Another Day of the Future Soon To Be Past: Ray Bradbury’s “There Will Come Soft Rains”
- L. Roy Aiken
- Aug 4
- 1 min read
Updated: Aug 5
Today is the day. Attention must be paid.
We’re already well past the projected future years in dystopian movies like Soylent Green, Blade Runner, et al. But today, 4 August 2026, is the day of Ray Bradbury’s saddest chapter in The Martian Chronicles, “There Will Come Soft Rains,” which describes the last day of an empty, computer-run house after global nuclear war has killed off everyone on Earth. I still choke up thinking of that poor starving dog outside the kitchen door as the computer cooks up an entire breakfast only to throw it into the disposal. And then the little robot mice cleaners emerge to dispose of the dog's corpse one hour after it whimpers and dies...Bradbury is generally remembered as a jovial futurist, but he distrusted technology, entertained little hope for the future of mankind, and he never flinched from the hard and ugly scenes.
The Martian Chronicles was first published in May 1950, with many of its chapters assembled mosaic style from short stories written for various magazines years before, so it’s safe to say “There Will Come Soft Rains” was originally written sometime between late 1945, after the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and 1949. It’s the penultimate chapter in the Chronicles, and sets up the somber, if somewhat hopeful, conclusion of one of Bradbury’s best books.
Hey, but at least we don’t have to worry about nuclear annihilation anymore, do we? No, our ruling trash is already hard at work on something just as lethally awful. Bless their black little hearts.
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