Fahrenheit 451 Research Paper

The novel, Fahrenheit 451, takes place in an alternate society in which many of our daily activities today would be illegal. Simple things such as being a pedestrian and reading a book are not allowed. This may seem far off from today’s society, but many of the predictions in the book have come true. Even though the story was written over fifty years ago, the reader can still see reflections of the modern world in Fahrenheit 451 through the technology, social isolation, and other substance abuse.

Ray Bradbury make many technological predictions in the novel, Fahrenheit 451, many of which came true. Bradbury predicts “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” (Bradbury 8). As Bradbury wrote this novel, over 50 years ago, he was unsure of what inventions might come in the

In this fictional world, it is not ordinary to sit and talk, “‘Oh, just my mother and father and uncle sitting around, talking. It's like being a pedestrian, only rarer’” (Bradbury 4). People in this community are accustomed to talking to people only when necessary and simply watching the parlour walls for the entire day. Montag has to constantly ask Mildred “"Will you turn the parlour off?"” (Bradbury 23) as that is what people spend their day doing. They sit and watch the parlour walls, they only talk when necessary and they listen to their thimble radios; this is what Fahrenheit 451’s society has come to and accepted. They have accepted the social isolation, the absence of talking, and the knowledge and enjoyment of books. This leads the reader to see an aspect of modern day society in this novel, as, today, people have started to let go of the idea of commonly sitting around and talking. Instead, people spend their days on their phones, computers, or televisions listening to