Fahrenheit 451

1. Fahrenheit 451 Novel by Ray Bradbury University: Lomonosov Moscow State University Faculty: Faculty of Foreign Languages and Area Studies Student: Daria Smykova Course: 2 Group: 1 teachers Teacher: Yana Sholokhova

2. Fahrenheit 451 is a dystopian novel written by Ray Bradbury, first published in 1953.

3. Ray Bradbury: Biography Ray Bradbury, in full Ray Douglas Bradbury is an American author best known for his highly imaginative short stories and novels that blend a poetic style, nostalgia for childhood, social criticism, and an awareness of the hazards of runaway technology.

4. His works were translated in more than 40 languages and sold millions of copies around the world.

5. Early life Ray Douglas Bradbury was born on August 22, 1920, in Waukegan, Illinois. He was the third son in the family. His father, Leonard Spaulding Bradbury, was a telephone lineman and technician. His mother, Esther Marie Bradbury, was a Swedish immigrant. His grandfather and great-grandfather were newspaper publishers. In 1934 his family settled in Los Angeles, California. There young Bradbury often roller-skated through Hollywood, trying to spot celebrities. He attended Los Angeles High School, where he was involved in the drama club and planned to become an actor. He graduated from high school in 1938 and had no more formal education. Instead, he learned from reading works of such writers as Leo Tolstoy and Fyodor Dostoevsky, among others.

6. 1938-42 From 1938-42 he was selling newspapers on the streets of Los Angeles, spending days in the local library and nights at the typewriter. At that time he published his stories in fanzines. In 1941 he became a paid writer when the pulp magazine Science Stories published his short story, titled "Pendulum", and he was a full-time writer by the end of 1942. His first book - "Dark Carnival" - was a collection of stories published in 1947. That same year he married Marguerite McClure (1922-2003), whom he met at a book store a year earlier. Maggie, as she was affectionately called, was the only woman Bradbury ever dated. They had four daughters and, eventually, eight grandchildren.

7. Writing His other novels and stories also have been adapted to films and television, as well as for radio, theatre and comic books. Bradbury had written episodes for Alfred Hitchcock's TV series, as well as for many other TV productions. His total literary output is close to 600 short stories, more than 30 books and numerous poems and plays. He was writing daily. In 1950 Ray Bradbury shot to international fame after publication of "The Martian Chronicles", a collection of short stories partially based on ideas from ancient Greek and Roman mythology. Then he followed the anti-Utopian writers Yevgeni Zamyatin and Aldous Huxley in his best known work, "Fahrenheit 451". The 1966 film adaptation by director François Truffaut, starring Julie Christie, received several nominations.

8. Awards In 2004 Bradbury received a National Medal of Arts. He was given a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 6644 Hollywood Blvd. An asteroid was named in his honor, "9766 Bradbury", and the Apollo astronaut named a crater on the moon "Dandelion Crater", after his novel, "Dandelion Wine". He also received the World Fantasy Award for Lifetime Achievement, the Grand Master Award from Science Fiction Writers of America, an Emmy Award for his work as a writer on "The Halloween Tree", and many other awards and honors.

9. Death Ray Bradbury died on June 6, 2012, at the age of 91, in Los Angeles, California. He once said that when he died, he planned to have his ashes placed in a Campbell’s Tomato Soup can and planted on Mars. Then he decided that he wanted to have a place his fans could visit, and thought he’d design his own gravestone that included the names of his books. As a final touch, a sign at his gravesite would say Place dandelions here, “as a tribute to Dandelion Wine, because so many people love it.” In the end, he ended up going with something a whole lot simpler—a plain headstone bearing his name and “Author of Fahrenheit 451.”

10. 451 degrees Fahrenheit is "the temperature at which book paper catches fire, and burns."

11. Fahrenheit 451, probably the most famous of Ray Bradbury’s works, is also the most famous novel about books and their role in the life and development of humankind. Any time at outbreak of obscurantism the educated people would mention Fahrenheit 451, a dystopian grim tale of firemen burning books, because reading is mostly banned in their society. A compelling story revolves around Guy Montag, a fireman, who undergoes a personal evolution from a lawful citizen and a family man into a hunted criminal and exile, just because he dares to read forbidden books and doubts the perfectness of the existing order of things. Introduction to Fahrenheit 451

12. Plot structure analysis Fahrenheit 451 is divided into three parts, each with its own title. Part I is titled “The Hearth and the Salamander.” The overriding symbol in this section is of the salamander that lives through fire. In this section, the setting, the conflict, and most of the key characters are introduced. At the end of the section, Clarisse asks Montag the all-important question, “Are you happy?” Montag will spend the rest of the novel dealing with his unhappiness and trying to fix it. The conflict is, therefore, clearly delineated in this first section. Part II is devoted to the rising action of the plot and is appropriately entitled “The Sieve and the Sand.” The symbol in this section comes in a flashback to Montag’s childhood, when he was challenged to try and fill a sieve with sand. He was too young to understand the total futility of his efforts, but continued to try until frustration got the best of him. Throughout this section, Montag again feels like he is trying to fill a sieve with sand. He realizes the futility of the society in which he lives and the vapid nature of his existence and he becomes very frustrated that he can do nothing about it. The sieve and the sand also refer to society, which, like a sieve, is unable to retain or truly appreciate knowledge; as fast as they put knowledge into the sieve, they allow it to uselessly flow out.

13. Plot structure analysis Part III contains the climax and conclusion of the plot and is appropriately entitled “Burning Bright,” from the title of a William Blake poem. In the poem, the tiger burns bright as it symbolizes rampant evil in the world. In Fahrenheit 451, the world is clearly evil, and throughout the book, it seems to be burning bright. In fact, fire and burning are the most used images and symbols in the book. The firemen no longer put out fires, but start them by burning books; Clarisse puts a burning question into Montag’s thoughts, causing him to question being a fireman; Montag is called to burn his own house; to protect himself, Montag burns Beatty to death; when Montag escapes, he finds the exiles sitting by the fire; when the bombs are dropped on the city, it is literally on fire. But in the book the fire has a dual purpose - both good and bad. Although it is used by the totalitarian society as a destructive force, the intellectuals believe that the fire in the city has purged the society of its evil; they believe it can rise like a phoenix out of its own ashes. At the end of the book, the group of exiles walks towards the burned out city to rebuild a new and free society, where books are treasured and ideas are shared.

14. Plot structure analysis The plot ends in tragedy with one small, comic hope at the end. The protagonist, Montag, fights the repressive society throughout the book. In the process, he loses Clarisse (who is killed in a car wreck), Mildred (his wife who turns him in and then deserts him), his home (which is burned on the instruction of Beatty), his safety (which is threatened by the Mechanical Hound after he murders Beatty), his leg (which is seriously injured by the Hound), and his city (which is destroyed by bombs). In spite of all these tragedies, Montag is determined to survive and help to build a new and free society. At the end of the plot, he and the exiled intellectuals walk toward the city, still aflame from the bombing. This ending image is the one small ray of hope in the entire book; perhaps the fire has purged the evil, and Montag will be able to build a better society built on freedom.

15. Throughout the book, the key themes of conformity, apathy, stagnancy and censorship are shown in a variety of ways. Beatty and Mildred, both symbols of the totalitarian system, live vapid, meaningless lives and cannot escape. At first, Montag is also caught in the system, but his mind still longs for knowledge. He is completely intrigued by Clarisse, a symbol of nonconformity and free thought and a total contrast to Mildred; she challenges him to look at his own life and give it more meaning. As a result, he rejects the life of conformity, apathy, stagnancy, and censorship demanded by society. In its place, he begins to think independently, seek knowledge, steal, hide, and read books, hate his job, confront his wife’s indifference, and eventually kill Beatty. In truth, the entire text of Fahrenheit 451 is a discourse in theme. The one positive message of the novel is that society can and will rejuvenate itself, no matter what state it has fallen into. Montag represents the common man who finds it in himself to seek the truth no matter what obstacles are in his way. Man is a cousin to the phoenix, as Granger says, and will rise again from the ashes. Man creates the fire that will consume him, but he also manages to be born again out of the fire. Theme analysis

16. Main Character Analysis of Fahrenheit 451 Guy MontagGuy Montag is a protagonist, a loyal citizen who doubts the way of his life and ends up as a criminal and exile. He is thirty years old, a fireman in third generation and perfectly fit for his job, actually enjoying it for ten years – it’s somehow balances his unhappy marriage with Mildred. A year or two ago he started to doubt the existing order of things and became curious about reading forbidden books, which means all non-contemporary literature. His doubts and his inability to share them with anybody else start a controversy in his mind that eventually leads to the complete ruination of his marriage, house and life.Captain BeattyMalicious chief fireman, always surrounded by thunderclouds of smoke, is Montag’s nemesis. He uses his profound knowledge and intuition for manipulating his subordinates and reaching his goals. Once an enthusiastic reader, he hates books for diversity of opinions and thoughts represented here and is passionate in maintaining the existing way of life. He is a clever speechmaker, so it’s easy for him to confuse the opponent and persuade him to follow the proper line of life, thoughts and behavior. His only mistake was overestimating of his power and the degree of Montag’s despair, and as the result the powerful captain Beatty is burned alive by his stubborn subordinate.

17. Main Character Analysis of Fahrenheit 451 Mildred MontagProtagonist’s wife is an embodiment of shallowness, materialism and addictiveness. She is addicted to her sleeping pills, kitchen gadgets, TV-walls and endless soap operas, speed driving and radio ear-plugs. She has learned lip-reading and speaks to her husband in short sentences, never actually hearing him. Even her appearance is the essence of the artificial chemical beauty: slim due to endless diets, unnaturally white, always restless. Her hair looks like straw, burned by chemicals. Mildred forgets everything, starting from aspirin and the number of taken pills and to more significant things, such as the place and time of her first meeting with her husband. When she realizes it, she only laughs, but her fear and restlessness are obvious. Bubble-headed as she is shown, deep inside she realizes that something is very wrong – and goes to take more pills. Clarisse McClellanShe is seventeen and visits psychiatrist, because everybody except for her family perceives her as unsociable. The point is that she is not interested in accepted forms of socializing. She is curious, observant and loves to find out how and why things are working. Delightfully human, a perfect example of idealistic characters, she turns the Montag’s world inside out, merely by showing him that happy families still exist, a thoughtful conversation is possible, and rain drops are delicious. They see each other for seven days and this is enough to start Montag’s soul-searching and life questioning. After a week of these meetings Clarisse, who enjoys walking, is hit by car and dies. Montag learns about it only four days later, when Mildred casually mentions this fact.

18. Own impressions This novel is about the future of mass media and society. It's almost impossible to imagine that the author could predict the way our world would change. The book itself was breathtaking and quite easy to read. Now I can definitely claim this book to be one of my favourite novels written by Ray Bradbury.

19. Thank you for your attention!