In 2016, technology is part of our daily lives, but in the future it will become much more advanced and powerful, and not always in a beneficial way. In Ray Bradbury's short story “The Pedestrian,” it is the year 2053 AD and technology is taking over the world. The main character, Mr. Leonard Mead, has a daily routine that involves walking for hours and miles in a quiet town until he returns home at midnight. Throughout the narrative, Bradbury shows through symbolism, setting, and dialogue that technology can take away from nature and the beauty of life itself. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an Original Essay The only thing Mr. Leonard Mead would like to do is walk for hours along the streets of a "deserted" city. The powerful symbolism helps the reader understand how strongly the author feels about the topic. Mr. Mead's first glimpse of other human life is that “It all happened at night in the tomb-like houses. The graves, badly lit by the television light, where people sat as if dead, with the gray or multicolored lights touching their faces, but never touching them" (58). The reader learns the author's point of view when the houses are described as resembling graves, where people sit still just like the dead. It is also implied that the residents living in the houses rarely have contact with other people, other than people broadcast by the television light, which never physically touches them like Mr. Mead "put the hand on the door and peered into the back seat, which was a little cell, a little black prison with bars. It smelled like riveted steel. It smelled like a harsh antiseptic; it smelled too clean, hard and metallic. There was nothing soft in there” (59). The use of the word "prison" symbolizes the strong connection between technology and the dark and sad life of a prisoner. Using words like "hard", "antiseptic" and "metallic", which do not appeal to the sense of smell or touch, also indicates the disillusioned attitude towards technology. Bradbury's detailed description of the setting helps the reader visualize the darkness and gloom. world bombarded by technology. Through the eyes of Mr. Leonard Mead, we see that: "On his way, he saw the cottages with their dark windows, and it was no different than walking through a churchyard where only the faintest glimmers of firefly light appeared in flickers behind the windows .Sudden gray ghosts seemed to appear on the interior walls of the room where a curtain was not yet drawn against the night, or there were whispers and murmurs where a window in a tomb-like building was still open (56). the eerie and dark setting of the "abandoned" town, although it is inhabited. It also indicates the busy life inside the eerie houses, contrasting with the empty streets with only whispers and eerie shadows showing signs of life. Mr. Mead continues the his walk, indicating that "The concrete was disappearing under the flowers and grass. In ten years of walking night and day, for thousands of kilometers, he had never met another person walking, not even one in all that time" (57). The failure to maintain the concrete implies the lack of people walking and using the sidewalk The quote also states that for ten years Mr. Mead has never met another soul walking outside, which leaves the useless sidewalk to disappear under the grass and dirt Today, newspapers and magazines are still quite popular and are sold in almost every supermarket, restaurant and pharmacy. Through the dialogue between the police car and Mr. Leonard Mead, the.