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These mice, which are part of the house’s machinery, display the house’s dark side. Like the clock, they seem innocent enough at first, and they are quite useful, since they are able to reach hidden dust that would be difficult and unpleasant to clean by hand. However, when the sickly dog returns home after the nuclear explosion, the mice seem annoyed to have to deal with a mess, rather than relieved at the return of one of the house’s occupants. They clean up after the dog without compassion, and when the dog dies, they hurry to clean up after it, not even pausing to mourn. The robot mice show that there is a limit to how humane a machine can be.
Robot Mice Quotes in There Will Come Soft Rains
The There Will Come Soft Rains quotes below are all either spoken by Robot Mice or refer to Robot Mice. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
).
There Will Come Soft Rains
Quotes
The front door recognized the dog voice and opened. The dog, once huge and fleshy, but now gone to bone and covered with sores, moved in and through the house, tracking mud. Behind it whirred angry mice, angry at having to pick up mud, angry at inconvenience.
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In the last instant under the fire avalanche, other choruses, oblivious, could be heard announcing the time, playing music, cutting the lawn by remote-control mower, or setting an umbrella frantically out and in the slamming and opening front door, a thousand things happening, like a clock shop when each clock strikes the hour insanely before or after the other, a scene of maniac confusion, yet unity; singing, screaming, a few last cleaning mice darting bravely out to carry the horrid ashes away! And one voice, with sublime disregard for the situation, read poetry aloud in the fiery study, until all the film spools burned, until all the wires withered and the circuits cracked.
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Robot Mice Quotes in There Will Come Soft Rains
The There Will Come Soft Rains quotes below are all either spoken by Robot Mice or refer to Robot Mice. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
).
There Will Come Soft Rains
Quotes
The front door recognized the dog voice and opened. The dog, once huge and fleshy, but now gone to bone and covered with sores, moved in and through the house, tracking mud. Behind it whirred angry mice, angry at having to pick up mud, angry at inconvenience.
Related Characters:
Related Symbols:
Related Themes:
Page Number and Citation:
Explanation and Analysis:
In the last instant under the fire avalanche, other choruses, oblivious, could be heard announcing the time, playing music, cutting the lawn by remote-control mower, or setting an umbrella frantically out and in the slamming and opening front door, a thousand things happening, like a clock shop when each clock strikes the hour insanely before or after the other, a scene of maniac confusion, yet unity; singing, screaming, a few last cleaning mice darting bravely out to carry the horrid ashes away! And one voice, with sublime disregard for the situation, read poetry aloud in the fiery study, until all the film spools burned, until all the wires withered and the circuits cracked.
Related Characters:
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Related Themes:
Page Number and Citation:
Explanation and Analysis:
