Lit Circle Blog: Fahrenheit 451

     Our group read Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury. The essential question I have chosen for this blog is:What caused Ray Bradbury to write a novel about book burning/censorship? This tied into my study in a few different ways. First, we never quite found the answer in the plot itself. This led to about 5 minutes of discussion that resulted in the logical outcome of this being a rebuttal to the Nazis' practice of book burning. The outcome was two different articles being chosen: one on book banning, and the other on book burning, as you will see below.

The firemen in the book are very similar to Nazi book-burners in method and reason. On the back cover of the book, it says, "The system was simple. Everyone understood it. Books were for burning, along with the houses in which they were hidden." This would seem to just be attention-hooking. However, there is in fact a reason for the book burning. "Just what is that reason?" I hear you thinking. This precise reason is brought up on the Holocaust Encyclopedia website, on the page marked "Book Burning", where it states, “...the burning of books represents an element of censorship and usually proceeds from a cultural, religious, or political opposition to the materials in question." This is, in fact, brought up-spoiler alert- in the book. They burn books for this exact reason, which ties back to my EQ (Look at me, tying things together!). Writing this has also sparked a bit of pyromania in me.

     There is also a historical reference to the burning of books. In the book's altered history, there is a line, which states, "Established, 1790, to burn English-influenced books in the colonies. First Fireman: Benjamin Franklin." Obviously, this never happened. But clearly there is a reference to the Nazi's historic symbolism of book burning! The historical symbolism was mentioned in the article too. In there, it is clearly written,“In a symbolic act of ominous significance, on May 10, 1933, university students burned upwards of 25,000 volumes of ‘un-German’ books, presaging an era of state censorship and control of culture.” Clearly, this was in fact written as a Nazi rebuttal. Even the references to a war being over before they can start again make sense in the wider context!

That was my blog. Enjoy your spring break and the party!
The article

Symbolism. Pyromania.