Fahrenheit 451 was written by Ray Bradbury (1920-2012) in 1950 and published in 1953 by Ballantine Books. This novel has a total of 158 pages. The story begins in a burning site. The books, described as flapping pigeon-winged, died on the porch and lawn of the house. Once again, Guy Montag and his colleagues caught another reader. Montag wore his fierce smile, and so did the other firemen. As they arrive back at the firehouse, Montag disposes his helmet labeled 451, hangs his flameproof jacket, cleans himself, and heads home. Abruptly, he meets a young girl named Clarisse McClellan who is his new neighbor. They walk together and have a conversation about Montag’s job. Montag proudly shares his thoughts of being a fireman. When they reach Clarisse’s place, Clarisse asks Montag personally if he is happy. Montag found it a ridiculous question and later says he is happy in his consciousness.
When Montag is home, he felt his usual surroundings were different. The suspense continues on in the bedroom where he finds his wife Mildred in a critical state. She had taken almost all of the pills in the bottle Montag had found. He figured that Mildred tried to kill herself. Montag calls for an ambulance and the paramedics acted carelessly, which gives a preview of how their society is. The next day, Mildred acts as if her attempt of suicide never happened. The way she interacts with her husband shows they are not very much a happily married couple. Mildred, like everyone in the city, has an obsession with her parlor, which is a television screen as big as a wall.
Montag encounters Clarisse again in the neighborhood and have another friendly conversation that lightens up Montag’s mood. At the firehouse, the alarm went off, alerting the firemen that there is another person in possession of books. It turns out to be a woman and she would not leave her books behind, but rather burn with them. Beatty, a fireman and Montag’s friend, counts to ten until he sets the place on fire with a temperature of 451 Fo. Montag tries to convince the woman to come with him, but fails in the end. During the incident, he could not resist all the books lying around, and so he tucked one inside his jacket.
Clarisse McClellan has been missing. Mildred told Montag that Clarisse is dead, killed in a car crash. Her family moved out of their house across the street. Now Montag is sick and Beatty pays a visit, knowing that Montag had brought home a book from last night. It was allowed for every fireman to bring home a book, take a look at it, and then burn it after seeing how useless and silly it is. Beatty lectures Montag about what books do to people, hoping to brainwash Montag into thinking books are wrong. Later in the day, Montag reveals to Mildred that he has been hiding numerous books in their ventilator shaft. His wife panics and tries to throw the books into their kitchen incinerator, but Montag stops her. He begins to read a few passages from one of the books. Mildred does not comprehend a word Montag says, yet Montag continues.
About a year ago, Montag caught an old man quickly hide a book inside his pocket. The old man denied Montag’s accusations and ran away. Faber was his name. Montag phoned Faber and asked a few questions about books, but the old man would not give anything away. Montag decides to visit Faber and they eventually come up with a plan together. Plant the books, turn in an alarm, and see the firemen’s houses burn. Faber hands Montag a green chip that could be worn in his ear where Faber can hear Montag’s surroundings.
Montag heads back home and sees that his wife has guests, Mrs. Phelps and Mrs. Bowles. They are watching the parlor, but Montag interrupts them. They have an odd conversation about children and politics. The women have rude answers like children are ruinous and vote for the man with the good looks. Montag reveals his book of poetry and reads it to them. Mrs. Phelps ends up crying and Mrs. Bowles points that books will just bring them awful feelings. They leave and Mildred gets angry at Montag. Montag has a moment of weakness where he cannot move his feet, but Faber says words of motivation that gets Montag moving and goes to the firehouse.
Beatty and the firemen are playing a game of poker. Montag takes a seat but does not play. Instead, Beatty gives another lecture about literature and Montag shows signs of his nervousness. Faber reminds Montag that Beatty is just confusing him. The alarms sounds and the firemen get on the Salamander and drive to their next bookkeeper. As it turns out, they stopped in front of Montag’s house. Mildred came running outside, fleeing the place with their beetle. It was her who sent in the alarm. Beatty hinted this coming when he sent the Hound to Montag’s neighborhood. Montag informed Faber that the firemen are about to burn Montag’s house. Faber says to run away, but Beatty tells Montag to surrender with his books. Beatty finds the green chip hidden in Montag’s ear and threatens to find Faber and kill him. This makes Montag fire his flame thrower at Beatty and Beatty dies. Then Montag tries to escape, but the Mechanical Hound fights him and Montag loses one of his leg.
Montag meets Faber and tells him to get rid of everything that can be used to track Montag. They bid farewell for now and hope to see each other again. Montag is on the run and ends up on a river. At south, he meets a few men who also admire literature. They do not carry hardcopies, but it is in their minds. Montag lost his books on the way, yet he remembers part of Ecclesiastes and Revelation from the Bible. He follows them further down the river and see that the city he left behind is destructed within seconds. Mildred was back there and so she is dead. Although, Montag is not sad because she was a stranger to him. The men continue their journey in finding a place where literacy matters, where there was a tree of life, which bare twelve fruits; and yielded her fruit every month; and the leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations.
Guy Montag is a fireman who lives in an unspecified city sometime in the twenty-fourth century. He lives in a world dominated by television where literature is oblivious. In this strange place, his job as a fireman is to actually start fires instead to prevent them. Why? Since literacy is forbidden, it is the firemen’s duty to find every house that holds books and burn them, even if it takes the entire household. The setting is important because the author gives us a glance of how the future is without literature.
Montag is the protagonist of the story and is both a dynamic and omniscient character. In the beginning of the novel, Montag thinks he is happy with his life of being a fireman, but realizes that burning books is wrong. He is the main character and the author shares his stream of consciousness. Clarisse and Faber are also protagonists. Clarisse is a static character given by her kind actions towards Montag. Faber is dynamic based on his cowardice in Montag’s flashback, but stopped being afraid when he agreed to help Montag. Mrs. Bowles, Mrs. Phelps, Mildred, and Beatty are all antagonists and static characters. Mrs. Phelps is considered dynamic because she was affected by the poem Montag read aloud and it may have changed her view in life.
The conversation of Montag and Clarisse is the exposition of the story which is significant because it makes the reader wonder why Clarisse appealed to Montag so much. The reason for this was Clarisse’s knowledge. The rising action was when Montag brought another book home and revealed the other books he kept from Mildred. He wants to learn more and asks help from an old man named Faber who knows a lot about books. Beatty becomes aware of Montag’s whereabouts which leads to the climax during the scene of the firemen burning Montag’s house. Montag then killed Beatty. The falling action was at the river with the men who accepted Montag because they all long for the same thing. Finally, the resolution was their departure of the city, on the path of starting a new life finding a place where knowledge matters. This novel does not have a subplot. It was meant to end with the city in ruins and for Montag to start anew.
The theme is having knowledge instead of ignorance. Bradbury’s main point was to show his readers what our world would be like without any literacy. He proved it would be dreadful. The characters who lived in the city cared only for their parlors, the modified televisions in this lifetime. Mildred, the wife of Montag, was occupied with her television that she did not care to spend quality time with her own husband. Mrs. Phelps and Mrs. Bowles had the same situation. Mrs. Phelps’ husband left for war and was not concerned when he will return. Mrs. Bowles does not have children because she did not like the thought of being responsible to take care of them. These antagonists are good examples of how people’s actions would be if they did not carry knowledge from books. This is the conflict. People live in a world without literature where firemen burn every book they find. Society believes books will not do any good for them.
The title Fahrenheit 451 is appropriate because it is the temperature at which the books burn.  Its mood or tone is menacing and a little poetic. Montag’s eerie feelings, early descriptions of the Mechanical Hound, Montag’s nervous glances toward the ventilator shaft where he has hidden his books, and descriptions of fire act as foreshadowing. Significant symbols of the novel include fire, blood, the Electric-Eyed Snake, the hearth, the salamander, the phoenix, the sieve and the sand, Denham’s Dentifrice, and Clarisse’s dandelion.
Ray Bradbury was born on August 22, 1920 in Waukegan, Illinois and died on June 5, 2012 in Los Angeles, California of unknown illness. He was an American novelist, short story writer, essayist, dramatist, screenwriter and poet. Although he never went to college, he became “a student of life” selling L.A. newspapers in street corners and typewriting in the public library at night. His first work was established with the publication of The Martian Chronicles in 1950. Next came The Illustrated Man and then, in 1953, Fahrenheit 451, which is considered to be Bradbury's masterpiece. In total, Bradbury has published more than thirty books, about 600 short stories, and many poems, essays, and plays. He has been nominated for an Academy Award for his animated film Icarus Montgolfier Wright, and has won an Emmy Award for his teleplay of The Halloween Tree. He was married until his wife died in 2003, and raised four daughters and eight grandchildren.
“This is also some extraordinary writing, and indicative of what's to come prose-wise: several metaphors can be jammed into one sentence, and repetition of words and rhythms is used very carefully.” (James Schellenberg) I agree to this because it is shown at the very beginning of the book when Montag described the fire “that burned the evening sky red and yellow and black” and “to see things blackened and changed.”  “There's a sense in which Fahrenheit 451 can be read not just as snobbery (which it is), but as outright hate speech against the unbookish.” (Eric Rosenfield) I disagree with this critique. I currently think that Bradbury just wanted to show his readers a world without literature. His goal was not to denounce those who do not care for books.
This novel was very mind-blowing. It gave me a realization that not everything is about technology or social media. People cannot get accepted to college based on their knowledge about Twitter or the latest news of celebrities. I highly recommend this book to those who spend most of their time with television or cellphones. Literature matters and we should read more of it.