Themes, motifs and symbols on Fahrenheit 451

Themes

“Themes are the fundamental and often universal ideas explored in a literary work.” (SparkNotes LLC, 2012)

There are two types of themes, the stated and the implied. The stated themes are said directly and the implied themes are the ones that are shown gradually using characters, plot and setting. An example of a stated theme is literature and an example of an implied theme is violence.

Literature and knowledge:

Literature and writing in general is represented on texts. These texts can be anything with meaning and that’s why Faber says “Do you know why books such as this are so important? Because they have quality. And what does the word quality mean? To me it means texture. This book has pores. It has futures. This book can go under the microscope. You’d find life under the glass, streaming past in infinite profusion” (pg. 79). (Bradbury, 1950). Literature drags to another theme that is knowledge versus ignorance. These two themes, literature and knowledge are represented in books and they are universal because it’s fundamental in our world to know things. Our entire society is based in knowledge and capability and that’s why people is selected or separated in work or school. This idea that people should be educated and should know several things fundaments all the current programs about education and training kids. This theme is represented in the book by showing why ignorance should be avoid and why is so important to maintain some kind of connection to books to discover more about our past and about ourselves. Montag says, “’And besides if Captain Beatty knew about those books’-She thought about it. Her face grew amazed and then horrified.-’He might come and burn the house and the family. That’s awful! Think of our investment. Why should I read? What for?’” (pg. 69) (Bradbury, 1950). This shows how fear was managed to control people and maintain them ignorant because then, it would be easier to control them. This makes it harder for the reader to believe how we can be so easily influenced and controlled.

The Big 5:

1.    Audience / purpose (Whom does the text target? What does the author wish to achieve through the text?): If we take the two images of the books burning, we can understand how the author interprets the act of burning books as an action of destruction and resentment to literature. Literature represents knowledge, history and the desire for knowing what the people before us did to understand what to do now. If we burn that knowledge and that source of wisdom, we are limiting ourselves. The author sends this desperate sign to all the people related or interested in knowledge. People who are interested in knowing who we really are and how are we going to end up so they would, maybe, loose at some kind the interest in knowing. People in the society of “Fahrenheit 451” that want to know the truth, are suppressed by the idea that the source of consciousness should be suppressed.

2.    Content / theme (What is literally ‘happening’ in the text? What is it about? What are the main ideas of the text?): The main idea of the text is to express discomfort or displeasure with awareness. It shows a society that’s ignorant about the history and the education. It represents how people prefer to be ignorant and feel empty but happy to be intelligent and questioning themselves. If we try to see it deeply, it can also represent how people is directed by the government so it’s easier to control one-mind people so they convince them to burn the only source of free-thinking origin.

3.    Tone / mood (How does the text make you and/or the target audience feel? Describe the atmosphere of the text): The atmosphere of the text it’s tense and discontent. It makes you feel like you are guilty of letting people stay ignorant. The text is trying to show you that you can’t be a writer and you shouldn’t be reading dead authors so basically are pressuring your ideals to make you feel empty and that makes me feel like I’m in jail. By making knowledge an enemy, the mood of the text is violent and basic. It makes you understand that the people that do that kind of activity may be simple, ignorant or maybe just mad without an actual and firm reason.

4.    Stylistic devices (How does the author use language to convey a sentiment or message? What kinds of linguistic tools does he/she employ?): The author uses bright and intense colors such as the yellow, red and white to contrast it with the black and the darkness of the back of the picture. This way, the picture seems brighter and more interesting. It also uses several books with different colors to represent that they are burning different and diverse literature and the fire like it’s managing and controlling the situation.

5.    Structure (How is the text organized, literally (i.e. layout/formatting)? What kinds of structural elements of a particular text type do you see?): The fire is on top and at the sides of the books like they don’t have any way out. The books on top are already burnt and damaged so we already know that the other ones below are going to suffer the same luck. The fire seems to wrap the books like it’s some kind of powerful source or embracing thing you can’t escape from.

Violence:

Violence itself is a theme that can be represented in several ways so many times it can be hidden in the words of the author. Ray Bradbury tries to implement the verbal and the implicit violence. Violence, aggression and other ways to discriminate people are shown by different actions such as the differentiation, “I´ve got to go see my psychiatrist now. They make me go. I make up things to say. I don’t know what he thinks of me. He says I’m a regular onion! I keep him busy peeling away the layers” (pg. 20) (Bradbury, 1950). In this section, people who read, who question themselves about things, curious, that desire knowledge, are seen as weird and despicable people. Other way to use violence is the physical violence like the scene in the burning house, “’Here.’ Montag pulled at the woman. The woman replied quietly, ‘I want to stay here.’” (Pg. 36) (Bradbury, 1950). This way you can see how the woman was treated as a psycho and that led the people to think they could pull and push her like someone that is despair or invalid just because she likes books. This makes the reader wonder how does people express violently and how does society tend to form violent people against specific groups. The rules and norms of the society in the book are violent and support aggression against the readers.

The Big 5 (first picture):

1.    Audience / purpose (Whom does the text target? What does the author wish to achieve through the text?): The author wants to show the different types of violence. Violence is always related to physical abuse but there’s also mental violence or discrimination that is to put aside someone that thinks different from you. The expression of the woman (Mildred) implied repulsion or hate to the fact that her husband (Montag) is reading. She is the one who perpetuates the peace in the relation. The author wants also to show that a marriage without smart decisions and without feelings it’s full of implied violence because of the rancor. That’s why the text is dedicated to the people that want to establish a healthy relationship so they need to understand that if you want to be with someone, it needs to be in the good and in bad moments.

2.    Content / theme (What is literally ‘happening’ in the text? What is it about? What are the main ideas of the text?):  The main theme of the text is the discontent between a married couple. The wife is mad or bored at the fact that the husband has a newspaper. She is not saying anything but we deduct that she is pretty disappointed at the fact that knowledge is reaching him and not her. She is partially scared with the fact that now she needs to think and discuss too. She needs to catch up with her husband.

3.    Tone / mood (How does the text make you and/or the target audience feel? Describe the atmosphere of the text): The text has a tone of discomfort and it makes you realize that people in a relationship need to be entirely given. The mood of the picture is awkward and not pleasant because there’s some kind of hate in the relationship. The audience may feel related to the fact that sometimes we just don’t like what the other person is doing and we may not agree with everything but it may also seem to be aggressive and dumb because the woman is not talking to her husband. It may make the audience reflex and think that people should think and then talk to prevent bigger problems.

4.    Stylistic devices (How does the author use language to convey a sentiment or message? What kinds of linguistic tools does he/she employ?): The text uses yellow in the dress of the woman and in the background because that shows and implies some kind of relation between the woman and the wall. They are both the same color because neither of them think but they feel like they’re happy. Yellow means happiness and blue sadness. Because the husband is wearing a blue pajama it may represent that he is discontent with ignorance and with not knowing. The author centralizes the two people in the picture so they don’t seem one better than the other but accentuates on the husband to show how his action is changing the entire mood of the picture.

5.    Structure (How is the text organized, literally (i.e. layout/formatting)? What kinds of structural elements of a particular text type do you see?): The two subjects of the text are centralized and between them there’s a newspaper. They both are shown in the same position and in the same circumstance to represent that they are both capable of reaching knowledge but the only think separating them is the desire, shown in the facial expression.

Motifs

“Motifs are recurring structures, contrasts, and literary devices that can help to develop and inform the text’s major themes”. (SparkNotes LLC, 2012)

This book has a lot of recurrent motifs like death, religious symbols, nature and paradoxes. All motifs can be symbols but it’s about their transcendence and what how currently they appear that make them motifs or not. Nature and religious symbols may be used much more than others because they represent something bigger that is the contrast between now’s society and the society represented in the book. Paradoxes are motifs but they can also be considered collateral damaged due to a complex writing method that is the futurist literature. Its hard to imagine what’s going to be like in a couple thousand years because human nature and society can change a lot so paradoxes are usual in this type of literature.

Death:

Death is a constant thing through time in human history. It means many different things depending on the person, the time and the culture. In the book, death isn’t a symbol of something specific but it’s the answer for a representation of the two contrasting points of view. For Mildred, representing the modern society, death is something you should avoid or ignore.  Beatty says, “You ask a lot of things and you wind up vey unhappy indeed, if you keep at it. The poor girl’s better off death” (Pg. 58) (Bradbury, 1950) and that’s later supported by Mildred when she says, “She’s dead. Let’s talk about someone alive, for goodness’ sake.” (Pg. 68) (Bradbury, 1950). There’s some kind of tension that leaves the reader thinking that death is something unhappy and mysterious so we shouldn’t think much about it. It’s just something we cant and shouldn’t figure out because it depends on our own rationing and that takes a lot more of other consequences such as an unhappy answer.

On the other hand, Montag sees death as something mysterious but interesting. “'Stuff your eyes with wonder,' he said, 'live as if you'd drop dead in ten seconds. See the world.” (Pg. 157) (Bradbury, 1950). Montag sees death like some kind of opportunity. Its some kind of line that defines and impulses you to do your best in this life right here and right now. He is now inspired to change his way of thinking in that precise moment. “Some day the load we're carrying with us may help someone. But even when we had the books on hand, a long time ago, we didn't use what we got out of them. We went right on insulting the dead. We went right on spitting in the graves of all the poor ones who died before us. We're going to meet a lot of lonely people in the next week and the next month and the next year. And when they ask us what we're doing, you can say, We're remembering.” (Pg. 163)(Bradbury, 1950). Most of the authors from the books are dead but death means a lot more than just disappearing, means leaving some kind of mark for the next people to remember you by.

Symbols

“Symbols are objects, characters, figures, and colors used to represent abstract ideas or concepts.” (SparkNotes LLC, 2012)

This book is a dystopic novel that counts with several symbols such as blood, “the heart and the salamander”, “the sieve and the sand”, the phoenix, fire, flower gardens and mirrors. These may sound a little bit redundant and explaining each one of them would mean reaching until the author’s understanding of the topic. Ray Bradbury uses a lot of symbolism to talk about different themes such as society and identity.

Society:

Society is a complex thing represented in several ways. The flower garden represents the society that grows using the ideals from previous people so it’s the flower growing from another flower. It can also be represented using the mirrors because they show more or less what society has made of you and what you should be looking according to those standards. Another way to represent it is by using fire that is the destructor of other ideals. Society needs everyone thinking the same because then it’s easier to keep people doing what they need to do and being “happy” so all this is achieved by burning, destroying and vanishing everything that can lead to a revolution or other ways of thinking.

The Big 5 (fire picture):

     1.    Audience / purpose (Whom does the text target? What does the author wish to achieve through the text?): The text represents change and destruction. The message goes to everyone that dislikes or avoids something. This seem a solution a little pyromaniac solution but fire also represents get over something or to have a new start so the text symbolizes the pass of time and pass of interests in society. The author wants to create some kind of pressure in the mind of the person to make us understand that we need change.

     2.    Content / theme (What is literally ‘happening’ in the text? What is it about? What are the main ideas of the text?): The main theme of this text is change and evolution. Fire was the first and the main achievement that the humans have ever made and now we’re using it to destroy our advance in the past years. The theme can also be related as destruction and abolishment of things in general. The topic would be understood as the need of human beings to destroy and to run over everything that make us work and think.

     3.    Tone / mood (How does the text make you and/or the target audience feel? Describe the atmosphere of the text): The tone of the text is horror and hatred because of how the violence is implied. It makes you feel little and insignificant compared to that natural resource that can run over everything. The main thing to recognize in the picture is a sense of destruction and awareness because many times we don’t realize what we are doing until there’s no going back like when you burn something, you can’t turn back the ashes.

      4.     Stylistic devices (How does the author use language to convey a sentiment or message? What kinds of linguistic tools does he/she employ?): The author uses bright and vibrant colors against a dark background to catch the attention of the reader. The author also uses the curves of the flames in contrast with the straight lines at the background. It may sound strange but the paint in the back was painted in straight lines and you can notice by the sequence of the paint. This reflects some kind of independence from the fire.

   

     5.    Structure (How is the text organized, literally (i.e. layout/formatting)? What kinds of structural elements of a particular text type do you see?): The text starts with a black background that states for nothing and then, from all the sides, there are flames. Flames seem to take over all the picture so that’s what the blackness of the picture stands for, there’s nothing after the fire. The flames are bright red and orange so they seem attractive but they also mean dangerous and oblivion.

Identity:

People that try to describe who they are usually trapped into that paradox of knowing if you’re like a phoenix, something that lives out of the death. Its like your identity is conditioned by the authors you read or the ideals you represent. You are constantly being created and destroyed like the phoenix on those ideals so it’s never a new you, you are merely the same ideas with another figure. That’s why blood represents something really important in the book and that is that blood means change. Even though some people see blood as death, blood can mean the transition from one phase to another. Blood is a substance that it’s unique for each person.

Bibliography 

Bradbury, R. (1950). Fahrenheit 451. (T. S. Bureau, Ed.) New York, United States: Simon & Schuster.

SparkNotes LLC. (2012). SparkNotes. (SparkNotes, Editor, & B&N) Retrieved the 15 of May of 2015, from Themes, Motifs & Symbols: http://www.sparknotes.com/lit/451/themes.html