Fahrenheit 451 Theme Analysis

The science fiction novel, Fahrenheit 451, by Ray Bradbury, is about a futuristic dystopian society where everyone follows simple rules/norms: don't read books and spend time with their “families”. The families in the novel are also known as the TV’s. Whoever in the novel reads or owns books, gets put down by the hound. Montag, a protagonist in the novel, works as the fireman whom are very violent (like the rest of the society). No one in this society ever think, but when Montag (Protagonist) meets Clarisse McClellan, he becomes to question everything. Bradbury tries to portray that when people become emotionless, they don’t think about their actions which end up being violent. Bradbury’s hound (terrifying mechanical beast that kills who are unlawful) represents a type of police in the society that regulates everything and everyone. Thus Bradbury’s predictions are similar to today’s society in the police forces (which are controlled by the government).

Ray Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 451, is set in a dystopian society. The government’s main belief is happiness is the result of everyone being equal. The government believes that certain books should be forbidden because those books bring false, individual ideas, which make people unhappy. Guy Montag is just like every other fireman: he does not read the books, just burns them. Then one day, he meets Clarisse, a young girl, that challenges his viewpoint of life. After several conversations with her, he begins to question the government’s ideals. He starts stealing and reading the forbidden books, and he begins to understand the purpose of those books. Montag then meets up with an old friend, and they make plans to start a revolution by

In Ray Bradbury’s novel Fahrenheit 451, Guy Montag is one man attempting to turn his society upside down. After discovering for himself the injustice of his society as it shuns all literature, Montag relentlessly fights to fix this corruption and endures large amounts of persecution in the process (Bradbury). Meanwhile, in his autobiography, Narrative in the Life of Frederick Douglass, Douglass recounts his past as a single slave doing his best to right the evils of southern slaveholders. Although one takes place in a fantasy and one during 19th century America, both works portray individuals going against the unjust grain of their societies, and persevering through extreme opposition in the process. After escaping the grip of slavery, Douglass recounts his life story to a curious, yet most-likely privileged audience in an intelligent and revealing manner. Throughout his narrative, Douglass praises the surprising resilience of the human spirit even in the midst of constant hardship.

Fahrenheit 451’s underlying themes help strengthen the setting of the book. Ray Bradbury uses technology as a theme to show how it can change us into a society that is easily influenced. Society in Fahrenheit 451 is obsessed with technology that they have created a virtual reality with their TV parlors. These TV parlors are so real seeming that those watching can’t come to their own conclusions of what is being said. “The televisor is ‘real’. It is immediate, it has dimension. It tells you what to think and blasts it in. it must be right. It seems so right.” (Bradbury, page 112). By the TV parlors blasting in what to, and what to think, the government had complete control over its’ citizens, and it’s no surprise that the people in Bradbury’s

“There is something bigger than fact: the underlying spirit, the mood, the vastness, the wildness,” Emily Carr explains during an interview. Carr explicates a compelling idea: Works of literature contain a sub-meaning or an underlying meaning. These sub-meaning emerges in the bestselling science fiction book written by Ray Bradbury, Fahrenheit 451. Ray Bradbury expresses sub-meanings in his text by utilizing character foils. Through the character foil displayed in the fictional personas, Montag and Beatty, Ray Bradbury elucidates three main ideas: contradicting viewpoints will unfailingly exist; choices define a person; to choose knowledge is greatness.

“The woman reached out with contempt to them all, and struck the kitchen match against the railing” (37). Montag and the other firemen report to a house that is suspected of harboring books. They are correct, and they find books in the attic of the home. The books belong to an old woman whose name is unknown to the readers, and she was devastated that the firemen were destroying her home and books. Ultimately she kills herself by setting fire to herself, her home, and the books. The very property and books in question that were about to be burned by Captain Beatty. She felt that books were so important in her life that she could not go on without them. Some people would feel that things to die for, like freedom, liberty, and their family would be more important, but this woman chose her books. It seems very clear to me that Ray Bradbury seems to be telling us, the readers, that there are things in life

Montag lives in a society where books aren’t allowed, but when he starts realizing things his feelings change about books and love. Clarisse a girl comes into Montag’s life and shows him a different view in love. Also, an old man, Fabor, Montag met at the park shows Montag a different view in books. Montag believed that reading books were useless and that he’s in love with mildred, but towards the end Montag learns from Clarisse and Fabor that books are more than words on paper and that he wasn’t really in love with Mildred.

Fahrenheit 451 takes place in a futuristic American West where books are outlawed and burned by firemen. The main character, Guy Montag is a fireman who burns books for a living, but doesn't

Montag could see the millions of little crumbles and bits of building that at one time in history were considered modern and original. Montag saw the remains of the building like they were all the rules and standards of society, holding him back in his past. He was startled, confused, and almost refreshed by the perspectives he was receiving from just a long glance at the remains. The thoughts flowing through his mind caught him completely off guard, almost like being slammed with one, bold, enormous brick. They left him feeling empowered and wise, like he all of a sudden understood all the unanswered questions flowing through his mind, even the ones that were nonsense, and he felt free, from the chains, the locks, and the bolts, locking

In the beginning, Montag is one with the culture: drab and superficial. He thinks little about his job – which is to respond to emergencies of books being found in homes – and does not give much thought as to what he is doing when he sets houses ablaze. Many factors play a role in changing Guy. Clarisse McClellan opens his eyes to the beauty of written works and taking time to think: “(Clarisse) I tell them that sometimes I just sit and think. (Montag) You’re peculiar, you’re aggravating, yet you’re easy to forgive” (Bradbury 21). Montag believes that Clarisse should be seeing a psychiatrist because she is abnormal and does strange things such as spend her free time thinking and tilting her head back to taste the rain. Another event that makes Montag do a double-take is when he responds to a call about a woman’s house that has many books within. She sets fire to her own house and dies in doing so. Montag thinks there must be a reason worth dying for that she had to do such a thing. Is their society not perfect after all? Is there something in those books that is truly life changing? A third occasion that must have had some effect on Montag is when Mildrid overdosed on sleeping pills because she forgets she has taken them already. In the morning after her stomach is pumped, “She watched his lips casually. What about last night?” (Bradbury 16). Mildrid

‘Nineteen Eighty-Four’ and ‘Fahrenheit 451’ are both dystopian novels published just after the end of the Second World War. ‘Nineteen Eighty-Four’ by George Orwell is set in ‘Airstrip One’; the ‘future’ England, which has become a totalitarian government that persecutes all individualism and independent thinking as ‘thoughtcrime’. ‘Fahrenheit 451’ by Ray Bradbury however, is set in a future American society where books are outlawed and any found are burned. Both novels explore how governments can oppress their citizens by propaganda, such as the Big Brother posters everywhere, which are meant to give the citizens a feeling of protection, and also denying them the right to knowledge and individualism.

Most people do not consider that committing suicide or bullying people is “fun.” However, in Montag’s society, they do enjoy doing those activities. In Ray Bradbury’s novel “Fahrenheit 451”, a firefighter named Guy Montag lives in a society where having books are considered against the law, and he realizes that this city needs books and tries to change people’s opinions. Montag molds from a person like everybody else in this world into an outlaw trying to bring books back into people’s life tying it with the theme of this novel and is impacted by the conflicts he faces in the dystopian society.

Information and knowledge, invaluable in society, are concealed and destroyed due to the government’s greed for power. The novel Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury follows the life of Guy Montag, a fireman, as he attempts to understand the dystopian society around him and his life. Montag rebels against the government and society itself in an attempt to understand his purpose. In the futuristic novel, books are illegal and burned in fires when found in homes. When Montag reveals his own collection of books, his world begins to change. In the novel and in life, people have restricted access to knowledge and information. This dystopian quality can be a result of the government’s desire to protect the people, or due to the government’s want to

The lack of action to fight for their freedoms is concerning for both speakers in these examples. In her article, Paretsky addresses the amount of restrictions the government has put into today’s literature. She identifies the fears authors , like herself, have when they decide what to put in their books. She warns our society to not ignore the government taking our liberties. Paretsky indicates how even in today’s society it is very hard to fight for our freedom, and risk going to “prison” if we have the courage to do so. In Fahrenheit 451, Faber tells Montag about his own silence when their society began to banish books from their world. He explains that he was “one of the innocents who could have spoken up and out when no one would listen

Now at first glance anyone may look at the book and wonder what does Fahrenheit 451 mean? Well Fahrenheit 451 is the temperature at which paper catches on fire. This is our first glimpse into Ray Bradbury’s dystopian world in Fahrenheit 451. So, this book was originally published in 1953 during World War II and starting the Cold War, which plays a huge role in what this book symbolizes. The author of Fahrenheit 451 is Ray Bradbury.