Theme Of Alienation In Fahrenheit 451

The people of Fahrenheit 451 are so engrossed with technology that they avoid physical contact, and even conversations with other people. Montag is alienated from Mildred, by the three T.V. walls she had set up between them; which she isolates herself with her fictitious T.V. family. Alienation slowly affects Montag. It was first noticed by the firehouse’s mechanical hound, Montag then begins to lose interest in playing games with his firemen coworkers. He was completely alienated from the firemen after they got a call and the firemen and Montag ended up in front of Montag’s own house, and they had to burn it. Some quotes from the book even support the idea of the topic. “I’m antisocial, they say. I don’t mix. It’s so strange. I’m very social indeed. It all depends on what you mean by social, doesn’t it?” said Clarisse McClellan “Social to me means talking to you about things like this.” Guy Montag said"I don't know. We have everything we need to be happy, but we aren't happy. Something's missing. I looked around. The only thing I positively knew was gone was the books I'd burned in ten or twelve years. So I

Holden has very noble goals, he wants to protect children’s innocence. He says to his little sister “‘Anyway, I keep picturing all these little kids playing some game in this big field of rye and all. Thousands of little kids, and nobody’s around-nobody big, I mean-except me. And I’m standing on the edge of

What would a society be like if there was no individualism? In the novel Fahrenheit 451, by Ray Bradbury, a man named Guy Montag, a local fireman, talked about his feelings towards the society in which he lives. Montag lives in a society where there is very little individualism. He is unhappy with this because he feels something is missing. Then Montag meets Clarisse, his 17 year old neighbor, and she inspires him to stand out and be individual. Individualism is important in a society where conforming is normal because it makes people stand out and that can shock people into being different as well.

The book Fahrenheit 451 is a book that promotes many themes and morals. There are more than just a few themes we can see in this story, some of them quite different to the others. Some of this has to do with violence, in the book we read about how young people go around killing others just like them or sometimes just because they are a bit different, which shouldn’t matter, another one about how the citizens are not satisfied with how they’re living their lives. What if many of them actually found appealing or amazing the art of writing but weren’t able to pursue that because in that society it wasn’t right to do that, it was more like a crime.

Holden then realizes that he wants to help preserve children’s innocence before they go out in to a corrupt world. He wants to become a catcher in the rye, and catch children before they go off the “cliff”, as he did. “ What I have to do, I have to catch everybody if they start to go over the cliff- I mean if they’re running and they don’t look where they’re going I have to come out from somewhere and catch them.”(P173) Holden can be compared to peter pan in the

Throughout the story Holden emphasizes his love for childhood innocence. In a passage he says “The thing with kids is, if they want to grab for the golden ring, you have to let them do it, and not say anything.” (Salinger 211) This immediately points to his affinity for innocence and not having the limits of being and adult. The

Holden is unable to accept realities of life because of his negative personality. He claims that many people are phony and that they try to do things to make them look better than they are. Holden also thinks of many things as depressing. “It was really nice sightseeing, if you know what I mean. In a way, it was sort of depressing, too, because you kept wondering what the hell would happen to all of them” (p. 123). Holden always finds a down side to a situation. He fails to recognize the good sides of life, and this prevents him from seeing advantages in adulthood that are not present in his life.

Holden’s contempt for adults goes deeper than teen angst or a need to rebel. Rebellion is done out of a need for attention, however in Holden’s case he acts upon a fear and unresolved childhood trauma. Throughout the novel, we see our character Holden bouncing around denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and finally acceptance. Holden lost his brother to leukemia; Holden was 13, while Allie was 11. Holden was left devastated. At the beginning of this book we see Holden in isolation watching the football game on his own atop a hill after a long disappointing day in New York. Holden tells us about when he found out about Allie’s death, and in a fit of rage punched the windows out of the garage of their summer home, breaking his hand with the desire to punch the car windows out. Holden was unable to reconcile the loss of Allie. He missed the funeral because of his accident and continues to not visit the grave because of his denial of the situation. Holden used bargaining when he asked Allie to catch him in his fall through depression. Holden perceived the children of the rye as falling, while he was the only one actually falling with no one to catch him. Throughout the entire novel except in short bits, Holden claims to be depressed and hates being around those with less than himself. Finally, at the end of the book, Holden reaches an acceptance that he can’t control everything and life continues. He has to let go and allow others to reach for that carousel's golden ring even if they do fall along the

In the course of the story, Holden is suspended between adulthood and childhood. Several of his actions and words show evidence of his confusion between adults and children. Admitting to his immaturity, Holden says, “I was sixteen then, and I’m seventeen now, and sometimes I act like I’m about thirteen.” (p. 9) Sunny, the prostitute is an example of Holden’s attempt to be an adult, but realizing he is stuck in childhood. Another example is when he asks his cab driver where the ducks in Central Park go during the Winter when the ice is

Holden is attracted to the privileges that adulthood offers. Drinking, Sex, Independence and Smoking represent aspects of adulthood that Holden is not averse to and is genuinely excited by. After arriving in New York, Holden attempts to act as an adult, but his attempts fail miserably. He tries to order a scotch and soda but is carded and must settle for a coke instead. Holden is content with childhood right up until it forfeits him an opportunity to get a drink. He wants to be an adult, but also wants to be a kid. He seems excited with the freedom but fears the loss of innocence and responsibility that

We sit on the subways and we ride on the busses, we drown the outside world with our headphones and our television sets, and we walk on the sidewalks brushing past one another just enough to avoid physical contact so that we can continue on our "merry" way towards our next destination. As a society, we beeline our way through life, weaving between moments of rendezvous and accidental concurrence, and we surround ourselves with instruments of interference in an attempt to pull ourselves out of the day-to-day life. As they say, art imitates life, and in a very sadistic way Fahrenheit 451 imitates what we are, and what we could become. Fahrenheit depicts a future where the common people surround themselves

Throughout the novel Holden supports children’s endeavors because he cites their “innocence”. Holden has three

Holden believes that he can change the world and he reveals his feelings on a date with Sally '" Did you ever get fed up? … I mean did you ever get scared that everything was going to go lousy unless you did something…"'(pg 130). Holden proposes to Sally to escape this world with him. It is finally to his younger sister that Holden reveals that he wants to prevent children from growing up. He blames the world's corruption on adults and believes that when he stops the children from growing up he will preserve their innocence and save the world.

This passage proves that Holden is dissatisfied with the boys at his school, he believes they are fake and he does not social well with them. Although Holden doesn’t want to interact much, when he does end up interacting with people, he usually gets the short end of the stick. For instance he invites Ackley, a boy he meets at Pency Prep, along to the movies, but Ackley won't return the favor by letting Holden sleep in his roommate's bed. ‘“I’m not worried about it. Only, I’d hate like hell if Ely came in all of a sudden and found some guy-”’ (Salinger 49). Another instance is when Holden pays Sunny even though they don’t have sex, and ends up getting scammed. At a young age, Holden lost his younger brother, Allie. This had a huge traumatizing effect on him; Holden felt useless because he was unable to help his brother. Holden turns his emotions into anger; stating that he punched out all the windows in the garage. Another time Holden felt unable to help was when his peer, James Castle, was harassed and bullied, leading to James’s suicide. Holden says, “... and there was old James Castle laying right on the stone steps and all. He was dead, and his teeth, and blood, were all over the place, and nobody would even go near him. He had on this turtleneck sweater I'd lent him”’ (Salinger 170). Holden feels that society had

However if they get criticized, why should not the adults be too? However, if that does not work they will attend to act like adults, try to be independent and experiment with unfamiliar things as sex and alcohol. Yet they cannot transform overnight, resultantly the child in them comes forth once the responsibility becomes too much to handle. And this is all a part of young adolescents ways to find themselves and their own identity. Which brings us to the question, is Holden a ‘rebel without a cause’?