Farenheit 451

[Juicybearfut]

hey we were reading this book for english class and i was wondering if anyone else had read it/what they thought about it

[Earniel]

I've read it and was very impressed afterwards. I'm usually not one for these bleak possible-future books but Farenheit struck me as different and well worth the read (and the reread).

[Nurvingiel]

I read that for English too - it was awesome! 451 degerees Ferenheit is the temperature at which paper combusts, that's why the title. (Random factoid for those Celcius-inclined folks.) ;)

[Khamûl]

I enjoyed it. Another interesting factoid is the fact that Faber is the name of a pencil company. :)

[brownjenkins]

excellent book!

there's a movie of it too... 1970s ish

of course, you must read the book first ;)

[inked]

The whole subtext is the danger of ideas. Really a wonderful piece of social analysis. And it should be read in the continuum of Animal Farm and 1984, in my opinion. The book is really dangerous....

[Juicybearfut]

And it should be read in the continuum of Animal Farm and 1984, in my opinion.

haha we read 1984 this year and animal farm two years ago

[brownjenkins]

there's a few good movies for those too :p

[mithrand1r]

I found 451°F to be an enjoyable read. I liked it better than 1984, since I considered 451°F to be more hopeful than 1984, IMO.

If you are interested in some info about the movie Fahrenheit 451 (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0060390/).

I do recommend that you read the book first. You may want to finish your class before you see the movie, to minimize the possibility of confusing movie facts with book facts. Although I know that is very rare and has not happened with other books turned into movies. ;)

[Last Child of Ungoliant]

i haven't read farenheit, or 1984, but i love animal farm, and the cartoon film is brilliant too

[Nurvingiel]

Apprarently Ray Bradbury (author) was mad that Michael Moore called his movie Farenheit 9/11. But that just made me want to read Bradbury's book again.

[Snowdog]

I read it many years ago and thought it interesting. A whole new concept to the term 'firemen'.

[Juicybearfut]

we had to write an in-class essay on whether we thought it was an "effective piece of literature" (one of the questions we overdue because its on hte capt, which we have to pass to graduate)

i wrote it was, because it made us think about the book and society today. How with the patriot act we loose our privacy and soon we may be subject to have officials enter our house without warrents like the fireman can and how with teh FCC being so strict about TV and what it can/can't show, the government is censoring more and more each year and how soon this could spread to books. and how the world that is shown in farenheit 451 is simply the extrememe of what we are starting today.....

not bad considering we only get 15 minutes to write them and it cant be more than a page long

[Adonai Dragonwagon]

I've read Fahrenheit 451 three times, twice on my own and once for an english class, and each time I discover something new. Ray Bradbury is a wonderful author; I love everything I've ever read by him. The idea that people restrict their own information is a wonderful concept; so much of the time you hear about how the government censors things and whatnot, but people don't often recognize how much they censor themselves.
Another reason why Fahrenheit 451 is such a compelling novel is that no one ever claims to be right. Faber never claims that he is right, nor does Guy, or Beatty or anyone else.
Faber actually says that if there was no war, he would be all for people having fun. Who is to say that knowledge is integral to life? Bradbury's point is that maybe the purpose of life is to be happy.
The men with books in their heads don't try to convince anyone, to force their views on the general populace; that would be akin to what they are trying to fight. They are content to wait until the world needs them again.

[Snowdog]

I had to name Montag as one of my Top Ten Characters (http://entmoot.tolkientrail.com/showthread.php?t=12892)!