Montag About Books example essay topic

The significance of the story Fahrenheit 451 is the destruction of available knowledge to man leads to the irony and theme of the story. Fahrenheit 451, the title 451 degrees is the temperature in which paper burns. Guy Montag is a fireman who lights fires instead of putting them out which firefighters are trained to do. Through out the story Guy is to burn all books so society will not gain knowledge. When guy goes to a specific job, he burns the books and a woman who refused not to leave. She would rather die than not to gain knowledge.

Guy feels very guilty, tells his wife Mildred who does not seem to care. Mildred is "brainwashed" like the rest society in which she and the rest think reading books are bad. Mildred stays at home watches the televisions which is the only "correct" source of information and knowledge. When Montag meets Clarisse she opens his eyes to a different light. She explains to him her life as a free spirit. Clarisse was not allowed in school because she wanted to learn and she kept asking why why why.

"An hour of TV class, an hour of basketball or baseball or running, another hour of transcription history or painting pictures, and more sports, but do you know, we never ask questions, or at least most don't; they just run the answers at you, bing, bing, bing, and us sitting there for four more hours of film teacher". (Bradbury p. 29) Books seem to threaten society. Captain Beatty told Montag about books and how owning books is not a crime but reading them is. If someone is caught with books, the books will be burned, yet through out the story the firemen burned everything from books, to the house, and even a person and noone cares. There were rules to follow "Established, 1790 to burn English influenced books in the Colonies.

First Fireman: Benjamin Franklin. Rule 1. Answer the alarm swiftly. 2. Start the fire swiftly. 3.

Burn everything. 4. Report back to the firehouse immediately. 5. Stand alert for the other alarms. (pages 34-35) The ironic part is the in our "normal" society fireman have similar rules to follow, but not to start fires swiftly, but to respond and put them out swiftly. Also another ironic point is that Bradbury used the names Montag which is named after a paper manufacturing company and Farber is a maker of pencils. (page 173) The nature of society, television, and Hollywood during the period 1947 to 1954 is that people carry values, have political ideas, and learn about other people's cultures.

People went to the movies to see who they were or wanted to be. They want to be reflection of what is in the movies. People went to the movies because there was no television. They gathered to learn and get influenced by the actors.

Even though the actors were acting, people wanted to be like them. From rebels, to teenage rebellion, to music, to different teaching skills, these types of things would not happen in a regular American home. It was like taboo. Anybody who chose to go to the movies, would be exposed to a different way of life for an hour or two.

I feel that the story is making a social commentary in which society is totally conforming. The society is nice and orderly. Yet it also a faceless society. They all believe that books are bad and the television is the main source of information.

They are brainwashed to think that way. If anything goes out of the "norm" there is craziness. The would "rat" each other out if something went out of the "norm". Every thing was based on what the "cousins" said and did on the television. History has been distorted in the sense that people have the opportunity to make their own choices and would not be looked upon as being defiant.

People do not fear to read for our society encourages knowledge. The more you know the better off you are. Some items that are mentioned in the book that did exist in 1952 that are similar to actual items in 2002 are the ear piece in Montag's ear given by Professor Faber to listen in on and have conversations with Montag. Montag needed help from Professor Farber to understand the "books". Faber was aware that Montag has books and tries to help Montag understand them.

Faber would not "rat" on Montag because Faber does not believe society and the "firemen". Faber trusts Montag and tries to help him. Another item is the large screen televisions. People did not have only one, but four was the going amount. The society needed four to make sure they knew exactly what was going on all the time. The important character that was in the book, but not in the video was the Mechanical Hound.

The Mechanical Hound was to keep society in fear. The Mechanical Hound was to seek and destroy anything or anyone that would go against society and the "norm" of the lifestyle. "The Mechanical Hound never fails" (page 133) was told to all the society so that they would never go against it's lifestyle and stay in fear. At the end of the story Montag is believed to be dead and killed by the Mechanical Hound. But Montag did get away. The Hound found someone that looked like Montag so that society would know that the Hound could get you if you break the law.

In a way the Hound never failed it had to prove that by killing something whether it was the truth or not. I feel that Truffaut chose to eliminate the character in the movie because it was too much for people to handle. People may see this and feel something like this can never happen. Truffaut used a helicopter with shooting bullets to make more sense that it can happen. The thought was on the same premise.

The helicopter was the Hound it sought and destroyed. As an individual I do not prefer a video presentation to reading. I find that there are a lot of things that are missed in a video. I enjoy reading. I feel that I miss out, I'm not getting enough knowledge when I watch the television. I would rather pick up the newspaper than watch the news.

In some sense this story relates to my life today. Not with the burning of books of course, but how our society does rely on television bullshit. People want to believe in something. Just like in the movies we watch and we wish were. Nobody is ever satisfied.

I feel that every day life is on television. We are not brainwashed to watch it, although we the people do like terrible news. We are drawn to it. If there is a high speed chase with guns and hostages we are glued. Why does our society like to sit at the edge of their seat expecting to see the worst? We are similar to the story where people can get brainwashed to an extent..