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Fahrenheit 451 Quotes

Decent Essays

In Fahrenheit 451, Bradbury depicts an anti-intellectual society, set five centuries from now, where firemen set books that people have been hoarding or reading illegally on fire. In this dystopian society, literature is banned for the fear that it will incite people to think and question the status quo of their society: happiness and freedom from the elimination of controversy (Sisario 201). Throughout the novel, Bradbury uses several direct quotations from different works of literature in order to add a subtle depth to the ideas conveyed in the novel. Quotations are often used as demonstrations with the intent of depicting the aspects of a referent – used to distinguish the intended referent from other possible referents (Clark 768). Bradbury …show more content…

He asks Mildred, his wife, for a period of forty-eight hours in order for him to read the books and see if he can find something valuable in them to share with others. He picks us a book and reads: “It is computed, that eleven thousand persons have at several times suffered death rather than submit to break their eggs at the smaller end” (Bradbury 65). This quote, taken from Jonathan Swift’s novel Gulliver’s Travels, illustrates the struggle between being reasonable and following a tradition blindly. Swift uses exaggeration in order to point out the ridiculous degree which is used to enforce conformity, much like Fahrenheit 451. This quote alludes to the extreme measures presented in Bradbury’s novel such as it being illegal to walk and the censorship of books, in order to have compliancy in their …show more content…

As in filling a vessel drop by drop, there is at last a drop which makes it run over; so in a series of kindness there is at least one which makes the heart run over” (Bradbury 67). James Boswell wrote this passage after meeting his lifelong friend Samuel Johnson, Life of Dr. Johnson, in which he wrote about the several encounters he had with Johnson. When they met, Bowell was twenty-three years old while Johnson was fifty-three years old, starting an unusual friendship that lasted until Johnson’s death. This is a very important allusion because as Montag reads the passage he is reminded of an encounter with an elderly man named Faber who used to be a English Professor. Since Montag wants to learn how to understand books it is no surprise that he decides to call Faber and ask him for his help therefore, alluding to the start of a lifelong friendship between

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