Sixth Discussion Question for Fahrenheit 451

Fahrenheit 451 has been around for 58 years! And high school students and all sorts of people still read this book. For being around for a half of a century, Fahrenheit's future is more of a possibility today then back in the 1953 because of the censorship issue. I understand that when this book was written books were the main entertainment and there wasn't as much technology as there is today. But because the present time has such a great amount of technology, books are growing unpopular as more people read ebooks and just don't have the time to sit down and read a good book. This book makes the issue of censorship and ignorance of knowledge more profound in today's time.

The message of this book is timeless because there will always be unhappy and offended people when it goes to literature no matter what the time period is. The timeless aspect comes from the story of what could happen of the critics and offended take it a step too far. The book serves as a warning to the present day people of what they could become in the future if they allow censorship to become a dominant part of society. Another timeless aspect is the burning of the books. That idea was new at the time as a punishment, weapon, law satisfying thing. Burning things has always been part of man's nature ever since fire was discovered. Food is cooked through fire, witches were burned, angry mobs burn everything, etc. So the concept of burning outlaw books wasn't knew, just in the context that Bradbury used.

We can learn two main things from Fahrenheit 451. The first is that too much censorship is bad. While everyone is entitled to their own opinion, that doesn't mean people can change a body of writing produced by one man/woman just because they don't agree with it. The author is entitled to their own viewpoint too! The other thing is to take the time to look at the little things like grass and flowers and even the cows on the side of the road (Bradbury 9). Without the deeper sense of comprehension and observation we will turn into brainwashed mushy zombie like people. Thought provoking stimulation doesn't sound all that important, but without it we would turn into the aforementioned zombie people.

Bradbury, Ray. Fahrenheit 451. New York: Ballantine, 2003. Print.