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Fahrenheit 451: A Novel Hardcover – Deckle Edge, September 23, 2003
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- Print length208 pages
- LanguageEnglish
- Dimensions6.25 x 1 x 8.75 inches
- PublisherSimon & Schuster
- Publication dateSeptember 23, 2003
- ISBN-100743247221
- ISBN-13978-0743247221
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Product details
- Publisher : Simon & Schuster; Reissue edition (September 23, 2003)
- Language : English
- Hardcover : 208 pages
- ISBN-10 : 0743247221
- ISBN-13 : 978-0743247221
- Reading age : 13+ years, from customers
- Item Weight : 12.8 ounces
- Dimensions : 6.25 x 1 x 8.75 inches
- Best Sellers Rank: #1,995,085 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #2,810 in Classic American Literature
- #43,005 in Classic Literature & Fiction
- #97,194 in Science Fiction (Books)
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About the author

In a career spanning more than seventy years, Ray Bradbury, who died on June 5, 2012, at the age of 91, inspired generations of readers to dream, think, and create. A prolific author of hundreds of short stories and close to fifty books, as well as numerous poems, essays, operas, plays, teleplays, and screenplays, Bradbury was one of the most celebrated writers of our time. His groundbreaking works include Fahrenheit 451, The Martian Chronicles, The Illustrated Man, Dandelion Wine, and Something Wicked This Way Comes. He wrote the screen play for John Huston's classic film adaptation of Moby Dick, and was nominated for an Academy Award. He adapted sixty-five of his stories for television's The Ray Bradbury Theater, and won an Emmy for his teleplay of The Halloween Tree. He was the recipient of the 2000 National Book Foundation Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters, the 2004 National Medal of Arts, and the 2007 Pulitzer Prize Special Citation, among many honors.
Throughout his life, Bradbury liked to recount the story of meeting a carnival magician, Mr. Electrico, in 1932. At the end of his performance Electrico reached out to the twelve-year-old Bradbury, touched the boy with his sword, and commanded, "Live forever!" Bradbury later said, "I decided that was the greatest idea I had ever heard. I started writing every day. I never stopped."
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These firemen are sanctioned by what one can only conclude to be a dystopian government to burn books, as well as the houses they are contained within. In this future world, the government has deemed books as dangerous, containing ideas that run counter to the narrative they wish to form and broadcast via televisions that cover entire walls within people’s homes. And the people want this, as they feel more comfortable with their government fed information. How dystopian indeed.
Reminds one of the behavior of the Roman Catholic Church during the Dark Ages. The two have book burning in common, as well as burning Bibles (in the case of the RCC, Bibles that didn’t subscribe to their criteria – even though they came from source material originating from the same authors). No offense to Catholics – some Protestant sects weren’t much better (like the early Anglicans who destroyed much of the Church’s property, including relics, as did Orthodox Christians during the Iconoclast Era).
Montag takes quite apparent joy in his job, causing a smile to overcome his face every time he gets to burn those devilish books. That is, until he becomes intrigued by a young neighbor girl named Clarisse. Clarisse is a female character that many feminists sadly overlook as to her importance in the overall arc of the story. Good on Bradbury for taking this approach, as you know what they say – “behind every great man, there’s an even greater woman”. This doesn’t always have to imply a spouse, mind you, and Bradbury exploited this fact while using Montag’s lame wife as a great contrast.
Clarisse is somehow able to tap into Montag’s emotional capacity to better understand what exactly his job is harming, and how his otherwise dull life (including dull wife who serves as a great example of the brainwashed zombie like people of his society) could become so much more enriched by. This confrontation with not only Clarisse – but himself – causes a sort of psychosis for our villainous protagonist. And thus begins his character development that makes the book really begin to take off and hook the reader into the protagonist’s story arc and growth.
At first, Montag struggles with his newfound understanding of the profound beauty of books. He is intrigued by the sense of wonder, emotion, and timelessness that books have to offer compared to the mind numbing talking heads that rule the day (sounds similar to our times with all the political talking heads telling how people should think, unlike books that allow people to draw their own conclusions). Yet he is still skeptical, resisting this newfound understanding as he continues in his line of work.
He challenges the notion of books being a net positive for society along the way, including challenging protectors of books along the way. All of this amidst some unknown war going on in the background of the story that is never really described in much detail. I assume that Bradbury himself had assumed (living in the days of the Cold War between the US and the USSR) that some kind of war of that magnitude coming to fruition was sadly somewhat inevitable.
As his change of heart is occurring, he struggles with his chief named Beatty (the antagonist of the story). Beatty is a walking contradiction, as he is full of knowledge pertaining to the books they burn. He is so well versed in their content by heart, yet seeks to eliminate books from existence on behalf of the government.
Unlike Montag who simply found pleasure in his destructive line of work, Beatty knows full well every reason and intention as to why they do and takes pleasure in doing so. This, all while being so well versed in the knowledge and insights contained within them. He overall sees them as dangerous, yet behaves as if the type of knowledge contained within books should be reserved for elites rather than the average citizen. This antagonist displays the kind of pretentious attitude that perfectly captures what it means to convey the notion of a dystopian society within a book of this genre.
After trials and tribulations in his struggle, Montag reaches a point where he is so moved by the message of a particular book, that he even steals it so that he can preserve it himself. As a Christian myself, I personally loved that this book just so happened to be a Bible. Why does Montag take such a personal infatuation with the Bible?
It may be that Montag’s society is so lost that when bombs begin to fall toward the end, whatever Montag had read might help him and others rebuild society for the better. After all, the Bible is full of advice, and provides direction for moral and ethical enrichment. Certainly a new society would need guidelines to rebuild and improve over mistakes made in the past.
Montag refers to the book of Job at one point in the story, as well as references made about Caanan. At the end, Montag even tries to recall parts of the books of Ecclesiastes and Revelation. The book of Revelation itself (arguably my favorite book of the Bible – I’m a fan of the dystopian genre after all) deals with the end of times. Although, perhaps Montag failed to recall this as quickly as he might because they are preparing to start a new life when the world appears to be ending.
The novel ends with Montag escaping the city in the midst of this new war. He escapes deep into the countryside, meeting a band of roving intellectuals who have elected to preserve significant works of literature in their memory. Reminds me of the Vaudois, the Waldenses and the Albigenses who preserved the original books of scripture in spite of the persecution they suffered from the RCC.
Not long after these roving intellectuals welcome Montag into their community, an atomic bomb falls on the city and reduces it to rubble. The next morning Montag leads the men on foot back toward the city with rebuilding in mind. The novel’s conclusion functions to bring the prevalent violence to its logical conclusion, which is that violence infiltrates nearly every aspect of the world our protagonist finds himself in.
The firemen violently destroy people’s property and lives. Television displays gruesome, desensitizing violence for viewers’ entertainment. Pedestrians regularly get trampled by speeding vehicles. Finally, war takes these forms of violence to a new extreme, destroying society and its infrastructure altogether. The novel’s ending depicts the inevitable self-destruction of such an oppressive society in such an effective, and rather melancholy fashion.
As stated in the beginning of the Fahrenheit 451 book review, this book is one of my all time favorites. It’s no wonder as to why I give it a 5/5 rating. Bradbury’s use of language is lyrical, yet not overly forceful. He paints a picture of a world in which we as a society should wish to avoid – in a multifaceted way.
When it comes to dystopian books, this is truly a classic – and for good reason. Not only was it tremendous back in its heyday; it has stood the test of time, proving to be of use to us nearly 70 years later. I absolutely love Fahrenheit 451, and I believe you would too if you love dystopian fiction and have happened to somehow not have read it yet (it happens – later is better than never though!).
As we grow older, we all begin to see the society we live in through different eyes. Is it because of experience? Wisdom? Trauma? I don't know. But I do know that at some point we realize we play a role in our societies and our communities, and we must evaluate if we are playing a role that coincides with the ethics and beliefs we say that we have. Guy Montag faces this exact situation and it causes him to make choices. Some of his choices feel small and some rather large, but they all set him down a path where his life is changed permanently.
Maybe it is trauma or maybe it is because I am older and a little wiser, but I really connect to Montag's story of self-realization. He is an admirable character because he realizes his choices will have consequences and still he continues forward on his path. Change is agonizing and painful. Becoming a new person is intimidating. Montag is an example of how a person can be true to themselves in any society, no matter the consequences.
Throughout the novel, the narrator describes multiple things as being alive and dead at the same time. It is shown with the woman’s suicide. The primary use of the “alive and dead” term is for the various pieces of technology that the members of society use, most notably robotic hounds and a robotic snake that pumped his wife’s stomach after her overdose on pills. The same term is used for various people throughout this book some who die, like Captain Beatty and some who almost die, like Mildred, his wife.
All of them abandoned the written word in favor of their electronic trinkets that they think make them happy. The dichotomy between The is woman’s suicide and the death of Beatty/almost death of Mildred is that while the old woman has something to die for, Mildred and Beatty have nothing to live for. That is the power the written word can have in someone’s life.
Additionally the dichotomy is seen through the symbolism of the flames used throughout the book. The flames are obviously a destructive force in their use to destroy the books, but they also provide warmth and comfort for Montag after he flees society. The books themselves in this sense are flames, as s book represents an idea which spreads quickly in the mind acting as a destructive force and as a source of warmth and comfort. The fact that the societal rejects he met preserve the books in their minds through memorization shows that, in the end the idea flame is one that cannot be extinguished, even if the physical vessel of the idea, the book, is destroyed.
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It's a short novel and a quick read and it lights the flicker of a flame of thinking about the power of books but it's all just so rushed, so fast to develop and accelerate, that a lot of the opportunities to explore deeper are missed. Montag the fireman - one of the elite who set fire to books, burn people's houses to punish them for the knowledge in their books - witnesses an old lady start a fire and kill herself because she can't be without her books, and meets a young girl who tells him there's so much more to books then just fuel for his fires. He takes a book and becomes part of the anti-establishment.
In the foreword to the book, Ray Bradbury tells us he spent less than 10 dollars hiring the use of a typewriter to write Fahrenheit 451. Sadly sometimes it shows. This is just the bare bones of a story, lacking the meat to flesh it out into something more satisfying, more horrifying. It was written in the 1950s with the Nazi book burnings still fresh in people's minds but long before the wall-to-wall round the clock interactive television experiences that Bradbury envisions. For its time it must have been revolutionary. Today it just looks a bit tired and much too rushed.
At 225 pages split into three parts this book is small, particularly when its larger than average font is considered.
It's a long time since I've read a Ray Bradbury book (since I studied The Illustrated Man in 1983!!). I have little interest in science fiction or fantasy novels although enjoy some dystopian novels so I approached this cautiously but hopefully.
There is a great quote at the start of the book "If they give you ruled paper, write the other way". Maybe this is a hint of the rebellion in this book.
I always ignore introductions to "classic" books as they are usually written by sycophantic admirers and give away too much of the novel (note to publishers... always put these at the end of novels not the beginning). This introduction is written by the author himself and worth reading - it gives context and sets the scene of him writing the story.
I tried very hard to enjoy this book but it was ultimately too much of a struggle and took a huge amount of time to read. The language is overplayed with some of the descriptive sections not actually describing anything at all. I wanted to try to get to know the characters but didn't get anywhere close.
I love the idea of the concept of TV taking over from books and how this effects society so was unsure how this author managed to make the narrative so uninspiring.
The novel was controversial when it was released and I can see why but the world has moved very far since then and, without the shock factor, this book is more of a curiosity than a classic.
Finally got around to reading this one folks, & it's...OK. I wasn't blown away by it as I found the characters all a bit hard to like or empathise with. The female characters especially are very thinly drawn, with Clarisse & Millie nowhere near being fully fleshed characters who the reader can care about. There's quite a bit of casual cruelty (treatment of animals, & the car full of young people who try to run Montag over just for fun), especially the killing of an innocent man just for ratings. To me, the author is trying to say a lot about censorship, apathy, & the dumbing down of standards, but it gets lost in the overly florid writing style. 2.5 stars (rounded up to 3 on sites which don't allow half star ratings).











