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Definition of Setting
Setting is where and when a story or scene takes place. The where can be a real place like the city of New York, or it can be an imagined... read full definition
Setting is where and when a story or scene takes place. The where can be a real place like the city of New York, or... read full definition
Setting is where and when a story or scene takes place. The where can be a real place like the... read full definition
Setting
Explanation and Analysis:
Ray Bradbury's "A Sound of Thunder" is set in two distinct times: the near future and the prehistoric past. The story first takes place in the year 2055 in the United States, the day after the presidential election between "anti-everything" Deutscher and all-American Keith. The narrative opens in an office for Time Safari, Inc., a company that takes people to the past to hunt down exotic or extinct animals. The office itself is unremarkable, but the Time Machine it houses is magnificent. A piece of technology that people in the 20th century could only dream of, the Time Machine allows people to not only manipulate time, but also cause inadvertent damage to the future. The story's exploration of this concept mirrors the rising fear of both authoritarian regimes and nuclear technology after World War II and into the Cold War.
The main action of the story occurs approximately 60 million years ago in the jungle, the location of which is unspecified. Dinosaurs are not yet extinct, and they roam the Earth in their native habitat. The jungle is lush and expansive, seemingly going on forever in every direction. The Time Machine takes the hunting group to the edge of a floating metal path which leads them to the targeted Tyrannosaurus. Even though the setting is vibrant, the hunters are not allowed to step foot off the path for fear of accidentally causing irreparable damage to the future.
At the end of the story, the setting returns to 2055, where the world is not quite the same. The air has shifted, the people look slightly different, and the English language follows an unconventional spelling system. However, the most frightening change is the outcome of the previous day's election: the authoritarian Deutscher will instead be the next President of the United States.
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