Ray Bradbury’s FAHRENHEIT 451 What? Where? When? Who? Why?

WHAT?  Reading banned  Firefighters burn books  Censorship  Conformity  Imagination repressed  Technology advanced

WHERE?  In a violent and hedonistic future America  In the city *hedonistic means self- indulgent

WHEN?  In the not-so-distant future?  Written over 50 years ago  Based on “The Fireman” which was published in 1950

WHO?  Guy Montag  His wife, Mildred  Clarisse McClellan, a teen  Captain Beatty  Professor Faber

WHY?  Hatred of thought investigation/thought control  Mary Bradbury, tried in 17 th century Salem Witch Trials  McCarthyism  Black Listing  Book Banning

FACT – FACT – FACT – FACT  1953 Ballantine Books publish F451  1967 Special Edition for schools Modified 75 passages to eliminate words like “hell,” “damn,” and “abortion” 1980 Bradbury’s friend informs him Ballantine withdrew version

AGREE?  “ Censorship reflects a society’s lack of confidence in itself.” Potter Stewart/Associate Justice of the Supreme Court ( )

FACT – FACT – FACT – FACT  LATE 1950’S American television - cookie-cutter sitcoms, predictable westerns, and violent dramas. Critics howled, but viewership continued to rise

AGREE?  Television is “…a really dreadful influence on all of us. Don’t ever look at local television news again. It’s all crap. There’s no news, there’s no information. It’s negative, negative, negative. You look at that, and you think the world is coming to an end.” Bradbury 1990

AGREE?  Television is very dangerous. Because it repeats and repeats and repeats our disasters instead of our triumphs.” Bradbury 1990

Three Sections  “The Hearth and the Salamander”  “The Sieve and the Sand”  “Burning Bright”

Symbols  The title refers to the temperature at which books burn.  Salamander – mythological lizard capable of living in fire  Phoenix – mythological bird reborn from fire

Themes  conformity vs. individuality  Freedom of speech and the consequences of using it  importance of reading and understanding history  Machines – help us or hinder us

Critical Issues  Censorship – the suppression of a book, movie, etc. considered offensive or a threat to security  A story about how television destroys interest in reading literature.

Why might censorship be imposed?  to protect the public  to protect our children’s growth and development  religious beliefs  to be fair to minorities