Literary Elements In 'The Jacket'

“If you hide your ignorance, no one will hit you and you'll never learn.” (Bradbury pg.104) In Fahrenheit 451 and The Pedestrian, the main characters witnessed the rarity of social interaction and how inclined people are to their screens. Author Ray Bradbury describes how it has gotten to the point where people are more in touch with technology rather than each other. Through foreshadowing and flashback, Ray Bradbury’s short story, The Pedestrian, and his novel, Fahrenheit 451, explain how society has become more ignorant in a technology-obsessed world.

First, the metaphors in “The Jacket” support the theme because they help clarify that everything one has is important. In the article the boy says,”That green ugly brother who breathed over my shoulder that day and ever

In Fahrenheit 451, The Hearth and the Sledgehammer, Ray Bradbury writes of a fireman, Guy Montag, who is the fireman in charge of burning books. He wears a helmet with the numbers 451 engraved in it, which represents the temperature at which paper burns. His uniform, black with with a sledgehammer on the arm, which seems to really attract the ladies. After suspecting an abiding near by he decides to meet up with his new neighbor, Clarisse, instantaneously she becomes greatly intoxicated by the fact that he is a fireman and feels a slight attraction toward him. Clarisse's constant “flirting” with Montag causes him to slightly feel attracted to her. After meeting with his new neighbor Montag returns home only to find his wife, Mildred, doing exactly what she had been doing for the past two years, listening to the radio with her earphones.

In a deeper sense, the writer is saying that the boy was just making things up and no one was whispering about him due to the fact he thought he looked stupid in the jacket. Ultimately, the middle of the story sets up the theme of the story by vividly describing how the jacket had affected him emotionally. At the end of the story, Gary Soto uses Personification and Imagery to develop the theme of how clothes can affect one’s life. For example, when explaining all the negative things that have happened to him when he has worn the jacket, the boy says, “Even the girls who had been friendly blew away like loose flowers to follow the boys in the neat jackets.” In other words, he thinks girls who liked him don’t anymore because of his jacket.

In this world what people often forget about that a human can do is cause mass destruction, things one should remember can be forgotten easily and just as fast as it came it leave, this can be seen in the books around us. Authors share their opinion through the words they write talking about society and how if we keep going the direction we are going we will find ourselves in deep trouble, the messages authors are trying to send can be seen through social commentary, many books have powerful messages behind them; especially in dystopian novels and movies. They show these messages through diction,syntax, imagery, and character development; for examples the books and movies; Fahrenheit 451, Incarceron, Wall-E, and Hunger games. The authors Ray Bradbury, Catherine Fisher, Andrew Stanton, and Suzanne Collins all convey a message through their works through syntax, diction, camera angles, and imagery; emphasizing their warnings of what they fear may happen.

When an author sits down to write a novel one of the most important questions is: "Where is the story going to take place?". This is because the land can have an effect on what happens in the story through culture, geography, or placement on the map. As stated in chapter nineteen of Thomas Foster's How to Read Literature Like a Professor, "The places of poems and fiction really matter. It isn't just the setting... it's a place and space and shape that bring us to ideas and psychology and history and dynamism." (Foster, 182). Placement and geography take a front seat in the novel Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury through country and city.

In the short story “The Pedestrian,” by Ray Bradbury, he writes about the future. A man goes for a walk every night through the cold dead of night. The town is full of zombies, no one goes out at night. He gets stopped by the police and is questioned about his whereabouts. Bradbury utilizes similes to further establish the setting in the reader's mind.

A common theme in the book is that of symbolism in language. Pierre Bourdieu, a sociologist, in brought to light the idea of symbolic language. Bourdieu shows that there is two different types of language, signs and symbolism (Bourdieu, 1991). A sign is what it means stop means stop. Symbolism would be what the boys did in their delinquency, they acted out in aggression to thoughts of authority and get punished. In the eyes of the boys they saw that they received more respect afterward.

The boy’ self esteem is constantly being lowered because of the people and mainly the jacket. Even his own friends are not being as nice as they normally are. The symbol also relates to the theme because his jacket did not meet his expectation so he feels sad because of the color. His peers do not make him feel any better instead they make fun of him. He no longer has happiness that he used to and this is causing him to feel

“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

Many authors use literary devices such as allusions, metaphors, similes, imagery, euphemisms, and others to create a more enhanced effect to their work. Ray Bradbury, the author of the acclaimed dystopian novel, Fahrenheit 451, cleverly incorporated several of these, throughout the text, along with a lot of symbolism. One example is the relentless burning of literature, symbolizing the ignorance of human beings, as well as the censorship of knowledge and freedom of thought. Another example is the many fascinating technological innovations featured in the novel, such as the TV walls or the mechanical hound, which expresses how people had mindlessly replaced the “real” stuff with the artificial.

In addition to this, belonging to a family is a key concept in this novel. The novel opens with an alluring introduction to the family; a blissful atmosphere is created through the picturesque icons of their family life. The composer uses small photograph like icons to allude towards the widely acknowledged contentment that is readily associated with the memories in a picture album. Tan introduces the motif of the paper crane which he carries through the length of his novel as a symbol of affection and belonging between the family members. The next pages signify the break in contentment as the man begins his journey and a salient image of the couple with their hands grasping the other’s parallels the anxiety and despair in their downcast facial expressions. Although the gloomy atmosphere, the light sepia tones in the picture allow an insight into the tender and loving relationship that the family members share. Upon the man’s departure the paper crane motif returns and he hands it to his daughter as a token of his undying love for her. His migratory experience is studded by the comfort and ease that he obtains from a picture of his family. In paralleled scenes on the boat and the new apartment, the

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.

Henry 's worn clothing, boots, and Bonita 's picture all convey symbolism in The Red Convertible by Lousie Erdrich. These symbols are presented to provide the reader a better understanding of Henry 's emotional transition when he returned from the military. Henry 's worn clothing represented who he used to be before the military, and what psychological struggles he couldn 't escape. The boots represented the emotional turmoil he faced in the military, and Bonita 's picture of Henry helped show how detached he became with the world around him.

“Then, moaning, she ran forward, seized a book and ran toward the kitchen incinerator. He caught her, shrieking. He held her and she tried to fight away from him scratching,” (63). In the novel Fahrenheit 451 follows the protagonist, Guy Montag, and his interactions with society discouraging and encouraging his discovery of the illegal books. Along the way he understands who are the poisonous people in his dystopian world and who are not; changing his perspective to lose trust in his wife Mildred, from previous quote, and finding safety with Faber, a retired professor he came by one day in a park. In the novel Fahrenheit 451 the author demonstrates the idea that when there is censorship in the world, ignorance will follow because when a subject is hidden from one anything they do regarding it is under the impression of their lack of knowledge surrounding the topic, this becomes more relevant when Ray Bradbury acknowledges the emotions of people who have read books and whom haven't and their general opinions of them.