Overseas in America, these very same fears were inspiring Bradbury’s writing, as well. Witnessing secondhand the horrors of Adolf Hitler, Bradbury penned Fahrenheit 451, which was published in 1953 following the fall of the Nazi regime. A steadfast bibliophile, Bradbury was horrified by Germany’s book burnings. Thus, while Fahrenheit 451 was written an ocean away from Nineteen Eighty-Four, it builds off of a shared horror towards totalitarianism and reflects the same fears of conformity and censorship that crop up so prolifically in Orwell’s writing.
In a genre with a name that so blatantly embraces innovation—science fiction—Nineteen Eighty-Four and Fahrenheit 451’s resistance towards technology may initially seem out of place. This, however, is where it is essential for readers to draw on historical context—for mechanization is, indeed,
…show more content…
Charrington’s antique shop in the prole quarters of Oceania, Winston’s eyes fall upon a coral paperweight: a hundred-year-old relic of a bygone era that symbolizes the world of possibility that existed before the Party—a world of love, independence, beauty, and wonder. Imprisoned by a government that rewrites the past, Winston finds a small freedom in holding this unchanging fragment of history—this simplistic item that exists for no great purpose, but simply because its owner once thought it to be beautiful. As the novel progresses, Winston begins to view the coral paperweight as a symbol of his relationship with Julia; forbidden, yet inexplicably beautiful, their affair is suspended for all of time in a space of its own.
Beauty, however, cannot exist for beauty’s sake in the utilitarian world of the Party. And so, naturally, when Winston and Julia are at last arrested by the Thought Police in their upstairs room at Mr. Charrington’s, the paperweight goes crashing to the ground. The Party controls the past, present, and future; as the glass shatters, so does Winston’s last glimpse of beauty—of