Fahrenheit 451

1
Fahrenheit 451

• An Introduction

2
Historical Context

• World War II had ended only a few years before
• Era of McCarthyism
• Threat of nuclear warfare loomed
• Many Sci-Fi books and movies reflected this fear

3
Predict or Prevent?

• Bradbury claimed he was trying to prevent the
  future.
• He did foresee many future developments
• Walkmans, earbuds, big-screen and interactive
  t.v., rise in violence, growing illiteracy,
  condensation of info into sound bites

4
Settings

• Historical Setting
• Physical Setting
• Social Setting

5
Themes To Watch For

• Individual self-expression is important.
• Violence is self-destructive.
• Mindless pleasure seeking and materialism make
  for an empty life.
• Humanity should preserve and value the culture of
  the past.

6
More Themes

• Humanity has the ability to be reborn or revived.
• In the wrong hands, modern technology can be
  dangerous.
• Commercialism can erode spiritual values.
• People lose their humanity when not able to
  communicate and interact with each other on a
  personal level.

7
Symbols To Investigate

• Fire
• Burning
• Water
• The salamander
• The Mechanical Hound
• Seashells
• Parlor Walls
• Titles of each section

8
Names

• Guy Montag
• Guy Fawkes?
• Name of a paper company
• Clarisse
• Form of Clara, from the Latin for bright
• Clarisse is often associated with a brightness
  different from that of a fire
• Faber
• Name of a pencil company

9
Fire Imagery

• Many cultures have gods associated with fire
• Egyptian goddess Sekhet
• Many myths try to explain the origin
• Greek myth about Prometheus stealing fire from
  the gods
• Scientists used to believe all matter was made of
  the 4 elements fire, earth, water, air

10
Connections Background Info The Hearth and the
Salamander

• Ben Franklin helped organize Americas first fire
  company and founded its first circulating
  library.
• Franklin was also a writer and printer who
  believed in free speech and press.

11
Connections Background Info The Hearth and the
Salamander

• Dante Dante Alighieri was an Italian poet who
  wrote The Divine Comedy
• Jonthan Swift Author of Gullivers Travels
• Marcus Aurelius Roman philosopher and emperor
• Hamlet You know this one!
• Little Black Sambo childrens book with racial
  stereotypes that are offensive
• Uncle Toms Cabin novel that condemns slavery

12
Section II

• The Sieve and the Sand

13
Connections Background Info The Sieve and the
Sand

• Authors mentioned by Montag
• Thomas Jefferson
• Henry David Thoreau author of famous essay on
  civil disobedience, and Walden.

14
Henry David Thoreau

• Civil Disobedience (Resistance to Civil
  Government) is an essay by Henry David Thoreau
  that was first published in 1849.
• It argues that people should not permit
  governments to overrule or atrophy their
  consciences, and that people have a duty to avoid
  allowing such acquiescence to enable the
  government to make them the agents of injustice.
• Thoreau was motivated in part by his disgust with
  slavery and the Mexican/American War.

• Walden
• The work is part personal declaration of
  independence, social experiment, voyage of
  spiritual discovery, and manual for self reliance
• He hoped to isolate himself from society to gain
  a more objective understanding of it
• Simple living, self-reliance,
• Transcendentalist.

15
Connections Background Info The Sieve and the
Sand

• Texts
• Dover Beach by Matthew Arnold
• -Reflects a personal sense of isolation and
  doubt. Montag does not read aloud the first two
  stanzas.

16
Connections Background Info The Sieve and the
Sand

• Texts
• The Bible
• Montag attempts to read a portion of Jesuss
  Sermon on the Mount that criticizes materialism.
• Another character reads to Montag from the Book
  of Job, about a man whose faith is tested by a
  series of great calamities.
• The Bible has often been a target of censorship.
• When the New Testament was 1st transalted into
  English by William Tyndale, copies were seized
  and burned. (He was also burned at the stake as a
  heretic.)

17
Connections Background Info The Sieve and the
Sand

• Beattys Quotes and Paraphrases
• Shakespeare, The Merchant of Venice
• Truth will come to light murder cannot be hid
  long.
• He doth nothing but talk of his horse.
• The Devil can cite Scripture for his purpose.

18
Section III

• Burning Bright

19
Connections Background Info Burning Bright

• William Blakes The Tyger
• Tyger! Tyger! Burning bright
• In the forests of the night,
• What immortal hand or eye
• Could frame thy fearful symmetry?

20
Connections Background Info Burning Bright

• Old Montag wanted to fly near the Sun and ...
  he's burned his wings
• Daedalus and Icarus

21
Connections Background Info Burning Bright

• You think you can walk on water
• There is no terror, Cassius, in your threats, for
  I am armd so strong in honesty that they pass by
  me as an idle wind, which I respect not
• Julius Caesar, IV, iii

22
Connections Background Info Burning Bright

• Thomas Hardy British novelist poet
• Charles Darwin Survival of the fittest
• Aristophanes Ancient Greek playwright

23
Connections Background Info Burning Bright

• Mr. Lincoln yes, its Abraham Lincoln
• Machiavelli The Prince
• The Phoenix