Book review: 451 Fahrenheit (by Ray Bradbury)
May 10th, 2003 at 9:20 pmThere are strong similarities between this book and Orwell’s
1984. Like 1984, “Fahrenheit 451″ describes what could have happen
had the non-democratic forces taken over the world. The will
of humanity would have been broken, people would be puppets in
the hands of the goverment. Atomic wars are everywhere, the country
lives from a war to a war.
Some points made by this book are acute - people are encouraged
not to think, to have no free will. Schools mostly teach
sports and TV is omnipotent, filled with what reminds today’s
empty talk shows. Books are prohibited, as they may remind
people that free will exists. The communication between people
is meaningless, small-talks leading nowhere.
A very original role is assigned to firemen in this book. Their
goal is not to fight fires - fires are entertainment. Their
work is to burn books. A siren sounds not when there is a fire,
but when books were found in someone’s house. The punishment
for possession of books is severe - the person’s house is burned
and he’s arrested.
The main character is one of these “firemen”, who discovers the
beauty of books, aided by an old professor. The story is his
quest against the “system”. The book is quite short, so telling
more will be a spoiler.
All in all, I really liked this book, it has some very strong
messages and gives a lot of food for thought. I’ve also read
some of Bradbury’s short stories - the message is the same,
highly influenced by the cold war. I’m not sure such books can
be written now, long after the fall of the iron curtain. But
it is still interesting to see how the future looked from the
perspective Bradbury.
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