Knowledge and Ignorance in Fahrenheit 451 Imagine a society where all books are banned from the public and if any are found they are burned into ashes. This is a reality in the novel Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury, which delves deep into problems a society becoming more and more dependant on technology may face. In Fahrenheit 451 Ray Bradbury shows many problems which range from technology to violence, one important topic that is discussed is knowledge and the theme that a society cannot function without knowledge You can clearly see this idea starting to form within the first few pages of the novel, when the protagonist Guy Montag has an interaction with a girl named Clarisse. As they are talking Guy Montag says “You think too many things”(pg 9). This quote shows just how “normal” people think in this society. They would rather not think about anything and just continue with their daily lives than to actually think about the world or …show more content…
A prime example of this is Mildred. “The small crystal bottle of sleeping tablets which earlier today had been filled with thirty capsules and which now lay uncapped and empty in the light of the tiny flare”(pg13). This quote is very important because it shows that even though Mildred says she’s happy and probably even thinks she’s happy, deep down she knows that she isn’t happy. However, in the society in Fahrenheit they are taught to just deny unhappy things and seek pleasure in whatever they can. This just doesn’t work because you can only feign ignorance for so long. This is shown by the “handymen” who come when Montag calls for a doctor, they say “We get these cases nine or ten a night. Got so many, starting a few years ago, we had the special machines built.”pg(15). This here also goes to show that in this dystopian world where everyone is “happy” on the outside, they most definitely aren’t on the