Alex's Reviews > Fahrenheit 451

Well none of my other friends agree with you. :-) Why didn't you like it?

Amateurishly written; philosophically puerile; conservative and misogynist. I'll rip into it for real when I get back from Brooklyn. Narrator: and he did.

I don't know who exactly to blame for this, but I think the biggest mistake was ever entering Fahrenheit 451 into the dystopia canon… if it was just part of some prolific scifi author's ouevre, it wouldn't be so annoying, but when it's put alongside other dystopia classics… it asks for this kind of bashing.

I can't say I at all disagree with the terms "philosophically puerile; conservative and misogynist" (TELEVISION IS EVIL, everybody, a cute pubescent girl told me so!), but might I play the devil's advocate and say that sort of shallow thinking is a function of Guy's(and all the other characters') stunted mental growth? This does not, indeed, as Josh says, excuse F451 into a sci-fi classic. It *is* histrionic and the social (particularly gender) values date it extremely to the 50s. Maybe it's better appreciated as a period piece. Hmm...

Word, thanks Josh. Nicely said.

Kaion, no, I don't think that flies. I feel Bradbury behind this, not Guy. Guy's growth is from idiot to bloviating asshat - not to anything you or I would consider interesting. And I think that's by design; that's the best Bradbury can do.

Nowhere in Fahrenheit 451 does anyone talk about writing anything new. It's only about remembering what's old. Guy remembers, but he doesn't invent.

Can anyone invent without models? I've been reading In Search of Our Mother's Gardens, and that very question is a large focus of the first part of the book.

I feel like that's sort of the price of free thought-- you are totally going to run the risk of ending up with a "bloviating asshat"-- especially when the person doesn't have models for being better, only negative models to not be.

I agree that F451 is very limited in that sense. It works primarily as an instinctual rejection and an overblown fire-and-brimstone dystopic vision that makes it easy to grasp as an allegory, a myth, better than a novel, I think.

I don't remember any details about the book to form a good argument, but my impression is that the people were dumb and non-thinking because of this future culture that they were a part of. Not because Bradbury can't write a book. I have never read anything else by him for comparison though either....

My issue is that it's not the people I think are dumb; it's the author. Montag is sometimes dumb and sometimes not, depending on the chapter; the philosophy in the book, though, is always dumb. It's a dumb book.

Kaion, if you're suggesting that the characters are dumb because they have no role models, then how do you explain the circle of literature rememberers? Again, there's no thought whatsoever of creating; there's just the dumb insistence on remembering what's been written. This is a society of rememberers; they have all of literature between them, and no one ever says anything about writing something new. It's a backwards-looking philosophy. (And just to goad you because I know you like to read female authors - how many of them are mentioned in the book? Just askin'.) What this is is Harold Bloom, except even less subtle.

Wow, I think you did just burn this book. Burrrrn.

It's kinda of funny you think this book blames minorities when the person quoting this is the bad guy of the story! Just because a villain in the book says something,doesn't mean the whole book will reflect his opinion. After all , who is the one ranting that conservatives wrote this book? Sounds like we're singling a group out, aren't we, Mr. Beatty? I'm fifteen, and I have learned to analyze a book to every aspect. Maybe if you grow up and try reading it again, you'll like it.

The reviewer is 38…

And, if you read the coda by the author, you get further anecdotes about how minorities try to censor literature. Bradbury was in full agreement with Beatty in that aspect. (If you want to analyze a book to every aspect, it's important to read the codas, prefaces, and afterwords the author put in them).

F451 isn't the most morally complex book, but it is beyond simple "good buy/bad guy" elements. Even though Beatty was the antagonist, he summarizes the point of the novel better than anyone else in the book.

I am very proud of you for learning how to analyze a book though, AN! Keep it up! Maybe next you could try reading one!

Read from December 27 to 28, 2013

What's most upsetting is you went into the future to read this book and it stunk!!! Most unlikeable time travel story ever!!! Didja at least get the lottery numbers for that week?

Ha...whoops.

I knew there was a reason I haven't been hanging out with you lately... It's because you're lame, Alex, so very very lame.

I'll try to be less lame if you come back to me, Jayme! I miss you.

I'll try to hang out with you guys soon. Field works starting, so I'll have more free time :)

Sweet! Let's all hang out this summer!

Bjorn, you're an idiot. You're on a social media website for book lovers and amateur reviewers and you're berating someone for not adhering to some arbitrary quality standard you hold in your tiny little brain?

Fuck you. Nobody owes you anything. If you don't like Alex's or anyone else's review, why don't you just keep scrolling down to locate one that better suits you?

I'd like to view this as an example of Jason's deteriorating mental state. Bjorn does not exist except in Jason's mind.

I knew you were going to have something to say, Eh?! As soon as I noticed Bjorn deleted, I said to myself, "D'oh! She's gonna keeeeel me for not quoting!"

He actually came on here afterward and apologized which made it awkward because I was kind of mean, but then he deleted even the apology.

Meh, fuck it.

You are what's wrong with history! No saving of records, no way to corroborate your story!

I have poor documentation practices! I could never work in QA.

Very Orwellian--destroy history's evidence and then create a new future. (I mean the book, not about this phantom Bjorn).

Bradbury doesn't delve into the political details like Orwell does, which is disappointing. And, as Alex mentioned, the characters oftentimes seem puerile and contrived. However, it's a fantastic concept for a short story...sadly Bradbury decided to add an extra 100 pages.
As for the comments I see about Beatty--he's merely a faux-villain. Montag states that he could tell Beatty welcomed death at the time of his incineration. I mean, who the hell can quote that many philosophers and writers and then openly lead a crusade against texts?
Responding to another great comment earlier (I forget who): what's with all this emphasis on the past? Yes, I understand, we should learn from our mistakes. But then technically if we all recreate our reality through archaic philosophies then I should be able to boss women and certain minorities around whilst drinking a fine sherry in the study with my mistress.
Yeah, I think Bradbury was a bit of a chauvinist.
However, I'm a bit obsessed with dystopias and I did think it was at least an entertaining read (that's right Bradbury, I enjoyed your novel solely for the FUN of it...muahahaha).

Hope I didn't ruin the conversation here...

I have no idea what this books ranks in the top 10 best Sci-Fi books ever written, it's very mediocre, but so far I've found that be be true of all his stories, he does have to great ideas, but the dude just can't tell a story worth a damn.

Great review, this is exactly how I felt!

Thanks, Vigdis!

1) Montag's intellect does not waver throughout the book. What does waver is his willingness to act upon intellectual curiosity. To neglect the difference is to completely miss one of this work's central themes: The enforced limitation of ideas. It's not that Guy is stupid, it's that he literally grew up in a culture where intellectual curiosity was criminalized.

2) Claims of misogyny are overly-simple analyses, devoid of consideration for Clarisse. Her character demonstrates that intellectual curiosity *is* in the natural order of mankind. It's this virtue in her that sparks Montag's journey to begin with. It's true that there's no lack of contempt for Mildred, but to label that as misogyny is to completely ignore her status as a symbol for the complacent, shallow consumerism that infests this world. At no point does Bradbury make evident any judgements based on her gender, any prescriptions of how either gender should behave, or how any of that might factor into her blind conformity. I would go as far as saying that referring to her as any kind of definitive "real woman," as this reviewer has, is every bit as misogynist as the reviewer claims Bradbury/Montag to be. As if deviation from Mildred's character were to make a woman less of a "real woman." The term itself belies a prejudicial, prescriptive mindset that mirrors exactly the flaw being decried.

3) The rationale for the destruction of books did not come from only two lines about political correctness. It came, quite clearly in my opinion, from the need to keep a populace ignorant enough not to know or care about the war being waged by and against their nation. This was made crystal-clear by the book's conclusion. But beyond that, Beatty himself goes to great lengths to explain to Montag that the ideas one can access in written literature can be subversive to the order of the world in which they live. He specifically details that the contradictory claims found in different books lead to instability. To distill all of that rationale down to "Some people don't like some books" is to have entirely misinterpreted, or even largely ignored, Beatty's speech to Montag. Ideas present in literature can create dissension, can create questions, can complicate belief systems into something difficult to manage. THAT is the rationale for the destruction of literature in Fahrenheit 451. Books, in this instance, simply symbolize intellectual curiosity.

4) It is entirely appropriate for the subject matter for Bradbury to go to great lengths in descriptive language. The entire point of Montag's journey is that he's learning not to take his world for granted, not to simply let your life speed by in a blur of entertainment and product, to question and think and strive for more knowledge and more sophisticated ideas. In dwelling on those small things the reviewer considers insignificant, Bradbury has perfectly encapsulated the mindset to which Montag is travelling.


There's a certain, nearly prejudicial contempt for this work in the reviewer that has apparently made for a skewed, short-sighted, and shallow analysis.

Yo, do you stick your pinkie out when you type things like "the flaw being decried"? You should make sure to stick your pinkie out. Maybe wear a monocle too.

So people who actually know literature, how to write with proper structure and syntax, and how to build a cohesive argument are pretentious to you?

No wonder you didn't understand this.

Well, not all people. Just you.

Snark is the poor man's substitute for wit. Goodbye.

This book is a masterpiece. Although the finer details of the plot can be lost on some people the overlying messages are clear. Censorship, control and how our society is developing as a whole. This is a fabulous piece of literature that will be a timeless classic and forever go down as one of the most accurate predictions of our future. Pity great novels are lost on you.

That does sound like a shame, yeah.

I love this thread.

It really is a relief you aren't a teacher then!

Sure is, weird little kid.

I'm reading this now and I feel the same way, glad to see I'm not alone since everyone seems to love this book and I can't figure out why.

It's clear you need to possess a certain maturity level in order to fully grasp the author's choices in this novel. Of course, everyone is entitled to an opinion. Personally, I can understand your viewpoint, but I believe that one needs to approach the book not as a story but as a lesson, a vision of a future we are inevitably moving towards.

Laurent wrote: "one needs to approach the book not as a story but as a lesson"

Hmmm, but it is a story not an essay or a lecture. There are plenty of well written stories that touch on this issue I just don't see this as one of them.

Interesting review. I always thought of the book as an argument against anti-intellectualism--and as that, I think it functions well--but you're probably right that there's some unfortunate conservatism in there too. The conservatism for me, though, comes more from lines like the government being inefficient and tax-mad and less from the ones you cited, which I think is more of a criticism of the idea that texts that make people uncomfortable (for legitimate reasons [Little Black Sambo] or not [Uncle Tom's Cabin]) are best censored (or forgotten entirely) than grappled with. The empowerment comes from the grappling (i.e. the thinking). Remember the controversy a few years ago when a publisher planned to release Huck Finn with all instances of the n-word replaced with "slave"? I think that's the kind of impulse Bradbury's commenting on. We're supposed to be uncomfortable when we read Huck Finn--part of Mark Twain's intent in writing it was to force America to come to terms with its ugliness (not that he was entirely successful, but that's another conversation). If society refuses to face down its demons (collective and individual), Bradbury argues, we might be faced with a future in which people don't think or analyze anything at all.

Well said.

Callie wrote: "Laurent wrote: "one needs to approach the book not as a story but as a lesson"

Hmmm, but it is a story not an essay or a lecture. There are plenty of well written stories that touch on this issue..."

It's a cautionary allegory. Which functions as both.

Kevin wrote: "Callie wrote: "Laurent wrote: "one needs to approach the book not as a story but as a lesson"

Hmmm, but it is a story not an essay or a lecture. There are plenty of well written stories that touc..."

I disagree. By definition an allegory is not an essay, lecture, or story. It is a literary device that can be found in many mediums. The use of this literary device does not define the medium since allegories can be found everywhere from paintings to music.

This debate is even lamer than this lame book.

Alex wrote: "This debate is even lamer than this lame book."

Ouch.

Alex wrote: "This debate is even lamer than this lame book."

Seriously? I expected a more mature approach to this :D

Agree 100% with the review.

I was ready to love this book (because I'm against burning of books, too!), but it got pretty bad pretty quick.

Bradbury's explanations for the book burnings are inconsistent, insufficient, and incredible. And plain ignorant besides.

I mean, 'minority sensitivities'? *That's* what bothered Bradbury about race relations in the 1950s? The political correctness is what worried him?

Wasn't Emmet Till lynched in 1955?
Rosa Parks arrested in 1955?

Also, story-wise, it sucked.

I like the protagonist's name though, 'Guy Montag' ... kinda cool sounding.

LMAO

I liked this book a lot more than you did but your review has raised many things that I also found concerning, and it's also quite entertaining!