptic world in the aftermath of a nuclear attack. Interestingly, the story lacks human characters and puts an automated house as its centerpiece. The house is run on automatic schedule, it serves pancakes, and speaks to its owners, but no human being is there to respond.
The most prominent sign of a past nuclear attack is the description of the silhouettes on the walls of the house. The nuclear blast has the paint torn off, vaporized the family, and left only “the image of a thrown ball, and opposite him a girl, hands raised to catch a ball which never came down” and the silhouettes of two adults – a woman who was picking flowers and a man who was mowing the lawn.
The only sign of life comes from a dog who has miraculously survived the nuclear blast, but it too will soon die in the parlour. While robot mice are running around to keep the house clean, pancakes are served automatically, and a voice from the wall kindly asks which poem the McClellan family would like to hear. Without any reply, the house system recites Tara Teasdale's 1918 poem “There will come soft rains”.
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;
Robins will wear their feathery fire,
Whistling their whims on a low fence-wire;
And not one will know of the war, not one
Will care at last when it is done.
Not one would mind, neither bird nor tree,
if mankind perished utterly;
And Spring herself, when she woke at dawn
Would scarcely know that we were gone.
Interestingly, the poem is also recited in the game Fallout – which, unsurprisingly, tells the story of a world that has experienced a nuclear disaster as well.
Soon, a storm breaks out and the house catches fire. While the house is trying to save itself by running emergency appliances, the fire likened to an elephant is quickly consuming the house like a living thing made of flesh and bone.
Main Theme
The most apparent theme is technology vs nature, and man’s unavoidable defeat. The many technological inventions of mankind, although they outlive us, are mindless and cannot stand against the forces of nature. When mankind is gone, nature will move on as if nothing has happened.
"There will come soft rains" is a nuanced piece that prompts us to question our human existence, our relationship with technology and nature, and our capabilities to destroy. It was especially relevant considering the fact it was written several years after the WWII Hiroshima and Nagasaki nuclear bombings. However, the threat of nuclear war is still upon us...