Give Reasons :

There will come Soft Rains by Bradbury is a futuristic short story

because although written in 1950 s the story describes the
extinction of mankind after a nuclear holocaust in the year 2026.
At 7:00 am, the clock announces the time, singing relentlessly, “as if it
were afraid” that nobody would get up because the clock’s reaction also
hints that something may not be right, since it is concerned that no
one can hear it.
The breakfast menu that the automated kitchen produces is supposed
to be indicative of the residents because the menu helps the reader
assume that a family of four live in the house; two adults and two
children, particularly based on the beverage preferences.
At night, the city of Allendale emits a “glow” that can be seen for miles
because the rubble and ash and a radioactive glow are the aftermath of
a massive nuclear bombing.
Sara Teasdale’s poem, There Will Come Soft Rains, has been included
in the story because the author means to warn humankind about the
impending extinction with the continued use of atomic bombs.

HISTORICAL BACKGROUND :
‘There Will Come Soft Rains’ is, like many stories Ray Bradbury
wrote in the early 1950s, haunted by the fear of nuclear war.
It’s worth remembering that the United States of the 1950s was, for
many, a time of great optimism: America had helped the Allies to
win the war in 1945, and, particularly for middle-class America,
this was an era of great hope and prosperity.But it was also a time
when the Cold War between the US and the USSR was starting to
worry the authorities: the Americans were only too aware that their
victory in the recent world war had largely been made possible by
unleashing a dangerous new weapon upon their enemies. What
would happen if the Soviet Union developed, and then launched,
nuclear bombs on America?

Interestingly, Americans feared that if the Russians ever launched

their weapons they would send many of them east across the
Pacific, and the first Americans to be hit would be Californians.

Structured Answers ;
What is special about the house in the story ?

The story, There Will Come Soft Rains is a narrative about a lone house that
stands intact in California that has otherwise been obliterated by a nuclear
bomb, and then is destroyed in a fire caused by a windstorm.
A nuclear catastrophe leaves the city entirely desolate. However, within one
miraculously preserved house, the daily routine continues to cater to the every
need of its residents.
The house is modeled after concept homes that showed society’s expectations of
technological advancement. Bradbury satirizes these concept homes by showing
their implications. The house cooks meals, cleans messes, wards off intruders
and reads the weather to protect residents from an inclement environment
—all for a family whose disintegration is memorialized by paint silhouettes on
the house’s otherwise charred west face. The absence of the family shows how
the automated house is an example of technology gone too far because it
replaces the most human aspects of life. The house also tries to direct the
residents’ every step without any knowledge of their current state as burnt
silhouettes on one of the walls. It tells the family when to leave for school and
how to dress for the day. The garage door opening and then closing is
ominous—it again suggests that the family is gone but the house is indifferent
to their absence, continuing its business as though nothing was wrong.
Perhaps the most striking examples of this replacement are found in the house’s
suggestions for entertainment—it produces bridge tables and reads poetry
having supplanted diversion and art.
While the house seems indifferent, the dog grieves the loss of humans by
wandering around the house with a broken heart. The house does not show
any sadness either for the humans they serve or for the pet that grieves the
humans. When the only living character in the story died, instead of grieving
the dog’s death, the house simply busies itself with the task of disposing of its
corpse.Based on this action, the reader realizes that though the house may
demonstrate human qualities throughout the short story, it lacks a vital
capacity for compassion.
The house burns because, despite its vigilance against intruders, a tree branch
crashes through the kitchen window and knocks a bottle of cleaning solvent
onto the oven. The house’s destruction is then framed as a death, and the
description of its battle against the fire is replete with references to living things
such as “mice” that spray water and “snakes” of flame-retardant chemicals. The
house is depicted in this way because it represents both humanity and
humanity’s failure to save itself.

Analyse Ray Bradbury’s allusion to the “Hiroshima Shadow” in

the story.
The Hiroshima Shadow was first discovered after the dropping of the atomic
bomb on Hiroshima, Japan in World War Two. After the bombing of
Hiroshima, silhouettes of Japanese citizens going about their daily lives
were found burned into walls that faced the blast. The name Hiroshima
Shadow was born, and became instantly notorious for capturing a subject’s
final moments of life before being cruelly burned alive in a nuclear fire.
Hiroshima Shadows were well known as a sign of the destructive power of
nuclear weapons and even today they suggest the same.
In the story, the entire west side wall of the house has been described by
the author as black except for five silhouettes: A man mowing the lawn, a
woman picking flowers, and two children at play beneath a thrown ball.
This infallibly establishes that a family of four lived in the house with
multiple contraptions. Their image on the west wall informs the reader of
when and how they died. Their images were burned on the wood in one
titanic instant. The images burned on the wall refer to what is known as a
Hiroshima Shadow, a silhouette caused by an object interrupting the flash
of thermal radiation from an atomic bomb .
What significance does the Dog have in the story,’There Will Come
Soft Rains’?
A dog—the story’s only living character—appears on the house’s doorstep
at noon, shivering. The house is hypersensitive to who can pass its
threshold, further indicating that it is obsessed with having control over
its environment. The house recognizes it and lets the dog in, which
suggests that it was once the family pet. It shuts out nature, which is
embodied by the foxes, cats, and birds mentioned in passing. It is a
wonder that these animals have survived a nuclear attack. Their
presence suggests that nature remains strong through all adversity. By
contrast, the house continues senselessly and uselessly after its
inhabitants disappear.The story tells us that the family dog used to be
large and fleshy but has since been worn away by radiation sickness and
hunger in the aftermath of the nuclear explosion that killed the family
which once occupied the house. Even from the first moment the house
encounters the dog, the reader suspects that the house does not like it.
At the very least, the house is disgusted by all the mud that the dog
tracks inside and cleans it up using robot mice. The dog searches for its
family, realizes that no one is home, smells some pancakes cooking in
the next room, and dies in a lonely frenzy. As soon as the house
discovers that the dog is dead, it quickly disposes of the body.
Commonly, pets are thought of as members of a family, and it remains
common for animals to be buried. In the story, however, the disposal of
the carcass becomes much less ceremonious; demonstrating and
clarifying the house’s lack of remorse in its dislike for nature, disposing
of it without even the shallowest hint of emotion.
The dog’s brief and pitiable appearance in the story creates juxtaposition
between the loving world the reader lives in and the heartless,
mechanical realm of the story.The robot mice give the dog a cruel
welcome. Even though the dog has sores on its body (see above) and
hardly any flesh on its bones, the house does not express sympathy.
Instead, the robot mice are irritated at having to clean up. By referring to
the incinerator as an evil Baal, he has used an ancient allusion to a
pagan god to indicate that the house has an unholy purpose.

What are the main themes discussed in the story, ‘There Will
Come Soft Rains’ ?
Ray Bradbury's ‘There Will Come Soft Rains’ explores themes of
technology's dominance, human absence, and nature's endurance
through the depiction of a fully automated house continuing its routine
despite the death of the owners. Influenced by post-World War II
anxieties and fears of nuclear annihilation, Bradbury critiques
over-reliance on technology and underscores nature's resilience despite
human self-destruction. It is a cautionary tale of mankind’s demise
when technology outpaces humanity, ultimately proving that neither
man or machine can prevail against nature.
’There Will Come Soft Rains’ centers around the actions of an artificially
intelligent house that proves to be nearly indestructible, even when the
entire city around it has been destroyed in a nuclear blast. The nature of
the house raises questions about humans’ technological development.
After the nuclear blast, the humans become nothing but mere
impressions on the burned house’s walls. Clearly, the house still stands
even when the people who lived in it have been destroyed. It is the lack of
human agency that propels this futuristic tale. This is a world in which
humans have been destroyed. The method of destruction is a nuclear
explosion created by people with the power of science. After humanity
has been killed, technology lives on without human.The technology lacks
the ability to comprehend that the people are gone, and though no one is
eating the breakfast it prepares, nor playing the cards it sets out for a
gathering, the house continues to carry on its normal operations like
from watering the lawn and preparing cigars to reading bedtime poems to
its users. Technology has outlived the masters it served, yet it is
unaware.
There is something eerie about the house functioning as if times are
normal.The author expresses widespread fears about technological
longevity. He specifically shows how the house has removed human
interaction by describing daily activities that the house performs
religiously despite lack of inhabitants. The disposal of the dog shows how
emotionless technology could be - rigid and robotic in its motives. Here,
the house is almost used as a warning, in that if we continue down our
current path where technology evolves faster than humanity, man will
eventually be obsolete to his own houses. The story implores the readers
to consider the downsides of technological development. This story
reflects fears about nuclear war and the rapid technological expansion; if
humans can produce a house that withstands a nuclear blast also
developed by humans, perhaps we ought to be wary of our role in
technological development.
Science and nature are juxtaposed throughout the story. Science is
represented by the technology of the house: at first it withstands the
blast, but it then succumbs to the forces of nature. In the story, science
has no self-awareness. When the family dog—who has been badly
injured in the blast—returns to the house, the house merely lets him in
and sweeps him away when he dies. Science is presented as impersonal,
unchanging, and inhuman. More implicitly but importantly, the empty
house gestures at the nuclear destruction that precedes the start of the
story, another product of humanity’s scientific efforts.
Nature prevails in the story and ultimately leads to the house’s
demise.One of the story's most pervasive themes is a war with nature.
First, the house tries to equip the owners to deal with the potentially
inclement weather by warning people that it is raining and that they
need to wear boots and raincoats. The second form the war with nature
takes is that the house actively protects itself against outside intruders.
When birds touch windows, the house snaps a curtain or shutter to drive
them away. The final aspect of the war with nature is the all-out war the
house fights when it catches on fire and the house loses both control and
the war itself. This loss of control is shown by the way the house screams
for help once it's on fire.This war with nature aligns with the poem that
gives the story its name and with the nuclear war that obliterated
humanity. Even the Sara Teasdale poem that the voice reads at the end
of the day, emphasizes the primacy of nature, giving the story its
namesake. The poem states that “Not one would mind, neither bird nor
tree / If mankind perished utterly.” This is essentially what happens in
the story: a windstorm fells a tree, which then starts a fire that destroys
the house. The science of the house, man-made and unchanging despite
the tragedy of the nuclear blast, comes to be eliminated by the
ever-enduring forces of nature. Even after technology fades, nature will
remain.
Briefly summarise how the fire spread and engulfed the
automated house.
At 10:00 p.m. the wind blows a tree branch into a window. It knocks a
bottle of flammable solvent into the stove. The kitchen immediately
catches fire. Automated pumps pour water on the fire, and a robotic
voice calls out "Fire!" to warn everyone in the house. The house slams
doors shut to contain the fire, but the broken windows let air in, and the
fire keeps spreading. The house fights back. Pumps in every ceiling pour
water on the flames, and the robotic cleaning mice pour their reserves on
the fire. However, the house's reserves ran dry because the house had
been using the water to wash dishes and fill baths.
The fire spreads even with the house spraying water on it, but as soon as
the water stops, the fire races upstairs, where it destroys expensive
paintings and the bedrooms. The house tries a counterattack, spraying
20 snakes of chemicals to fight the fire. However, the fire branches out,
sending a tendril up the exterior of the house. It enters the attic and
blows up the "brain" there that is controlling the pumps. This lets the fire
rage everywhere, burning clothes in closets. All the voices in the house
call out in chorus, sounding an alarm for everyone to run and asking for
help.
The fire destroys the nursery. Once it dies, chaos spreads throughout the
house. The house starts doing other tasks it had been programmed to
do, but randomly and mindlessly. While the fire burns, the house cuts
the grass, opens and closes the front door, sends robot mice out to clean,
and once again reads poetry, at least until the magnetic tapes on which
the poetry is stored burn. As the house burns, the stove makes breakfast
at an insane rate. Finally, the house collapses in on itself. The attic falls
into the floor below, which falls into the cellar and there's nothing left
but rubble and smoke.