Something Wicked This Way Comes

Something Wicked This Way Comes

by

Ray Bradbury

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Something Wicked This Way Comes: Chapter 14 Summary & Analysis

Summary
Analysis
Back at home, Charles can’t imagine why a carnival would come at three in the morning. To Charles, three a.m. is a “special hour.” Women aren’t up at that time— “they sleep the sleep of babes and children”—but men “know that hour well.” Middle aged men frequently wake at this time, and it is when “the body’s at low tide.” The soul leaves the body at three a.m., creating a sort of “living death,” and it is the closest to death one comes without actually dying. Charles remembers reading that “more people in hospitals die at three a.m. than at any other time.”
Charles’s explanation of three a.m. is precisely why the carnival arrives at this time. Along with the evil connotations of the hour, Mr. Dark is in search of souls to fuel his carnival, so the carnival arrives at a time when the soul is its most vulnerable. The freaks who populate Mr. Dark’s sideshows are in a state of “living death” as well—they are alive, yet they can’t return to their desired lives.
Themes
Good vs. Evil Theme Icon
Age, Time, and Acceptance Theme Icon
Fear, the Supernatural, and the Unknown Theme Icon
Quotes
Charles looks to his wife, who is sleeping with a faint smile on her face. “She’s immortal,” Charles thinks. “She has a son.” Charles knows that Will is his son too, but it is different for men. Women “own the good secret” and are “strange wonderful clocks” who “nest in Time. They make the flesh that holds fast and binds eternity.” Mrs. Halloway stirs in the bed and half-wakes. “You…all right…. Charlie?” she asks. Charles doesn’t answer. He “can’t tell her how he is.”
Charles resents his wife’s ability to seemingly live forever, again showing his resentment of his progressive age. His description of his wife as a “strange wonderful clock” is in keeping with Bradbury’s association between clocks and life and mortality. Still, Charles can’t tell her how he feels because he deeply loves her and doesn’t want her to know how badly her youth affects him.
Themes
Age, Time, and Acceptance Theme Icon
Love and Happiness Theme Icon
Quotes