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"The Pedestrian" is a short story by best-selling sci-fi author Ray Bradbury. This story was originally published in the August 7, 1951 issue of The Reporter by The Fortnightly Publishing Company. It is included in the collection The Golden Apples of the Sun (1953).

Summary

Bradbury’s purpose of writing “The Pedestrian” could be to warn the people of the future and how technology could effect the people of the future. In the 1950’s televisions had just came out, which made certain people watch it all day. Many people did not come out and socialize. I think his purpose was to prove the effect things can have on people. When the police questioned him for an innocent stroll through the neighborhood they thought that he was insane and not normal because he was not inside watching his television. The technology effected people in Bradburys story by them not socializing and normal things such as a walk would be considered abnormal.

Background

It is noticeable that the address of the main character, Leonard Mead, happens to be the address of the house that Bradbury grew up in. This has caused speculation that this short story is actually referring to himself, or is in some related way a message to his home town of Waukegan, Illinois.

The 60th anniversary edition of Fahrenheit 451 contains the short piece "The Story of Fahrenheit 451" by Jonathan R. Eller. In it, Eller writes that Bradbury's inspiration for the story came when he was walking down Wilshire Boulevard in Los Angeles with a friend sometime in late 1949. On their walk, a police cruiser pulled up and asked what they were doing. Bradbury answered, "Well, we're putting one foot in front of the other." The policemen didn't appreciate Ray's joke and became suspicious of Bradbury and his friend for walking in an area where there were no pedestrians. Using this experience as inspiration he wrote "The Pedestrian", which he sent to his New York agent Don Congdon in March 1950. According to Eller, " composition in the early months of 1950 predates Bradbury's conception of 'The Fireman,'" the short novella that would later evolve into Fahrenheit 451.

References

1. Bradbury, Ray (August 7, 1951). Ascoli, Max (ed.). "The Pedestrian" (PDF). The Reporter. 5 (3). 220 East 42nd Street, New York 17, NY: Fortnightly Publishing Company. Retrieved 22 August 2013.{{cite journal}}: CS1 maint: location (link)
2. Bradbury, Ray (January 10, 2012). Fahrenheit 451 (60th Anniversary ed.). New York, NY: Simon & Schuster, Inc. p. 172. ISBN 1451673310.

Adaptations

The story was made into an episode of The Ray Bradbury Theater, starring David Ogden Stiers as Leonard Mead.

Notes

Footnotes

Further reading

• Chalker, Jack L.; Owings, Mark (1998). The Science-Fantasy Publishers: A Bibliographic History, 1923–1998. Westminster, MD and Baltimore: Mirage Press, Ltd. p. 887.
• Contento, William G. "Index to Science Fiction Anthologies and Collections, Combined Edition". Retrieved 2007-10-10.
• LaGuardia, Dolores; Guth, Hans P. (1995). American Visions: Multicultural Literatures for Writers. Mountain View, CA and Toronto: Mayfield Publishing Company. pp. 384–388.

External links

• The Pedestrian title listing at the Internet Speculative Fiction Database

• 1951 short stories
• 1964 books
• Science fiction short stories
• Short stories by Ray Bradbury
• Works originally published in The Reporter (magazine)