preview

What Is The Role Of Oppression In Fahrenheit 451

Good Essays

Leonard Nimoy looked down at the script and cleared his throat as he began to say “During the whole of a dull, dark, and soundless day in the autumn of the year, when the clouds hung oppressively low in the heavens, I had been passing alone, on horseback through a singularly dreary tract of country, and at length found myself, as the shades of evening drew on, within view of the melancholy House of Usher” (Nimoy). Nimoy, a science fiction super star in his own regard was reading from Ray Bradbury’s “April 2005: Usher II” to an audience nationwide. Ray Bradbury had created the book as a pre-emptive strike towards censorship that would be followed up by “Fahrenheit 451”. As he considered the greatest threat to the world to be the suppression …show more content…

Mr. Stendahl had left Earth to escape the book burnings, but he decides that he will not run anymore, and makes his last stand towards oppression with his house that defies the government’s policies on free-expression. Inside the house, he takes his favorite parts from Poe’s stories, and creates a labyrinth of death traps based off of the ways people died in the books. He invites all those that would see his house destroyed, the people responsible for the destruction of inspiration in the form of liberal art. They were “Eminent, eminent people, one and all, members of the Society for the Prevention of Fantasy, advocators of the banishment of Halloween and Guy Fawkes, killer of bats, burner of books, bearers of torches; good clean citizens, every one . . .” (Bradbury.676). Bradbury shows how the model citizen in his dystopia is a sheep to those in power, with no real thought of their own. They blindly follow the will of their leaders, taking joy in the destruction of materials that has brought joy to so many for so long.
The story reaches its conclusion with Stendahl bricking in a government inspector in the catacombs of the house, with Stendahl forcing the agent to say “For the love of God, Montresor” before he puts in the final brick and leaves him to die (Bradbury.682). The finale that was a reference to Poe’s “The Cask of Amontillado” where the exact same thing happened, admittedly less forced though. In part the constant use of Poe is why it is a successfully story, as it is almost as though it is a new take on a bunch of old and familiar horror stories with the addition of the trending science fiction

Get Access