Fahrenheit 451- What Could Happen If We All Didnt Think

In the 1950's, Ray Bradbury saw traits in his society that he loathed. He applied these bad traits to write the novel, Fahrenheit 451 and the short story, "The Pedestrian". In both stories he wrote about the future where the evils he saw in his current society were exaggerated to the point where they basically consumed society. Also in his stories, Ray Bradbury wrote about characters who went against society, trying to improve it. Symbols can be very important in a story and Ray Bradbury used different motifs to express the same theme in both stories. The government or societies in both stories are very similar. Ray Bradbury created two futures where people do not think, read or walk in response to his world in the 1950's.

In Ray Bradbury's future worlds there are two main characters, Guy Montag and Leonard Mead. Throughout their stories, both resist society and its censorship, "Only an hour, but the world had melted down and sprung up in a new and colorless form." This was the first time when Montag started to oppose society in which he was part of. Leonard Mead had also already withdrawn and was alone in the world like Montag, "... startled by the passing of a lone figure, himself, in the early November evening." At this point, Mead had already changed and gone back to walking, but he was alone in the world when he altered his prospective just like Montag was.

Ray Bradbury used different symbols in both stories to illustrate similar messages. An important symbol in Fahrenheit 451 was fire. Fire was used to represent destruction and rebirth, "It was no burning; it was warming." All throughout the novel, Monatg saw fire as a consuming force and not something that could be good and helpful in the world. This was the first time he realized a flame could be both depending on how it is used. On the cover of the novel there is a picture of a phoenix. The phoenix is a crucial symbol in the novel because it represents the rebirth of Montag's civilization after it is leveled during the war, "There was a damn sillybird called the phoenix back before Christ." Montag learns that after a civilization collapses, it can be rebuilt into something better just like a phoenix can be reborn from its ashes. In "The Pedestrian" an analogous symbol is the police car, "The police car of course, but what a rare, incredible thing." In the short story, "The Pedestrian", the police car represents order of society and the government. The government has so much control that they only need one police car in a city of three million because there is no crime. Another important representation in "The Pedestrian" is the Psychiatric Center for Research on Regressive Tendencies. This psychiatric center is important because it illustrates that the civilization is so destroyed that is someone if out walking, they are sent to be researched because during