Fahrenheit 451 Analysis

6. Symbols are very important in Fahrenheit 451. Name three specific symbols and outline their references and meanings throughout the novel. Use specific examples from the text in your argument.

Throughout the novel Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury, symbols are very prevalent. Three major symbols that are present in Fahrenheit 451 are fire, the in-ear seashells and the hound. The plot of the book is that in a future time books have been banned due to them causing discrepancies in many people. The way that this ban is enforced is by having firemen who now instead of putting out fires, go and burn the book and the person’s house that had the books.

One of the very major symbols in the book is fire. In the book the main character, Montag is a fireman so it is his job to burn the books. In the beginning of the book Montag enjoys being a fireman. In the beginning it is Montag burning a house and it says: "Montag grinned the fierce grin of all men singed and driven back by flame. But soon after meeting a girl named Clarisse he starts to see his job as a fireman in a different way. In my opinion the fire represents the destruction of humanity. The burning of the books represents how Bradbury feels about our culture; how he thinks it is eroding. And the burning of the books symbolizes how as a culture we don't care enough about knowledge and slowly we are destroying our culture. This is proven in the part where Montag is talking to his friend Faber, who was a college professor. Faber says to Montag: "The whole culture's shot through. The skeleton needs melting and reshaping." Faber is saying that he feels that the culture is completely broken and it is in need of some major reshaping.

Another major symbol present in Fahrenheit 451is the use of in-ear seashells. During the time when Fahrenheit 451 is taking place the use of in-ear shells have become rampant. Now when you finish watching TV for the day you can insert you seashell in and still be enveloped in everything going on. The seashell use is most apparent in Montag's wife, Mildred. In one part where Mildred is listening to her seashell she is described as: "her Seashell was tamped in her ear again and she was listening
to far people in far places, her eyes wide and staring at the fathoms of blackness
above her in the ceiling." Because of her seashell use Mildred is almost impossible to communicate with and this angers Montag a lot. I feel that Bradbury uses the seashells as a symbol for how technology is slowly taking over our lives. In the book Mildred along with the rest of what seems to be the world use the seashells a lot. In the book Bradbury even writes about how Mildred listens to it while she sleeps: "His wife stretched on the bed, uncovered and cold, like a body displayed on the lid of a tomb, her eyes fixed to the ceiling by invisible threads of steel, immovable. And in her ears the little Seashells, the thimble radios tamped tight, and an electronic ocean of sound, of music and talk and music and talk coming in, coming in on the shore of her unsleeping mind. The room was indeed empty. Every night the waves came in and bore her off on their great tides of sound, floating her, wide-eyed, toward morning." I feel that Bradbury was portraying his feeling on technology with the seashells. I get the impression that he feels technology is too involved in our lives and it will just get worse and worse in the future.

A third symbol that Bradbury uses is the mechanical hound. In the book the fire station has mechanical hound that can be programed to anyone's specific smell and it will hunt you down and inject you with an extremely deadly chemicals. In the book Montag is very scared of the hound. He describes it as: "It was like a great bee come home from some field where the honey is full of poison wildness, of insanity and nightmare, its body crammed with that over-rich nectar and now it was sleeping the evil out of itself. “Throughout the book the hound plays a large role in Montag's fear as he leans more and more about the word of books. In my opinion the hound is a symbol of fear. Wherever Montag goes the thought of the hound is always looming over him, striking fear into him. When Montag goes on the run they get a hound from another district to come and follow him and on the TV station they say: “Mechanical Hound never fails. Never since its first use in tracking quarry has this incredible invention made a mistake. Tonight, this network is proud to have the opportunity to follow the Hound by camera helicopter as it starts on its way to the target..." This quote for me helps to show the symbolism of the hound. That wherever you are the hound is there to find you.

Throughout the book Fahrenheit 451 Bradbury uses symbolism to portray his points. The uses of these symbols help to really make the story much more meaningful. They make you think much harder about the book and really make the book much more powerful.

TU Tuesday - Local

http://www.timesunion.com/local/article/Troubling-issues-at-Guilderland-nursing-home-3533412.php

I read an article on Guilderland Center's nursing home and how they are in big trouble. According to the article: "state inspectors have cited the Guilderland Center Nursing Home for 52 deficiencies over the past three years, more than double the statewide average." This is a very troubling fact. It shows that the nursing home, where they are taking care of the elderly has many issues. This is especially bad for a nursing home because senior citizens need and deserve the best care possible as they live the last part of their lives there. As the story goes on it goes more and more in depth into how much trouble the nursing home is in. In the article it says: "The company that owned the facility, Guilderland LTC Management, filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in 2008. Last month, the new owner of the Route 146 nursing home, Guilderland Realty Holdings Corp., struck a deal with the city of Albany to repay $1 million in unpaid property taxes allowing the home to stay in business." This is a troubling fact. It shows that the nursing home went from unfit hands to equally unfit hands. This shows that on top of the deficiencies that the nursing home has they also have very poor ownership. Unfortunately these are not all that's wrong with the nursing home. Certified nursing assistant, Leonard Clark was accused of: "grabbing the breast of a 95-year-old resident in 2010, leaving a sizable bruise. According to the complaint filed by the Attorney General's Medicaid Fraud Control Unit." This makes the situation very messed up and along with this the nursing home is also accused of giving seniors medicine that they don't need and ignoring the seniors when they need help. This is a very messed up situation and Richard Mollot summed it up best when he said: "Clearly you have staffing problems here."

48. What do you think about war?

This is a very hard question for me. I would like very much too just write about how much I don't like war and how I disagree with it but I can't do that. For the most part I don't agree with war in any form. I don't like the idea of regular people getting killed for, what is sometimes, a useless argument. For an example I feel that the Iraq War is a very just drawn out war that should have never happened. In my opinion we should have never gone into the Middle East in the first place. But as I said I can't completely bash wars because I see their purpose. Although I don't like that soldiers go to war and sometimes end up dead I do see wars purposes. Without war we might have never became an independent world superpower that we are today. Without war we could have still been using slaves for labor. These reasons and more help to show that with all its evil, war can still be ultimately good for the world. What I disagree with is when you have disastrous wars, such as Korea, Vietnam and Iraq. All of those wars have turned out to be, or are in the process of being massive failures. When you are having so many soldiers die for a useless and pointless cause I do not agree with that at all. But there is another reason that I don't completely disagree with war and that is my cousin Robert. Rob is in the military and he is now in his second tour of duty, this time in Afghanistan. As much as I don't want Rob there because I don't want anything to happen to him I see the good in what he is doing. You can tell how proud he is to fight for the country that he loves and he doesn't mind risking his life to protect America. I find that very a very admirable trait. With all this being said I can say that I am very ambivalent in my feelings about war. In some cases I don't like it at all and in others I can see that good it can bring. I guess it's all about how you look at it.

What is Crippling Us

In both Fahrenheit 451 and Against School, Bradbury and Taylor Gatto make comments about society. Even though they are both about our society they are brought about in different ways. Fahrenheit 451 is told as a story taking part in the future while Against School is written from the view of an ex-teacher who says; "I taught for thirty years in some of the worst schools in Manhattan, and in some of the best, and during that time I became an expert in boredom." Also along with the fact that there are written from different perspectives they also have different messages. In Against Schools, Taylor Gatto talks about how boredom is widespread in schools, saying: "Boredom is the common condition of schoolteachers, and anyone who has spent time in a teachers' lounge can vouch for the low energy, the whining, the dispirited attitudes, to be found there." He says that not only are the children bored with school but the teachers are as well. Well Taylor Gatto talks about our poor public education system, Bradbury talks about society more as a whole. Fahrenheit 451 takes place in a world where books have been banned and firemen burn books instead of putting out fires. It has been so long that people have forgotten the old ways. In one part of the book a girl asks the main character, Montag about the past. She says: "Is it true that long ago that firemen put out fires instead of going to start them." This takes Montag off guard and he replies with: "No. Houses have always been fireproof, take my word for it." This shows how clueless the people in the world have become. Fahrenheit 451 is Bradbury's way of saying that as we become more and more culturally advance we lose touch with what is important and the great ideas that shaped the past world. In the cases of both pieces I am convinced to think the way that they do. In Fahrenheit 451i agree very much with Bradbury's points. I agree that as we become more advanced we lose touch of the past and I think that we can't do that; we need to hold on to it. In the case of Taylor Gatto I also agree. I feel that if teachers gave more of an effort to make kids want to learn we could achieve a much better and relevant education.

Tried and True

 

http://writingprompts.tumblr.com/post/17477297690/my-28-most-tried-and-true-writing-prompts

Monday: The old homeless man. He is wearing baggy dirty sweatpants and a over sized sweatshirt that has multiple holes in it. People who pass by him make a conscious effort to avoid contact with him.

Tuesday: A very nice young lady. You can see that she tries to look good for the day and you are attracted to her. But, once you get closer to her you realize that she is sort of annoying and soon you are looking for any excuse to leave her side.

Wednesday: Wednesday is the sort of overweight man that you can't help but be friends with. He is pretty slow and sometimes he can just get on your nerves but most of the time when you hang out with him you have a good time and leave happy.

Thursday: Thursday is the girl who you are really good friends with but that's all. You really want to further you relationship with her but the feeling is not mutual and you just end up bummed out. She is a real tease.

Friday: Friday is your best friend. Whenever you are with him you feel so good. You love Fridays company so much that you are always thinking about hanging out with him. He is your best friend and you never get sick of being with him.

TU Tuesday - Commencement Speech

http://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2008/06/text-of-j-k-rowling-speech/
 2nd speech: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2007/apr/23/nelsonmandela

It is very special when you can connect with something, especially something a famous person has said. In this case I made a connection with a speech by J.K. Rowling. In 2008 Rowling made the commencement speech at Harvard and during her speech she said: "Ultimately, we all have to decide for ourselves what constitutes failure, but the world is quite eager to give you a set of criteria if you let it." I could not agree with this quote more. Today there is so much pressure on kids to succeed. As a kid I experience this myself, not from my parents but from many other sources. Today it is a common belief that if you fail at something you are screwing up your life and that you won't amount to something. But as Rowling says: "Simply because failure meant a stripping away of the inessential. I stopped pretending to myself that I was anything other than what I was, and began to direct all my energy into finishing the only work that mattered to me." This helps to prove that failing is an important part of maturing. In a way everyone should fail at something just so they understand how terrible it is and gain more determination to not fail. Rowling goes on to say: "Had I really succeeded at anything else, I might never have found the determination to succeed in the one arena I believed I truly belonged." This speaks so much to me. To me it shows that it is OK to fail, that an extremely successful author failed and she is still what she is today. It helps to show that failing is OK and that is a normal part of life. A quote from Rowling speech that really puts this into perspective for me is; "You might never fail on the scale I did, but some failure in life is inevitable. It is impossible to live without failing at something, unless you live so cautiously that you might as well not have lived at all – in which case, you fail by default." I feel that this is the most moving quote and really brings the whole meaning to life.

Another speech that helps to show the power of failing is Nelson Mandela's speech in 1964. "I came to the conclusion that as violence in this country was inevitable; it would be unrealistic to continue preaching peace and non-violence. This conclusion was not easily arrived at. It was only when all else had failed, when all channels of peaceful protest had been barred to us, that the decision was made to embark on violent forms of political struggle. I can only say that I felt morally obliged to do what I did." Though this quote is talking about the use of violence it still is very powerful. It shows that Mandela failed many times and even though he failed he still kept fighting. Many people would have just backed down but with Mandela it made his drive even stronger. This helps to show the power of failing. It can ignite a determination in you that you never though was possible.

In this blog I am not saying that I think kids should go to school and just fail classes and receive no repercussions for it. What I am saying in this blog is that I feel that there shouldn't be so much pressure on kids to succeed all the time. Kids shouldn't have to live under the shadow of failing all the time and when they do fail; they can use it as a motivational tool to succeed even better than before.