The Last Night of the World

The last night of the world

Ray Bradbury

Analysis by Laura Karschenboim – 3rd Year Polimodal - CUDA

1) Describe the setting of the story.

The story is set in the United States, in 1969, during the Vietnam War.

There is a middle class family. The couple are having a chat in the parlour, while their two little girls are playing. They are very pleased with their life (although the man says that he does not like cities nor his work) because they are very close to each other. The fact that they plan to do what they always do every day during the last night of the world, shows that they do not regret anything. In fact his wife states that this is something to be proud of.

2) How do people in the story get to know what will happen?

They all dreamed that things would stop on Earth. They all dreamed exactly the same thing.

3) Why do you think the author choose that setting for the story?

In an interview, in 1990, Bradbury said, “Well, you know, when you’re twenty, it’s easy to be negative. And we were going through World War II, and coming out of it. An so, it was a negative time. And then the atom bomb came along (…) But there was the time in the middle of the summer of ’46 or ’47, when they were going to explode the first nuclear warhead, out in the islands. But the scientists weren’t quite sure whether the Earth wouldn’t catch on fire. What if the Earth caught on fire an the whole ting went up? Well, the night before, you know, I think everyone inn the world thought about it, everyone that could hear about it on the radio, because there was no TV in those days, an it was primitive: a few thousand sets in the United States. So, you become a philosopher that night, don’t you? What if this is the last night of the world?

Slightly more than thirty thousand young Americans had been killed in the Vietnam War by the year 1969.

In March 1969, President Nixon ordered the secret bombing of Cambodia. The military conflict lasted four years and caused great destruction and upheaval in that country. An estimated one hundred thousand peasants died in the bombing, while two million people were left homeless.

Agent Orange and other chemical defoliants were used. Due to them, Vietnam developed the highest rate of birth defects in the world. On October 15, 1969, citizens across the United States participated in The Moratorium, the largest onde-day demonstration against the war. In November 1969, students from all over the country headed for Washington D.C., for the Mobilization Against the War. Over forty thousand people participated in a March Against Death from Arlington National Cemetery to the White House, each carrying a placard with the name of a young person killed in Vietnam.

The use of napalm (weapon that ignites into fireballs and is either projected from a flametower, or place in bombs or missiles launched from aircrafts) came under criticism in the United States during this war because it was inhumane.

These were the reasons why the author chose this setting for the story.

4) What would you do if this were the last night of the world?

I would spend the last night of the world with our closest relatives, since they have always been my main support. I would also recall the most significant events of my life.