Part I Quote Analysis
Quotation # 1
“’She [Clarisse] started up her walk. Then she seemed to remember something and came back to look at him [Montag] with wonder and curiosity. ‘Are you happy?’ she said. ‘Am I what? ‘ he cried… Of course I’m happy. What does she think? I’m not? he asked the quiet rooms. He stood looking up at the ventilator grill in the hall and suddenly remembered that something lay hidden behind the grill, something that seemed to peer down at him now‘’ (Bradbury, 25-26).
Early in the story in an oppressive authoritarian society, a curious, innocent seventeen-year-old new neighbor, Clarisse, meets Guy Montag, the veteran 30 year-old book-burning fireman and questions him about work, society, and life. Her question about Montag’s happiness provokes him first to verbally dismiss the question with an “Of course I’m happy” as he enters his quiet room
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The old woman defiantly resists giving up her books. Captain Beatty cites the law, appeals to the woman’s common sense, expresses his disdain for books with different viewpoints in a “damned Tower of Babel, ” and clearly states that he will burn the whole house to accomplish his mission. Shortly thereafter, Beatty demonstrates that he is a man of his word as the house and woman are lit up in horrible flames, which demonstrates how far the authoritarian government will go to enforce its ban on books, which also begins to influence Montag of their value. In contrast to the old woman and eventually Montag, Beatty represents the forces seeking to ban books and censor thought and is a chief antagonist to Montag. A basic theme of the book related to the quote is the importance of free expression of printed and spoken words in society and the dangers literally to life itself when those freedoms are