“The Sound of Thunder”

By Ray Bradbury

Multiple Choice• Q: Eckels travels with

Time Safari because he wants to —A: hunt dinosaurs

• Q: At the beginning of the story, what event has just occurred?A: Keith has just been elected president.

• Q: The men who travel back in time are told they must —A: stay on the safari path

Multiple Choice• Q: When Eckels sees the

tyrannosaurus, he —A: changes his mind about the safari

• Q: Travis is angry with Eckels because —A: Eckles stepped off the path

• Q: In this story the future is altered because —A: Eckels didn’t follow instructions

Multiple Choice• Q: The climax of the

story occurs when —A: we learn the results of Eckels’ actions

• Q: A story’s mood refers to —A: the feeling or atmosphere the story evokes

• Q: The mood of “A Sound of Thunder” can be described as —A: tense and frightening

Multiple Choice• Q: Which sentence

from “A Sound of Thunder” uses diction to set the mood?

A: “The jungle was wide and full of twitterings, rustlings, murmurs, and sighs.”

Constructed Response

• How does Ray Bradbury’s manipulate the setting to add to the mood of the story? Make sure that you identify the setting & the mood at the beginning, the middle, and the end. How do those settings take a part in enforcing the moods?

Constructed Response AnswerThe setting changes in subtle ways: faint

smells, colors slightly wrong, words spelled strangely all contribute to the mood. At the beginning of the story, 2055, Eckles is leaving America to go back in time to hunt dinosaurs. In the safari office the mood is anxious, but at the same time excited. Once Eckles & his group reaches 55 million years ago, the mood changes. Upon seeing the T-Rex, Eckles cowers reflecting the frantic mood. At the end, Eckles gets back to 2055 where the setting has changed slightly giving the reader an uneasy mood. When Eckles sees the dead butterfly, the mood drastically changes to one of desolation & hopelessness. Every aspect of this setting evokes the mood of this short story.