In
Roald Dahl’s short story, “The Sound Machine,” he examines the importance of
life and understanding one’s impact on the world. In the beginning of the
story, Dahl portrays Klausner as a timid, curious man who dreams of uncovering
a new world of sound. When Klausner first hears plants crying out when they
become injured, he becomes excited and amazed by his discovery. However, Dahl
soon illustrates that with knowledge comes the responsibility to act on that
information. Klausner allows such responsibility to overwhelm him, as he cannot
deal with the harmful consequences of his most basic actions, like pulling a
flower from the ground. In order to share his new burden, Klausner begs a
doctor he knows to come over so he can hear the screaming as well because ‘“it’s
driving me mad!”’(32). Through using exclamatory syntax and directly
characterizing Klausner as “mad,” the author indirectly characterizes him as
desperate in order to assert that when people feel overwhelmed by their duties,
they turn to others to help them. Although doctors often represent
responsibility and helpfulness, the doctor tries to remain ignorant and refuses
to acknowledge the sounds he hears, illustrating that some people believe in
the idea that “ignorance is bliss.” However, Klausner forces the doctor to try
to alleviate the tree’s pain, illustrating that no one can ever truly isolate
themselves from others’ suffering and everyone must play a role in ending it. Fortunately,
in real life, people do not have to constantly hear blades of grass scream when
they walk across a lawn or roses cry out in pain when they create a bouquet. Constant,
forced awareness of so much pain could only drive people crazy like it does
with Klausner, because people can only help so much before they must accept
their limits. Klausner’s fixation on the going beyond such limits causes him to
become increasingly illogical and by the end of the story, he desperately begs
the doctor to stitch up wood. His desperation illustrates that while people
should try to help others, becoming obsessed with past harms, to a point where
it unproductively consumes one’s life, can only cause more troubles. Dahl’s
juxtaposition of two extreme views, Klausner’s obsession with helping and the
doctor’s denial of the pain, demonstrates the importance of finding a middle
ground where people focus on helping others in the present, but most
importantly, use knowledge of the past and present to prevent tragedies form
reoccurring. The story highlights the need for increased awareness for all
living beings’ pain. Like the plants’ agony in the story, people’s pain in the
world usually remains unapparent. For me, the story’s deeper meaning deals with
preventing people from unnecessarily suffering. The story’s focus on the
cruelty of one living being’s pain emphasizes the horrific nature of thousands
or even millions of living beings facing torture or death, as in the case of wars
and genocides. Klausner imagines, horrified, the sounds that entire wheat
fields would make when cut. In the short
story, Klausner uncovers a suffering he never knew he could inflict- the
torture he causes when he harms plants. Klausner asks how people can ‘“know…a rosebush doesn’t feel pain?”’ (31).
Through his use of a rhetorical question, the writer creates internal conflict
in Klausner as he desperately tries to understand his impact on living beings. Furthermore,
Klausner’s internal conflict allows him to serves as a synecdoche for people
who question their role in life. The pain that even the smallest flower feels
in the story demonstrates the importance of valuing all life, for we can never
truly understand how significant a role we may play in others’ lives. The
story, particularly its theme of sound and nature, reminds me of a question I have
often heard: if a tree falls in a forest and no one hears it, does it still
make a sound? After reading “The Sound Machine,” I realize that events, like a
tree falling, carry the same impact regardless of whether or not we observe
them. Poverty, war, hunger, genocide, fatal diseases, terrorism - every day,
people around the world suffer. Although we do not hear screams and shouts from
every distressed person, like Klausner hears plants’ cries of pain, a cry for
help, whether figurative or literal, should never go unheard. Regardless of
whether one witnesses suffering, the pain remains just as real, as well as the
need for people to take an active role in lessening it.
