Close your eyes and imagine a place where the sky is always grey, imagination is punishable by death, and love is a rare and meaningless thing. These are the worlds of 1984 and Fahrenheit 451. In these novels, Orwell and Bradbury craft a hellish landscape of a not-so distant future, in which the past is merely something to be forgotten. In both these societies, the government rules with an iron fist. No one is safe, and no one is different. The people of these two dystopias live under similar yet contrasting circumstances. But whether it be by burning books or altering memories, one message these authors were trying to spread prevails: there is nothing more dangerous than the human mind and what lies within it.
1984 follows Winston Smith, victim of the totalitarian
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In these two novels, ignorance truly is bliss. Both Fahrenheit 451 and 1984 convey some significant, albeit exaggerated truths, concerning human behavior. Originality and individuality are characteristics that are revered today, but feared by the fierce tyrants in Orwell and Bradbury’s novels. These governments strive to suppress the population into conformity, to keep them in an almost sedated state so that the citizens do not interrupt the reign of oppression. The human mind is the greatest and most difficult obstacle to conquer; and perhaps the most deadly weapon one can wield. In the end, it is not the knife that kills, but the brains behind it. In Winston's and Montag’s day and age, ordinary citizens would no longer dare to let a spark of inspiration penetrate their minds. It would take just one person stepping out of line to lead to the downfall of the carefully crafted system of societal control, and the government despots in either novel would never allow such intellectual or ideological