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Fahrenheit 451

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Fahrenheit 451
AuthorRay Bradbury
LanguageEnglish
GenreDystopian Novel
PublisherSimon & Schuster
Publication date
1953
Publication placeUnited States
Media typePrint (Hardback & Paperback)
Pages208 pp
ISBNISBN 0743247221 (Hardcover) Parameter error in {{ISBNT}}: invalid character
This article is about the novel. For the 1966 film adaptation, see Fahrenheit 451 (film). For the rock band of the same name, see Fahrenheit 451 (band).

Fahrenheit 451 is a dystopian fiction novel by Ray Bradbury. It is set in a world in which the reading of books is banned and critical thought is suppressed; the central character, Guy Montag, is employed as a "fireman" (which, in this case, means "book burner"). 451 degrees Fahrenheit (about 233°C) is stated as "the temperature at which book-paper catches fire, and burns ...". It was originally published as a shorter novella The Fireman in the February 1951 issue of Galaxy Science Fiction. The novel was made into a movie in 1966 by François Truffaut. In addition to the movies, there have been at least two BBC Radio 4 dramatisations, both of which follow the book very closely.

The novel reflects several major concerns of the time of its writing: what Bradbury has called "the thought-destroying force" of McCarthyism in the 1950s; the burnings of books in Nazi Germany starting in 1933; Stalin's suppression of authors and books in the Soviet Union; and the horrible consequences of an explosion of a nuclear weapon. "I meant all kinds of tyrannies anywhere in the world at any time, right, left, or middle," Bradbury has said.[1]

One particularly ironic circumstance is that, unbeknownst to Bradbury, his publisher released a censored edition in 1967 that eliminated the words "damn" and "hell" for distribution to schools. Later editions with all words restored include a "Coda" from the author describing this event and further thoughts on censorship and "well-meaning" revisionism.

Plot summary

Template:Spoiler The story takes place sometime in the twenty-first century, in an America which has turned hedonistic and rabidly anti-intellectual. Books are banned, with the penalty for owning one confinement in a mental hospital and having your house, books and all, burnt by "firemen". In the government's, and consequently the society's, opinion, books contain problems and conflicting theories causing people to be anxious, sad, or angry. They are disruptive to society and full of nonsense. According to the authorities, Benjamin Franklin was the first fireman and firemen have always burned books.

For ten years the protagonist, Guy Montag, works with grim pleasure as a fireman, seemingly committed to the concept that books have nothing to say. The stench of kerosene in his nostrils and the spark in his eyes do little, however, to mask the loneliness he feels coming home to his wife, Mildred, a woman who, at all times seeks self-stimulation in various forms, such as a miniature radio jammed in her ear at night or the three wall TVs in the parlour, with their silly shows, lacking any sense or meaning.

At first, Guy is proud of his work. He thinks it is a fine job and parrots what he has been told by his superiors. Upon meeting Clarisse McClellan, a 17-year-old girl living in Montag's neighbourhood, who is considered abnormal because of her compassion and her simple interest in the world around her, his way of thinking changes. Unlike Guy, she pays attention to nature, which "normal" people don't care about anymore. She makes him reflect on life and his work. She poses essential questions to him, asking him if he is happy, and why things are the way they are. This results in Guy beginning to think about his situation. Clarisse dies early in the story and acts as a catalyst to Guy's transformation. Guy develops from a loyal servant of the state's ideology to a self-confident human being with his own free will.

Guy's wife Mildred has lost her free will, self-confidence, and the desire to question societal norms, preferring to sit in her parlour and watch TV. She seems to be happy, but early in the book Montag finds her dying from an overdose of sleeping pills. Her suicide attempt belies her outward self confidence. Because she is constantly distracting herself with broadcast entertainment, Montag feels estranged from her.

Montag's descent into radicalism is triggered by the defiant self-immolation of an elderly book hoarder. She refuses to allow the firemen to burn her house down, and instead strikes the match herself. Montag is deeply disturbed and upset by the incident. He becomes curious as to why the woman considered books important enough to die for, and does much soul-searching. Eventually, he begins to read. He wonders if he could ever do his job again, both because of the old woman's death, and because of his new interest in books.

Beatty, the Captain of his fire station, comes to Montag's house because of Montag's suspicious absence from work. He explains the history of the fire brigade and why society has become so vehemently opposed to literature. It is implied that Beatty is well-read and already knows that Montag has at least one book. Beatty mentions in passing that once in his career every fireman wants to know what books say, and if a fireman takes a book with him, he has 24 hours to burn it, or the fire house comes and burns it for him.

Montag is unconvinced by Beatty's speech and looks up Faber, a retired English professor whom he met a year earlier. Montag visits Faber and he tells him of his problems. Faber advises Montag against violent protest, but also acknowledges his own cowardice in allowing society to become so anti-intellectual. They decide to copy books and plant them in firemen's houses, to sabotage the fire brigade. Faber gives Montag a two-way "seashell" (a small audio device resembling an earbud) with which he will be able to listen in on Montag's conversations and advise him on what to say. When Montag arrives at the fire house, he hands Beatty his Bible. Beatty attempts to test him, by quoting from several books, but they are interupted by a call. When they arrive at the house to be burned, Montag recognizes it as his own.

Beatty forces Montag to prove his loyalty by burning down his own house. When he further antagonizes him, and threatens to find Faber, Montag points the flamethrower at him and burns him alive. As Montag escapes, he knocks out his fellow firemen, then flees for his life, pursued by a relentless Mechanical Hound. The robot is armed with a syringe filled with a lethal dose of narcotics, and tracks Montag by scent. The pursuit is aired live on TV.

After warning Faber to destroy all traces of his presence at Faber's house and flee the city, Montag himself flees for the countryside. The police eventually lose his trail and are forced to kill an insomniac in place of Montag, so that the viewing public can enjoy a good show (this is a reference to a short story of Bradbury's "The Pedestrian", which features a similarly insomniac gentleman who walks for pleasure and is detained by the police when he gives this as reason).

Montag, having washed off his scent in a local river, floats downstream and meets a group of tramps — mostly older men — who, to Montag's astonishment, have been expecting him. Every one of them has committed entire books to memory, to share with those who would listen, until books will be allowed again. They themselves burned the books they read to prevent them from being discovered. Amongst them is Granger, the leader of the group. He has a talk with Granger about the fact that it is necessary for the mythical phoenix to be consumed by fire when it gets old and complacent, for it to be born again.

The city which Montag has just fled is soon bombed. It is implied that the bombs are nuclear weapons. Montag and the tramps return to the city, to help reconstruct society with their knowledge.

Characters in "Fahrenheit 451"

  • Guy Montag is the protagonist and fireman (see above) whose metamorphosis is illustrated throughout the book and who presents the dystopia through the eyes of a loyal worker to it, a man in conflict about it, and one resolved to be free of it. Bradbury notes in his afterword that Montag is the name of a paper mill. The first name, Guy, comes from Guy Fawkes who in the 17th century tried to kill the king and burn down the parliament building
  • Faber is the former English professor who represents those who know what is being done is wrong, but are too fearful to act. Bradbury notes in his coda that Faber is part of the name of a manufacturer of pencils (Faber-Castell).
  • Mildred Montag is Montag's wife, who tries to hide her own emptiness and fear of questioning her surroundings or herself, with drugs, meaningless chatter, and a constant barrage of television. She constantly tries to reach the glorified state of happiness, but is inwardly miserable. She is used symbolically as the opposite of Clarisse McClellan. She is known as Linda Montag in the 1966 film.
  • Clarisse McClellan displays every trait Mildred does not. She is outgoing, naturally cheerful, and intuitive. She serves as the "wake up call" for Guy Montag, by posing the question "why" to him. She is unpopular among peers, and disliked by parents for (as she puts it) asking why instead of how, and focusing on nature rather than technology. Montag always regards her as odd until she goes missing; the book gives no definitive explanation. But it is said that Captain Beatty and Mildred know that Clarisse has been killed by a car.
  • Captain Beatty is Montag's boss and the fire chief. Once an avid reader himself, he is disgusted with the idea of books and detests how they all contradict and refute each other. In a removed scene by Bradbury, he invited Guy to his house where he shows him walls of books which he leaves to molder on their shelves. He tries to entice Guy back into the book-burning business, but is burnt alive by Montag when he underestimates Montag's resolve. Guy later realizes that Beatty might have wanted to die and provoked Guy until he did it. He is the symbolic opposite of Granger.
  • Granger is the leader of a group of wandering intellectual exiles, who memorize books so they will be saved. Where Beatty destroys, he creates; where Beatty uses fire for the purpose of burning, he uses it for the purpose of warming. His acceptance of Montag is considered the final step in Montag's metamorphosis, from embracing Beatty's ultimate value (happiness and complacency), to embracing his value (love of knowledge).
  • Mechanical Hound The mechanical hound exists in the original book but not in the film. It is an emotionless, mechanical killing machine that can be programmed to seek out and destroy free thinkers, hunting them down by their scents; the hound is blind to anything but the destruction for which it is programmed.
  • Mildred's friends (Mrs. Bowles and Mrs. Phelps) Mildred's friends represent the average citizens in the numbed society that is described throughout the novel. They are examples of the people in this society who are not happy, but do not think they are unhappy. When they are introduced to literature, which symbolizes the pain and joy that has been censored from them, Mrs. Phelps is overwhelmed by the rush of emotion that she has not felt before.

Template:Endspoiler

Allusions/references from other works

The title of Bradbury's book has become a well-known byword amongst those who oppose censorship, in much the way George Orwell's 1984 has (although not to the same extent). As such, it has been alluded to in dozens of later contexts, amongst them the ACLU's 1997 whitepaper Fahrenheit 451.2: Is Cyberspace Burning? and Michael Moore's 2004 documentary Fahrenheit 9/11 (Bradbury objected to its allusion of his work [1]).

  • The title of the documentary feature Fahrenheit 9/11 was derived from Ray Bradbury's science fiction novel Fahrenheit 451 and the September 11, 2001 attacks. Bradbury did not appreciate this reference to his book and referred to director Michael Moore as a "screwed asshole".[2]
  • The movie Equilibrium, starring Christian Bale and Sean Bean, draws heavily from Fahrenheit 451, as well as 1984 and Brave New World. The most notable is the overall plot; Both Montag and Equilibrium's main character, John Preston, are enforcers of the law in the near future where literature is a crime, start to experience illegal emotions after they come into contact with females who have broken the law. They eventually both are hunted for treason.
  • The "rat things" of Neal Stephenson's novel Snow Crash heavily resemble the Mechanical Hounds in being literally dead-alive (as cyborg dogs), in their tracking and killing methods, and in their use to hunt down criminals.
  • Artist Micah Wright used the theme "Hand all books to your local fireman for safe disposal" overlayed on a 1940s fireman propaganda poster.
  • In the movie Velvet Goldmine, which features original music, a reference to Fahrenheit 451 was in the lyrics of the Ballad of Maxwell Demon, which said "the boys from quadrant 44 with their vicious metal hounds don't come round here no more".
  • In 1984 a Fahrenheit 451 video game was made for the C64 and the Apple II computers.
  • In the show The Famous Jett Jackson, the episode "Saving Mr. Dupree" centered around the banning of the book.
  • In 1989, an instructional pornography movie titled Fahrenheit 69: The Desired Temperature for Oral Sex, was released.
  • The Ion Storm Dallas computer game Deus Ex uses 0451 as an early keycode, as "an allusion to System Shock's allusion to Fahrenheit 451".
  • Looking Glass Studios also used 451 for the security keypad to their main offices [3].
  • In the season two ending episode of the West Wing in a flash back teenage Jed Bartlett is in an arguement about book banning included is Fahrenheit 451 which he says is 'about banning books'
  • An episode of R.O.D the TV entitled "Fahrenheit 451" features all the books in Jinbocho being piled up and set aflame.
  • The novel is mentioned in a Five Iron Frenzy song

Accuracy as a vision of the future

Several aspects of the fictional future depicted in the novel have become reality in the late 20th and early 21st century:

  • There are now live television broadcasts of police pursuits of fugitives, aided by helicopter-mounted cameras and supplemented by voice-over commentary by announcers.
  • "Seashell radios" closely resemble portable radios and earbuds, such as those found in portable audio players, the two-way version that Faber gives Montag could be considered a highly miniaturized version of modern ear-clip cellphones.
  • Some people believe that television content has become more empty (for instance, reality television; see also the above comment on broadcast police chases in view of shows like Cops).
  • Anti-depressant pills have become much more common and commercialized (see also Brave New World).
  • Abortion and caesarian section are used for non-lifesaving reasons.
  • There is a greater reliance on anonymous tips by law enforcement agencies (portrayed in the movie version).
  • Political candidacy is determined in part by media corporations through manipulating presentations and report schemes (see spin (public relations)).
  • Some enforced conformity to dress codes in public (usually enforced in benign ways, but occasionally intrusive or humiliating incidents occur).
  • The use of Jesus/religion to sponsor products (while not entirely mainstream as a form of advertising, it is used quite frequently on both a small and large scale)
  • The United States being hated and verbally attacked by other nations perhaps, as Montag suggests, because it is viewed as possessing a disproportionate share of the world's wealth (see Fahrenheit 9/11).
  • The rise of political correctness which forces the revision or censorship of previously-published works to prevent offense on ethnic, racial, religious, political or moral grounds.
  • Front porches are becoming less common due to urbanization and lack of space and use.
  • Flat-screen televisions built into the walls of a house. While the techoonology is not exactly as described, and projection systems and whole wall televisions are rare, the introduction of HDTV and home theatre systems is driving adoption of ever larger television sets that dominate living space.

On the other hand, the following phenomena have not yet occurred (and Bradbury argues that the purpose of his fiction is to keep such things from happening):

  • Routine use of robots for pursuing suspects, as in the use of the Mechanical Hound, (currently in development for military application; civilian law enforcement may follow suit); this is also shown as a major plot line in the Terminator series.
  • Government endorsement of high-speed land vehicles on public highways.
  • The death of the newspaper industry (readers are resorting to radio, television, and the Internet as a news source; however, newspapers are still widely available today.)
  • Many cities continue to be, or have become, beautified by trees and plantlife, while various subcultures venerate the natural world.
  • Use of nuclear weaponry as a possibility in wartime.
  • The city the book takes place in is speculated to be an allusion to Detroit beacuase of its motto: Speramus meliora; resurget cineribus (We hope for better things, it will rise from the ashes); Granger references a phoenix in the final chapter with similar words.

Ray Bradbury Quotes

"In writing the short novel Fahrenheit 451 I thought I was describing a world that might evolve in four or five decades. But only a few weeks ago, in Beverly Hills one night, a husband and wife passed me, walking their dog. I stood staring after them, absolutely stunned. The woman held in one hand a small cigarette-package-sized radio, its antenna quivering. From this sprang tiny copper wires which ended in a dainty cone plugged into her right ear. There she was, oblivious to man and dog, listening to far winds and whispers and soap-opera cries, sleep-walking, helped up and down curbs by a husband who might just as well not have been there. This was not fiction." - Ray Bradbury on his own book, as quted by Kingsley Amis in New Maps of Hell (1960) (Back of the Third Printing paperback, December 1962)

References

  1. ^ Bradbury, Ray (2004). Conversations with Ray Bradbury. Jackson: University Press of Mississippi. p. 19. ISBN 1578066417.

Printings

  • First Printing - prebound, October 1953
  • Second Printing - paperback, April 1960
  • Third Printing - paperback, December 1962, Ballantine Books

ISBNs

  • ISBN 0606006281 (prebound, 1953)
  • ISBN 0871293102 (paperback, 1986)
  • ISBN 0345342968 (mass market paperback, 1987)
  • ISBN 089968484X (library binding, 1990, reprint)
  • ISBN 067187229X (hardcover, 1993)
  • ISBN 1560549599 (audio cassette with hardcover, 1995, unabridged)
  • ISBN 0345410017 (paperback, 1996)
  • ISBN 0783883137 (library binding, 1997, Large Type Edition)
  • ISBN 8401422825 (hardcover, 1998)
  • ISBN 0395878063 (hardcover, 1998, McDougall Littell textbook)
  • ISBN 156137301X (hardcover, 1999)
  • ISBN 1561373028 (hardcover, 1999)
  • ISBN 0791059294 (hardcover, 2001)
  • ISBN 0758776160 (hardcover, 2002)
  • ISBN 0743247221 (hardcover, 2003)
  • ISBN 0848801474 (hardcover)
  • ISBN 8401422345 (hardcover)
  • ISBN 3257208626 (paperback)
  • ISBN 7246250102 (paperback)

See also

Further reading

  • Bustard, Ned. Farenheit 451 Comprehension Guide. Veritas Press, 2004.

External links

Wikiquote has quotations related to Fahrenheit 451.
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