New Vocabulary Words

Convoluted
Perpetual
Beatific
Torrent
Invigorate
Perfunctory
Insidious
Skepticism
Suffused

Fahrenheit 451

English 9 GROUP WORK

For each section of the novel do the following:

1) Overall summary of what happened
2) Pick out and explain two symbols – what they mean how the relate the overall theme(s) of the novel
3) What is the meaning of the title of your section
4) Write a monologue from the following characters point of view:
Either A) Beatty or B) Mrs. Bowles
5) If you had to direct a movie who would you cast as the characters?
6) Find pictures that represent the following: A) The characters
B) The mechanical hound
C) The Firehouse
D) The Act of Burning Books
E) The Parlor Walls


7) Find a song that fits this section.

8) Pick a scene and act it out.

Dover Beach

Why does Bradbury use the poem "Dover Beach" in Fahrenheit 451? Read the poem below and reflect on it.

The sea is calm to-night.
The tide is full, the moon lies fair
Upon the straits; on the French coast the light
Gleams and is gone; the cliffs of England stand;
Glimmering and vast, out in the tranquil bay.
Come to the window, sweet is the night-air!
Only, from the long line of spray
Where the sea meets the moon-blanched land,
Listen! you hear the grating roar
Of pebbles which the waves draw back, and fling,
At their return, up the high strand,
Begin, and cease, and then again begin,
With tremulous cadence slow, and bring
The eternal note of sadness in.

Sophocles long ago
Heard it on the A gaean, and it brought
Into his mind the turbid ebb and flow
Of human misery; we
Find also in the sound a thought,
Hearing it by this distant northern sea.

The Sea of Faith
Was once, too, at the full, and round earth's shore
Lay like the folds of a bright girdle furled.
But now I only hear
Its melancholy, long, withdrawing roar,
Retreating, to the breath
Of the night-wind, down the vast edges drear
And naked shingles of the world.


Ah, love, let us be true
To one another! for the world, which seems
To lie before us like a land of dreams,
So various, so beautiful, so new,
Hath really neither joy, nor love, nor light,
Nor certitude, nor peace, nor help for pain;
And we are here as on a darkling plain
Swept with confused alarms of struggle and flight,
Where ignorant armies clash by night.




Now go here for some commentary on the poem.

After reading the commentary, answer the question: Why does Bradbury use "Dover Beach"? What themes does it represent?

Things to Know

Fahrenheit 451 – Study Guide
1) Outline the plot according the six elements of plot. Give at least three events for the rising action and falling action.
2) Be able to discuss the importance of the following characters:
Montag
Clarisse
Beatty
Mrs. Phelps
Black
Stoneman
Faber
Granger
Mildred
The Mechanical Hound

3) Be able to explain and give at least three examples of scenes that fit the following themes:

The Dangers of Censorship
The Dangers of Ignorance
Dystopia
How censorship and mass media can be used to control people
The importance of independent thought and creativity

4) List two foreshadows
5) List four allusions and discuss why these allusions are important to the book
6) List the point of view
7) List the setting
8) Discuss How Montag is a dynamic character
9) Discuss the meaning of the following images/symbols

Salamander
451
Phoenix
Electric-Eyed Snake
Mausoleum
Dandelion
Parlor walls
Denham’s Dentifice
War
Books

10) List and explain four metaphors and/or similes. What is being compared? What is important about the comparison?
11) Discuss “Dover Beach” – How is it used? What are the results?
12) Discuss Montag’s relationship with Mildred. Is it a typical relationship in this society? If so what does this say about this society?
13) Discuss conversation in this society.
14) Discuss what the schools are like in this society. Why is this important?
15) How many Atomic Wars have taken place since 1990? What does this say about this society?
16) Discuss the war that is always alluded to in the background of the book.
17) Why is another man killed in Montag’s place? What does this represent?
18) What’s important the significance of the following quote, who says it?: “Go home and think of your first husband divorced and your second husband killed in a jet and your third husband blowing his brains out, go home and think of the dozen abortions you’ve hand and your children who hate your guts…”
19) What do you make of Beatty’s ability to quote literature and destroy books?
20) What do you make of Beatty’s death? Did he want to die or did he underestimate Montag? Explain.
21) Are people really happy in this world? Explain.
22) Describe Montag in the beginning of the book. How does he feel about his job?
23) The jets that fly overhead all the time foreshadow what? What things do they represent?
24) Describe the woman who burns herself up with her books. What does she represent? What does she killed herself? How does she change Montag?
25) List some religious allusions. What are these important?
26) Explain the quote: “She didn’t what to know how a thing was done, but why?” Who does this quote refer to? What does it mean?
27) Why don’t women want children in this society? How are the children raised?
28) Why does Beatty make Montag burn his house?
29) Why does Montag plant a book at Black’s house?
30) How are books being saved?
31) Does the novel end with hope? Explain.
32) How doe the dark ages connect with Fahrenheit 451.

New Vocabulary Words

Pedantry
Odious
Luxuriant
Dictum
Cacophony
Proclivity
Proboscis
Stratum
Mausoleum
Marionette
Phoenix