In the near future, books are regarded as wanted objects, set to be destroyed. The Firemen are up to the task, with the job of locating anyone who might harbour them and set them alight. Montag has been doing the job for years and never questioned it, that is, until his neighbour Clarisse, starts asking him the tough questions. Fahrenheit 451 is about our responsibilities to one another and to ourselves and to the freedom of thought.
Well, look. It's not that I hated Fahrenheit 451, it just isn't exactly a riveting read either. The prose is often obvious, the characters underdeveloped and the dialogue silly. I joked about it with a friend not long after I'd read it that it could be called The Poor Choices of Guy Montag instead, and in hindsight, man, did he make a lot of poor choices. On top of that, I struggled with the overt sentimentality of the novel, and how closely it aligns to the more modern idea of the manic pixie dream girl. The way Clarisse enters Montag's life with the almost explicit purpose of nurturing his development as a character feels heavy-handed and frustrating, and the treatment of Mildred, Montag's wife, felt pretty undercooked too.
That said, I did like elements of the novel. I think the concept is a great one, intriguing and compelling in its nature (but hey, I've always been a sucker for a good dystopia), and Beatty, the chief fireman, is kind of wonderful, even if his primary job is to deliver the exposition. All in all though, pretty underwhelmed by this classic.
2 out of 5 book-hunting robot hounds.
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