Fahrenheit 451

Fahrenheit 451 is a book by Ray Bradbury, written after World War II and it examines the corruption of technology in a dystopian society. This book explains how a dystopian society works and how people are so attached to television and cars and do not enjoy the natural world. People in a dystopian society are full of fear and sadness. They do not have equality or freedom, they are all so soaked up in technology that it is illegal for them to do simple stuff, such as, reading books. The book, Fahrenheit 451 explains how firefighters start fires rather than stopping them. A firefighter’s job is do burn books, since books are illegal to have because they go against the power of technology and modernization. In a dystopian society, people should be unhappy, unequal, violent, and brutalized and that is what is exactly being seen throughout this book. As Ray Bradbury captures the attention of many readers, he captures our attention on how the future could be if technology would become so extreme. Bradbury’s novel, Fahrenheit 451 is not about control, but it is a novel about how television destroys curiosity in reading literature.

Fahrenheit 451 is a dystopian novel written by Ray Bradbury that depicts a futuristic American society where books are banned and independent thought is persecuted. Bradbury uses his imagination to take a hard look at a world consumed by technology, and he presents predictions about pleasure, violence and anti-intellectualism that are alarmingly similar to the modern American society. Notably, in both societies people find pleasure in entertainment that is endlessly preoccupying. Second, people are violent and careless. Finally, anti-intellectualism and suppression of independent thought affect both societies, as firemen ban books in Fahrenheit 451 and, in the

Fahrenheit 451 is a dystopian novel for all ages, written by Ray Bradbury. The author crafted a society highly dependent on technologies such as cars, televisions and radios. In this city, the people lack creativity or knowledge because they chose to burn books instead of reading them, however, others like Montag who is a fireman, wants to read books. In this society, instead of stopping fires, firemen start them, they burn books. Montag's wife, Mildred, a TV addict, is highly dependent on technology and hates books. As the story progresses Montag learns that he doesn’t love Mildred and questions if he ever did. In Fahrenheit 451, Ray Bradbury indirectly characterizes Mildred’s actions to communicate that technology destroys relationships by

Fahrenheit 451 is a book published by Ray Bradbury in 1953 set in the 21st century. The protagonist, named Guy Montag, has the job of a fireman who burns books which are illegal to obtain or read. Montag usually has the easy job of burning houses that contain books while the police would come beforehand and get rid of anyone living there. This lets fireman like Montag not have to deal with human interaction and emotion. In the book, Montag's firemen crew is called to burn down a house, but they appear before the police arrive. A lady is still in the house gathered with her books refusing to leave. Before anyone can make her leave, the lady commits suicide by burning herself with her books. Montag starts questioning his society and wonders if books are bad, why would someone die for them. Montag starts reading the books that society wanted to burn. He starts to learn things and the more he reads, the more he wonders why people aren’t allowed too. Bradbury’s 451 characters all symbolize different realms of this futuristic, book burning culture, and the masses are content with the illusion of happiness they have created for themselves. In many ways, Bradbury predicted behaviors that saturated much of modern American culture. As new things are found to be diagnosed, people become obsessed with finding the fastest and easiest ways to feel better causing doctors to overdiagnose and overmedicate people of all ages; therefore, causing America to develop a dependency to pharmaceutical drugs.

The book Fahrenheit 451 is set in a dystopian, authoritarian world. The main character, Guy Montag, joins a movement for books when he begins to go against his society’s and government’s regulations. It is a book about censorship, individualism, and mass media.

Book-burning is the first thing that is explained about this future based society of Fahrenheit 451. Burning books is the obliteration of the single thought on paper or in one word- censorship. Books are considered evil because they make people question and think. All intellectual curiosity and thirst for knowledge must be quelled for the good of the state — for the good of conformity. Without ideas, everyone conforms, and as a result, everyone should be happy. When books and new ideas are available to people, conflict and unhappiness occur. Some of the many different motifs in the novel Fahrenheit 451 are conveyed through the use of various sardonic lines and connotations planted throughout the book. On the matter of technology and modernization it explains how TV reigns supreme in the future because of the "happiness" it offers. People are content when they don’t have to think, or so the story goes. TV aside, technology is the government’s means of oppression, but also provides the renegade’s opportunity to subvert. Rules and order is another popular topic written into the book. It is stated that “All books can be beaten down with reason.” This was said by Captain Betty, a quote ironically coming from a book itself. Much of the restrictions on the general populous are self-enforced. The government has taken away the citizens’ ability to dissent and marred all dissatisfaction with a cheap version of "happiness," a.k.a. TV. This means

“There is more than one way to burn a book. And the world is full of people running about with lit matches”. This quote was put into words by the great author, Ray Bradbury, explaining his point of view that books are useless and could be burned in many ways, and lack of knowledge should occur. Fahrenheit 451 is one of Bradbury’s famous dystopian fictional novels that were published in 1953, which showed lack of knowledge as one of its concepts. Lack of knowledge exists throughout the novel because firemen burned books, people of the society had no time to think, and the society relied on technology more than anything else.

When writing the introduction to Fahrenheit 451, author Neil Gaiman stated that “ideas--written ideas--are special. They are the way we transmit our stories and our thoughts from one generation to the next. If we lose them, we lose our shared history”. Gaiman is absolutely correct; especially because what he is saying heavily applies to books. Books are a critical aspect in shaping humanity as a whole, they create and share a network of creative ideas, history, and overall entertainment; to lose books would be like losing patches of humankind’s history. Creativity, history, feelings and thoughts: all of the aspects that make us human...gone. Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury illustrates the story of a man named Guy Montag, who struggles to live in a futuristic dystopian society where censorship through book burning is prominent. Throughout Fahrenheit 451, Bradbury uses multiple motifs to emphasize a certain idea or convey a message to the reader better. A motif is a recurring subject, theme, idea, or even a physical object that appears in literature. Ray Bradbury’s hostile tone towards technology gives meaning to the reader by depicting the message that technology has the power to completely detach people from their genuine emotions, as well as urge readers to not get too attached to technology because it separates them from relationships in real life.

“People need quality information, the leisure to digest it, and the freedom to act on what has been learned.”(Bradbury 85) When these aspects are removed from a society, human beings lose every right to freedom and individualism. In the novel Fahrenheit 451 and the short story Harrison Bergeron, this proves to be more than true. These pieces of literature each display similar values of society, technological advancements, rebellious acts, and a human desire for fulfillment of equality.

Fahrenheit 451 is one of the hundreds of books that contains multiple instances of social commentary. In the novel, Ray Bradbury critiques the citizens as well as their home society, which refer to the censorship the government imposes on the society. Notwithstanding the possible effects, the citizens’ minds drastically change due to the amount of brainwashing they received throughout the years to destroy all of their community’s past. Initially, we can see this when we read that the firemen are completely different than what we know today in comparison to what they formerly were. Firemen now burn houses that carried traces of books on fire to substitute the old style of extinguishing already lit fires. Little do they know that what they’re doing has a lasting impact on the people of their communities.. We see this when Montag ultimately realizes why they burn the books after talking to Clarisse McClellan, the young, perfect-looking woman that Montag finds waiting outside of the fire station one night. Montag couldn’t let anyone know what he was thinking or doing unless he wanted his life to brutally come to an end. Bradbury grew up during the times of censorship as well as the technological advancements. With these changes, a lot of the people worried about the lives of their people, Bradbury consisting of this population of people. He wrote this Novel to demonstrate what life would be like if these changes grew out of hand. During the time Bradbury wrote the book,

In Fahrenheit 451, the people living in the book are living in a world where everything they do is censored. According to the Merriam-Webster dictionary, censorship is the suppression or prohibition of any books, films, etc. that are considered obscene, politically unacceptable or a threat to security or society. The people living in the world that the novel takes place in are censored to books. Not just certain ones, but every single book that exists. Nobody remembers an era when people were allowed to read books because the people living in the book disapprove of it. When there are books, the firemen come and burn them all, because the people believe that the books are a threat to their society. Censorship is all about deciding what people

Fahrenheit 451 accurately portrays Censorship as it has been throughout history. Ray Bradbury was probably influenced by world events during his time, such as the cold war and other diplomatic leaders who have censored their citizens to avoid the truth from getting out. From politicians right now and their attempts to censor the media, to censorship from the history of other foreign countries the actions of the “Firemen” in Bradbury’s novel Fahrenheit 451 are similar in method and meaning. The action of the book burnings by the “Firemen” to destroy self-thinking and self-awareness has been shown in a never ending cycle within the book and throughout history. Disposing of offending literature, violence or potential harm to the authors of books and writings are just some of the method in which people use to ban literature.

I believe that works of fiction should have a place in the school curriculum because they are able to convey a deeper meaning, while entertaining the reader. The stories read by students often influence their perception of the world through the social issues printed in each work of fiction. In addition, some of the most well known works of literature are fictitious. For instance, classics such as “Romeo and Juliet” by William Shakespeare, “To Kill a Mockingbird” by Harper Lee, “Pride and Prejudice” by Jane Austen, and “A Christmas Carol” by Charles Dickens also broaden the students’ vocabulary and ability to analyze different situations. One may feel that without fiction in the school curriculum, students’ creativity will be suppressed.

Shall one remove the sack placed so cruelly upon one’s head by the crooks one calls society? Revealing the truths that were hidden far away in the corner of the world, Ray Bradbury wrote Fahrenheit 451 as a way to open the eyes of the reader, allowing them to understand a dystopia of hidden truths. Placed in futuristic times, the world in which Guy Montag lives is grim, in the eyes of an onlooker. From the eyes of Guy Montag however, nothing was wrong. He has the job that he loves, a wife to come home to every night, everything is safe, or in other words, peaceful. Or is it? Such is the path they walk, hidden from truth and they have no reason to suspect that what they know is anything but. Montag is in several cases blind.

Someone famous once stated, “The eyes are useless when the mind is blind”. In our present society, to find a place in which our minds are not being constantly suffocated with what the world wants us to perceive is becoming a strenuous task. From the grocery store to the rooms of our very own homes nothing seems to be of our own conscience anymore. Yet we are able to turn a blind eye to this fact. Why’s that? Just take a few seconds to think to yourself, “ How long [has] it [been]since you were really bothered? [Bothered ]about something important, about something real?”(pg)