“ Stand still! Stay where you are! Don’t move!” – this indicates Mead is being treated as a dangerous criminal. The police car aggressively shouts commands e.g. The interaction between Mead and the police car also contributes to the sinister tone. The car blinding him with its lights relates to an escaped prisoner being put under spotlight which adds a dark tone as it hints at the idea that Mead’s freedom may be in jeopardy. Bradbury changes the mood from peaceful to aggressive and sinister when he writes “flashed a fierce cone of light upon him”. This change is created by the arrival of the police car. Halfway through the story there is a dramatic shift in mood, as it changes from positive, romantic and peaceful to sinister and threatening. the tombs ill-lit by television light, where the people sat like the dead, the grey or multi-coloured lights touching their faces but never really touching them”. “he would see cottages and homes with their dark windows, and it was not unequal to walking through a graveyard” Of the two options, Mead’s lifestyle is clearly presented as the more favourable: The lifestyle of Mead’s peers is so sedentary, routine, unfulfilling and unimaginative that he compares them to the dead.

ěradbury creates a contrast between Mead and the rest of his society through effective use imagery related to graveyards and death. This is to convey Mead’s love of walking and make his experience seem appealing and attractive to the reader. Ě very positive, peaceful and romantic mood is created at the start of the story. Opening sentence is a long sentence: “To enter out into that silence that was the city at 8 o clock of a misty evening in November, to put your feet upon that buckling concrete walk, to step over grassy seams and make your way, hand in packets, through the silences, that was what Mr Leonard Mead most dearly loved to do.” Sentence structure to establish relaxed atmosphere, furthering the impression that Mead enjoys walking and is peaceful when outside. ‘he would stride off, sending patterns of frosty air before him, like the smoke of a cigar’ – because we usually smoke cigars at special events, the reference to cigar smoke here has connotations of celebration, emphasising the positive nature of Mead’s experience of walking. The word ‘misty’ has connotations of romance, establishing a peaceful, tranquil and romantic tone.

Word choice to show Mead’s love of walking What are the main literary techniques we discussed when studying ‘The Pedestrian’? You would write about these in ANY essay on the text.

The pedestrian tone