View source for Fahrenheit 451

{{Short description|1953 dystopian novel by Ray Bradbury}}
{{About|the novel}}
{{Use mdy dates|date=March 2016}}
{{Use American English|date=January 2019}}
{{Infobox book
<!-- |edition       = Classic Edition -->| name              = Fahrenheit 451
| image             = Fahrenheit 451 1st ed cover.jpg
| alt               = This original cover shows a drawing of a man, who appears to be made of newspaper and is engulfed in flames, standing on top of some books. His right arm is down and holding what appears to be a fireman's hat made of paper while his left arm is as if wiping sweat from the brow of his bowed head. The title and author's name appear in large text over the images and there is a small caption in the upper left-hand corner that reads, "Wonderful stories by the author of The Golden Apples of the Sun".
| caption           = First edition cover ([[clothbound]])
| author            = [[Ray Bradbury]]
| illustrator       = [[Joseph Mugnaini]]<ref name=crider>{{cite journal|last=Crider|first=Bill|author-link=Bill Crider|editor1-last=Laughlin|editor1-first=Charlotte|editor2-last=Lee|editor2-first=Billy C.|title=Ray Bradbury's FAHRENHEIT 451|journal=Paperback Quarterly|isbn=978-1-4344-0633-0|date=Fall 1980|volume=III|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=8FVzjEjyHH0C&q=%22The+first+paperback+edition+featured+illustrations+by+Joe+Mugnaini+and+contained+two+stories+in+addition+to+the+title+tale%3A+%27The+Playground%27+and+%27And+The+Rock+Cried+Out.%27%22&pg=PA22|page=22|quote=The first paperback edition featured illustrations by [[Joseph Mugnaini|Joe Mugnaini]] and contained two stories in addition to the title tale: 'The Playground' and 'And The Rock Cried Out'.|issue=3}}</ref>
| country           = United States
| language          = English
| genre             = [[Dystopian literature|Dystopian]]<ref name=gerall>{{cite book |last1=Gerall |first1=Alina |last2=Hobby|first2=Blake|editor1-last=Bloom|editor1-first=Harold|editor1-link=Harold Bloom|editor2-last=Hobby|editor2-first=Blake |title=Civil Disobedience  |year=2010|publisher=Infobase Publishing |isbn=978-1-60413-439-1 |page=148 |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=N5NDMxfkum8C&q=%22While+Fahrenheit+451+begins+as+a+dystopic+novel+about+a+totalitarian+government+that+bans+reading%22&pg=PA148 |chapter=Fahrenheit 451 |quote=While ''Fahrenheit 451'' begins as a dystopic novel about a totalitarian government that bans reading, the novel concludes with Montag relishing the book he has put to memory.}}</ref>
|published=1953-10-19 ([[Ballantine Books]])<ref>{{cite journal |date=1953-10-19 |title=Books Published Today |journal=[[The New York Times]] |page=19 }}</ref>
| isbn              = 978-0-7432-4722-1
| isbn_note         = (current cover edition)
| dewey             = 813.54 22
| congress          = PS3503.R167 F3 2003
| oclc              = 53101079
| pages             = 156
}}

'''''Fahrenheit 451''''' is a 1953 [[Dystopian fiction|dystopian]] [[novel]] by American writer [[Ray Bradbury]].<ref name="reid_p53_1">{{cite book |last=Reid |first=Robin Anne |author-link=Robin Anne Reid |title=Ray Bradbury: A Critical Companion |series=Critical Companions to Popular Contemporary Writers |year=2000 |publisher=Greenwood Press |location=Westport, CT |isbn=0-313-30901-9 |page=53 |quote=''Fahrenheit 451'' is considered one of Bradbury's best works.}}</ref> It presents a future American society where [[book]]s have been outlawed and "firemen" [[Book burning|burn any that are found]].<ref>{{cite book |last=Seed |first=David |title=A Companion to Science Fiction |series=Blackwell Companions to Literature and Culture |volume=34 |publisher=Blackwell Publications |location=Malden, MA |isbn=978-1-4051-1218-5 |pages=491–98 |date=2005-09-12 }}</ref> The novel follows in the viewpoint of [[Guy Montag]], a fireman who becomes disillusioned with his role of censoring literature and destroying knowledge, eventually quitting his job and committing himself to the [[Preservation (library and archive)|preservation]] of [[Literature|literary]] and [[Culture|cultural]] writings.

''Fahrenheit 451'' was written by Bradbury during the [[Second Red Scare]] and the [[McCarthy era]], inspired by the [[book burnings in Nazi Germany]] and by [[ideological repression in the Soviet Union]].<ref name="bigread_burn" /> Bradbury said his motivations for writing the novel had changed multiple times. In a 1956 radio interview, Bradbury said that he wrote the book because of his concerns about the threat of [[Censorship in the United States|burning books in the United States]].<ref>{{cite web |author=Ray Bradbury |others=Narrated by Norman Rose |title=Ticket to the Moon (tribute to SciFi) |date=December 4, 1956 |work=Biography in Sound |publisher=NBC Radio News |url=https://oldradioprograms.us/My%20Old%20Radio%20Shows/B/Biographies%20In%20Sound/Biographies%20In%20Sound%20(NBC)-1956-12-04-Ticket%20To%20The%20Moon%20-%20Tribute%20To%20Scifi.mp3 |format=mp3 |access-date=2017-02-02 |at=27:10–27:30 |quote=I wrote this book at a time when I was worried about the way things were going in this country four years ago. Too many people were afraid of their shadows; there was a threat of book burning. Many of the books were being taken off the shelves at that time. |archive-date=2021-02-09 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210209110704/https://oldradioprograms.us/My%20Old%20Radio%20Shows/B/Biographies%20In%20Sound/Biographies%20In%20Sound%20(NBC)-1956-12-04-Ticket%20To%20The%20Moon%20-%20Tribute%20To%20Scifi.mp3 |url-status=dead }}</ref> In later years, he described the book as a commentary on how [[mass media]] reduces interest in reading literature.<ref name="LAweekly" /> In a 1994 interview, Bradbury cited [[political correctness]] as an allegory for the [[censorship]] in the book, calling it "the real enemy these days" and labeling it as "[[thought control]] and [[freedom of speech]] control".<ref name=":3" />

The writing and theme within ''Fahrenheit 451'' was explored by Bradbury in some of his previous short stories. Between 1947 and 1948, Bradbury wrote "Bright Phoenix", a short story about a librarian who confronts a "Chief Censor", who burns books. An encounter Bradbury had in 1949 with the police inspired him to write the short story "[[The Pedestrian]]" in 1951. In "The Pedestrian", a man going for a nighttime walk in his neighborhood is harassed and detained by the police. In the society of "The Pedestrian", citizens are expected to watch television as a leisurely activity, a detail that would be included in ''Fahrenheit 451''. Elements of both "Bright Phoenix" and "The Pedestrian" would be combined into ''The Fireman'', a [[novella]] published in ''[[Galaxy Science Fiction]]'' in 1951. Bradbury was urged by [[Stanley Kauffmann]], an editor at [[Ballantine Books]], to make ''The Fireman'' into a full novel. Bradbury finished the manuscript for ''Fahrenheit 451'' in 1953, and the novel was published later that year.

Upon its release, ''Fahrenheit 451'' was a critical success, albeit with notable dissenters; the novel's subject matter led to its censorship in [[apartheid]] [[South Africa]] and various schools in the United States.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Spivey |first=William |date=2023-02-23 |title=Fahrenheit 451: Book Burning Is Suddenly Relevant |url=https://medium.com/the-polis/fahrenheit-451-book-burning-is-suddenly-relevant-b493873857a5 |access-date=2025-09-17 |website=The Polis |language=en}}</ref> In 1954, ''Fahrenheit 451'' won the [[American Academy of Arts and Letters]] Award in Literature and the [[Commonwealth Club of California]] Gold Medal.<ref name=aggelis_pxxix>{{cite book |editor-last=Aggelis |editor-first=Steven L. |title=Conversations with Ray Bradbury |year=2004 |publisher=University Press of Mississippi |location=Jackson, MS |isbn=1-57806-640-9 |page=xxix |quote=...[in 1954 Bradbury received] two other awards—National Institute of Arts and Letters Award in Literature and Commonwealth Club of California Literature Gold Medal Award—for ''Fahrenheit 451'', which is published in three installments in ''Playboy''.}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |last=Davis |first=Scott A. |title=The California Book Awards Winners 1931-2012 |publisher=[[Commonwealth Club of California]]|url=https://www.commonwealthclub.org/sites/default/files/u123/Official%20Complete%20California%20Book%20Awards%20Winners.pdf |access-date=2014-03-05 |archive-date=2021-02-28 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210228151248/https://www.commonwealthclub.org/sites/default/files/u123/Official%20Complete%20California%20Book%20Awards%20Winners.pdf |url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |last=Nolan |first=William F. |author-link=William F. Nolan |title=BRADBURY: Prose Poet In The Age Of Space |date=May 1963 |journal=The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction |publisher=Mercury |volume=24 |page=20 |quote=Then there was the afternoon at Huston's Irish manor when a telegram arrived to inform Bradbury that his first novel, ''Fahrenheit 451'', a bitterly-satirical story of the book-burning future, had been awarded a grant of $1,000 from the National Institute of Arts and Letters. |issue=5}}</ref> It later won the [[Prometheus Award|Prometheus "Hall of Fame" Award]] in 1984<ref>{{cite web |title=Libertarian Futurist Society: Prometheus Awards, A Short History |url=http://lfs.org/awards.shtml |access-date=2013-08-09|archive-date=2021-04-19|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210419045400/http://lfs.org/awards.shtml |url-status=live}}</ref> and a [[Hugo Awards#Retro-Hugos|"Retro" Hugo Award]] in 2004.<ref>{{cite web |title=1954 Retro Hugo Awards |date=2007-07-26 |url=http://www.thehugoawards.org/hugo-history/1954-retro-hugo-awards |access-date=2013-08-09 |archive-date=2013-07-30 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130730092423/http://www.thehugoawards.org/hugo-history/1954-retro-hugo-awards/|url-status=live}}</ref> Bradbury was honored with a [[Grammy Award for Best Spoken Word Album|Spoken Word]] [[19th Annual Grammy Awards|Grammy nomination]] for his 1976 [[audiobook]] version.<ref name="grammy">{{cite magazine |date=January 22, 1976 |title=19th Annual Grammy Awards Final Nominations |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=PkUEAAAAMBAJ&q=%22Fahrenheit+451%2C+Ray+Bradbury%2C+Listening+Library%22&pg=PT148 |magazine=Billboard |publisher=Nielsen Business Media Inc |volume=89 |issue=3 |page=110 |issn=0006-2510}}</ref> The novel has been adapted into films, [[Play (theatre)|stage plays]], and [[video game]]s. Film adaptations of the novel include a [[Fahrenheit 451 (1966 film)|1966 film]] directed by [[François Truffaut]] starring [[Oskar Werner]] as Guy Montag and a [[Fahrenheit 451 (2018 film)|2018 television film]] directed by [[Ramin Bahrani]] starring [[Michael B. Jordan]] as Montag, both of which received a mixed critical reception. Bradbury himself published a stage play version in 1979 and helped develop a 1984 [[interactive fiction]] [[Fahrenheit 451 (video game)|video game of the same name]], as well as a collection of his [[Short story|short stories]] titled ''[[A Pleasure to Burn]]''.<ref>{{cite news|last=Genzlinger|first=Neil|author-link=Neil Genzlinger|title=Godlight Theater's 'Fahrenheit 451' Offers Hot Ideas for the Information Age|date=March 25, 2006|work=The New York Times|url=http://theater2.nytimes.com/2006/03/25/theater/reviews/25fahr.html?_r=0|access-date=August 10, 2013|archive-date=November 17, 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211117115802/https://www.nytimes.com/2006/03/25/theater/reviews/godlight-theaters-fahrenheit-451-offers-hot-ideas-for-the.html|url-status=live}}</ref> Two [[BBC Radio]] [[drama]]tizations were also produced.

==Historical and biographical context==
{{Further|Second Red Scare|Nazi book burnings|ideological repression in the Soviet Union}}
[[File:1933-may-10-berlin-book-burning.JPG|thumb|The [[Nazi book burnings]] horrified [[Ray Bradbury]] and inspired him to write ''Fahrenheit 451'']]

The [[House Un-American Activities Committee]] (HUAC), formed in 1938 to investigate American citizens and organizations suspected of having communist ties, held hearings in 1947 to investigate alleged communist influence in Hollywood movie-making.<ref>{{cite web|last=Kelley|first=Ken|title=Playboy Interview: Ray Bradbury|url=http://www.raybradbury.com/articles_playboy.html|work=[[Playboy]]|publisher=raybradbury.com|date=May 1996|quote=In the movie business the [[Hollywood Ten]] were sent to prison for refusing to testify before the [[House Un-American Activities Committee]], and in the [[Screen Writers Guild]] Bradbury was one of the lonely voices opposing the loyalty oath imposed on its members.|access-date=August 24, 2013|archive-date=August 17, 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190817093541/http://www.raybradbury.com/articles_playboy.html|url-status=live}}</ref> The government's interference in the affairs of artists and creative types infuriated Bradbury;<ref>{{cite book|last=Beley|first=Gene|title=Ray Bradbury uncensored!|year=2007|publisher=iUniverse|location=Lincoln, NE|isbn=978-0-595-37364-2|quote='I was angry at [[Joseph McCarthy|Senator Joseph McCarthy]] and the people before him, like [[J. Parnell Thomas|Parnell Thomas]] and the [[House Un-American Activities Committee]] and [[Robert F. Kennedy|Bobby Kennedy]], who was part of that whole bunch', Bradbury told Judith Green, ''San Joe Mercury News'' theatre critic, in the October 30, 1993, edition. 'I was angry about the blacklisting and the Hollywood 10. I was a $100 a week screenwriter, but I wasn't scared—I was angry.'}}</ref> he was concerned about the workings of his government, and a late 1949 nighttime encounter with an overzealous police officer would inspire Bradbury to write "[[The Pedestrian]]", a short story which would go on to become "The Fireman" and then ''Fahrenheit 451''. The rise of Senator [[Joseph McCarthy]]'s [[McCarthyism]] persecution of accused communists, beginning in 1950, deepened Bradbury's contempt for government overreach.<ref>{{cite book|last=Beley|first=Gene|title=Ray Bradbury Uncensored!: The Unauthorized Biography|date=2006|publisher=iUniverse|isbn=9780595373642|pages=130–40}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|last1=Eller|first1=Jonathan R.|last2=Touponce|first2=William F.|title=Ray Bradbury: The Life of Fiction|date=2004|publisher=Kent State University Press|isbn=9780873387798|pages=[https://archive.org/details/raybradburylifeo00elle/page/164 164–65]|url=https://archive.org/details/raybradburylifeo00elle/page/164}}</ref>

The [[Golden Age of Radio]] occurred between the early 1920s to the late 1950s, during Bradbury's early life, while the transition to the [[Golden Age of Television]] began right around the time he started to work on the stories that would eventually lead to ''Fahrenheit 451''. Bradbury saw these forms of media as a threat to the reading of books, indeed as a threat to society, as he believed they could act as a distraction from important affairs. This contempt for [[mass media]] and technology would express itself through Mildred and her friends and is an important theme in the book.<ref name=reidmildred>{{cite book|last=Reid|first=Robin Anne|title=Ray Bradbury: A Critical Companion|series=Critical Companions to Popular Contemporary Writers|year=2000|publisher=Greenwood Press|location=Westport, CT|isbn=0-313-30901-9|page=59|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=wvMEoM8gu74C&q=Fahrenheit%20451%20%20mildred&pg=PA59}}</ref>

Bradbury's lifelong passion for books began at an early age. After he graduated from high school, his family could not afford for him to attend college, so Bradbury began spending time at the [[Los Angeles Public Library]] where he educated himself.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Orlean |first1=Susan |author-link=Susan Orlean|title=The Library Book |date=2018 |publisher=Simon & Schuster |location=New York |isbn=978-1-4767-4018-8 |page=103}}</ref> As a frequent visitor to his local libraries in the 1920s and 1930s, he recalls being disappointed because they did not stock popular science fiction novels, like those of [[H. G. Wells]], because, at the time, they were not deemed literary enough. Between this and learning about the destruction of the [[Library of Alexandria]],<ref>{{cite book|last=Cusatis|first=John|title=Research Guide to American Literature: Postwar Literature 1945–1970|series=Facts on File Library of American Literature|volume=6|year=2010|publisher=Infobase Publishing|location=New York, NY|isbn=978-1-4381-3405-5|edition=New|quote=He 'wept' when he learned at the age of nine that the ancient library of Alexandria had been burned.}}</ref> a great impression was made on Bradbury about the vulnerability of books to censure and destruction.

Later, as a teenager, Bradbury was horrified by the [[Nazi book burnings]] stating, "When I was fifteen years old, Hitler burned books in the streets of Berlin. And it terrified me".<ref>{{cite book|last=Westfahl|first=Gary|title=The Greenwood Encyclopedia of Science Fiction and Fantasy: Themes, Works, and Wonders|volume=3|date=2005|publisher=Greenwood Publishing Group|isbn=9780313329531|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=M_3kNDKhxIcC&q=%22Inspired+by+images+of+book+burning+by+the+Nazis+and+written+at+the+height+of+Army-McCarthy+%27Red+Scare%27+hearings+in+America%2C+Fahrenheit+451%22&pg=PA1029|page=1029|quote=Inspired by images of book burning by the Nazis and written at the height of Army-McCarthy 'Red Scare' hearings in America, ''Fahrenheit 451''...|access-date=November 11, 2020|archive-date=November 17, 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211117115858/https://books.google.com/books?id=M_3kNDKhxIcC&q=%22Inspired+by+images+of+book+burning+by+the+Nazis+and+written+at+the+height+of+Army-McCarthy+%27Red+Scare%27+hearings+in+America%2C+Fahrenheit+451%22&pg=PA1029|url-status=live}}</ref> Bradbury was also influenced by [[Joseph Stalin]]'s campaign of political repression, the [[Great Purge]], in which writers and poets, among many others, were arrested and often executed, stating, "They burned the authors instead of the books."<ref name="bigread_burn">{{cite AV media |url=http://neabigread.org/books/fahrenheit451/media |title=Ray Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451 audio guide |at=08:57–09:44 |quote=Well, we should learn from history about the destruction of books. When I was fifteen years old, Hitler burned books in the streets of Berlin. And it terrified me because I was a librarian and he was touching my life: all those great plays, all that great poetry, all those wonderful essays, all those great philosophers. So, it became very personal, didn't it? Then I found out about Russia burning the books behind the scenes. But they did it in such a way that people didn't know about it. They killed the authors behind the scenes. They burned the authors instead of the books. So I learned then how {{sic|dangerously}} it all was. |work=The Big Read |access-date=August 18, 2013 |archive-date=May 24, 2017 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170524114806/http://www.neabigread.org/books/fahrenheit451/media |url-status=dead }}</ref>

==Plot summary==
==="The Hearth and the Salamander"===
In a distant future,<ref name=":0" group="note">During Captain Beatty's recounting of the history of the firemen to Montag, he says, "Out of the nursery into the college and back to the nursery; where there's your intellectual pattern for the past five centuries or more." The text is ambiguous regarding which century he is claiming began this pattern. One interpretation is that he means the 20th century, which would place the novel in at least the 24th century. "The Fireman" novella, which was expanded to become ''Fahrenheit 451'', is set in October 2052.</ref><ref name=":0"/> [[Guy Montag]] is a fireman employed to burn outlawed books, along with the houses they are hidden in. One fall night while returning from work, he meets his new neighbor Clarisse McClellan, whose free-thinking ideals and liberating spirit cause him to question his life and perceived happiness. Montag returns home to find that his wife Mildred has overdosed on sleeping pills, and he calls for medical attention. Two [[Emergency medical technician|EMTs]] pump her stomach and change her blood. After they leave to rescue another overdose victim, Montag overhears Clarisse and her family talking about their illiterate society. Shortly afterward, Montag's mind is bombarded with Clarisse's subversive thoughts and the memory of Mildred's near-death. Over the next few days, Clarisse meets Montag each night as he walks home. Clarisse's simple pleasures and interests make her an outcast among her peers, and she is forced to go to therapy for her behavior. Montag looks forward to the meetings, but one day, Clarisse goes missing.<ref name=koster_p35>{{cite book|editor-last=De Koster|editor-first=Katie|title=Readings on Fahrenheit 451|url=https://archive.org/details/readingsonfahren00deko|url-access=registration|year=2000|series=Literary Companion Series|publisher=Greenhaven Press|location=San Diego, CA|isbn=1-56510-857-4|page=[https://archive.org/details/readingsonfahren00deko/page/35 35]|quote=Montag does not realize at first that she is gone, or that he misses her; he simply feels that something is the matter.}}</ref>

In the following days, while he and other firemen are ransacking the book-filled house of an old woman and drenching it in kerosene, Montag steals a book. The woman refuses to leave her house and her books, choosing instead to light a match and [[self-immolation|burn herself alive]]. Jarred by the suicide, Montag returns home and hides the book under his pillow. Montag asks Mildred if she has heard anything about Clarisse. She reveals that Clarisse's family moved away after Clarisse was hit by a speeding car and died four days ago. Dismayed by her failure to mention this earlier, Montag uneasily tries to fall asleep. Outside he suspects the presence of "The Mechanical Hound", an eight-legged<ref>{{cite book|editor-last=De Koster|editor-first=Katie|title=Readings on Fahrenheit 451|url=https://archive.org/details/readingsonfahren00deko|url-access=registration|year=2000|series=Literary Companion Series|publisher=Greenhaven Press|location=San Diego, CA|isbn=1-56510-857-4|page=[https://archive.org/details/readingsonfahren00deko/page/32 32]|quote=The Mechanical Hound is an eight-legged glass and metal contraption that serves as a surveillance tool and programmable killing machine for the firemen, to track down suspected book hoarders and readers.}}</ref> robotic dog-like creature that resides in the firehouse and aids the firemen in hunting book hoarders.

Montag awakens ill the next morning. Mildred tries to care for her husband but finds herself more involved in the "parlor wall" entertainment in the living room – large televisions filling the walls. Montag suggests he should take a break from being a fireman, and Mildred panics over the thought of losing the house and her parlor wall "family". Captain Beatty, Montag's fire chief, visits Montag to see how he is doing. Sensing his concerns, Beatty recounts the history of how books had lost their value and how the firemen were adapted for their current role: over decades, people began to embrace new media (like film and television), sports, and an ever-quickening pace of life. Books were abridged or degraded to accommodate shorter [[attention span]]s. At the same time, advances in technology resulted in nearly all buildings being made with fireproof materials, and firemen preventing fires were no longer necessary. The government then instead turned the firemen into officers of society's peace of mind: instead of putting out fires, they were charged with starting them, specifically to burn books, which were condemned as sources of confusing and depressing thoughts that complicated people's lives. After an awkward exchange between Mildred and Montag over the book hidden under his pillow, Beatty becomes suspicious and casually adds a passing threat before leaving; he says that if a fireman had a book, he would be asked to burn it within the following twenty-four hours. If he refused, the other firemen would come and burn it for him. The encounter leaves Montag shaken.

Montag reveals to Mildred that, over the last year, he has accumulated books that are hidden in their ceiling. In a panic, Mildred grabs a book and rushes to throw it in the kitchen incinerator, but Montag subdues her and says they are going to read the books to see if they have value. If they do not, he promises the books will be burned and their lives will return to normal.

==="The Sieve and the Sand"===
Mildred refuses to go along with Montag's plan, questioning why she or anyone else should care about books. Montag goes on a rant about Mildred's suicide attempt, Clarisse's disappearance and death, the woman who burned herself, and the imminent war that goes ignored by the masses. He suggests that perhaps the books of the past have messages that can save society from its own destruction. Mildred remains unconvinced.

Conceding that Mildred is a lost cause, Montag needs help to understand the books. He remembers an old man named Faber, an English professor before books were banned, whom he once met in a park. Montag visits Faber's home carrying a copy of the [[Bible]], the book he stole at the woman's house. Once there, after multiple attempts to ask, Montag forces the scared and reluctant Faber into helping him by methodically ripping pages from the Bible. Faber concedes and gives Montag a homemade earpiece communicator so that he can offer constant guidance.

At home, Mildred's friends, Mrs. Bowles and Mrs. Phelps, arrive to watch the "parlor walls". Not interested in this entertainment, Montag turns off the walls and tries to engage the women in meaningful conversation, only for them to reveal just how indifferent, ignorant, and callous they truly are. Enraged, Montag shows them a book of poetry. This confuses the women and alarms Faber, who is listening remotely. Mildred tries to dismiss Montag's actions as a tradition firemen act out once a year: they find an old book and read it as a way to make fun of how silly the past is. Montag proceeds to recite a poem,<ref group="note">Specifically ''[[Dover Beach]]''.</ref> causing Mrs. Phelps to cry. The two women leave.

Montag hides his books in the backyard before returning to the firehouse late at night. There, Montag hands Beatty a book to cover for the one he believes Beatty knows he stole the night before, which is tossed into the trash. Beatty reveals that, despite his disillusionment, he was once an enthusiastic reader. A fire alarm sounds and Beatty picks up the address from the dispatcher system. They drive in the fire truck to the unexpected destination: Montag's house.

==="Burning Bright"===
Beatty orders Montag to destroy his house with a [[flamethrower]], rather than the more powerful "salamander" that is usually used by the fire team, and tells him that his wife and her friends reported him. Montag watches as Mildred walks out of the house, too traumatized about losing her parlor wall "family" to even acknowledge her husband's existence or the situation going on around her, and catches a taxi. Montag complies, destroying the home piece by piece, but Beatty discovers his earpiece and plans to hunt down Faber. Montag threatens Beatty with the flamethrower and, after Beatty taunts him, Montag burns Beatty alive. As Montag tries to escape the scene, the Mechanical Hound attacks him, managing to inject his leg with an anesthetic. He destroys the Hound with the flamethrower and limps away. While escaping, Montag concludes that Beatty wanted to die a long time ago, having goaded him and provided him with a weapon.

Montag runs towards Faber's house. En route, he crosses a road as a car attempts to run him over, but he manages to evade the vehicle, almost suffering the same fate as Clarisse and losing his knee. Faber urges him to make his way to the countryside and contact a group of exiled [[Bibliophiles|book-lovers]] who live there. Faber plans to leave on a bus heading to [[St. Louis, Missouri]], where he and Montag can rendezvous later. Meanwhile, another Mechanical Hound is released to track down and kill Montag, with news helicopters following it to create a public spectacle. After wiping his scent from around the house in hopes of thwarting the Hound, Montag leaves. He escapes the manhunt by wading into a river and floating downstream, where he meets the book-lovers. They predicted Montag's arrival while watching the TV.

The drifters are all former intellectuals. They have each memorized books should the day arrive that society comes to an end, with the survivors learning to embrace the literature of the past. Wanting to contribute to the group, Montag finds that he partially memorized the [[Ecclesiastes|Book of Ecclesiastes]], discovering that the group has a special way of unlocking photographic memory. While discussing their learnings, Montag and the group watch helplessly as bombers fly overhead and annihilate the city with nuclear weapons: the war has begun and ended in the same night. While Faber would have left on the early bus, everyone else (possibly including Mildred) is killed. Injured and dirtied, Montag and the group manage to survive the [[Shock wave|shockwave]].

When the war is over, the exiles return to the city to rebuild society.

==Characters==
*'''[[Guy Montag]]''' is the [[protagonist]] and a fireman who presents the dystopian world in which he lives first through the eyes of a worker loyal to it, then as a man in conflict about it, and eventually as someone resolved to be free of it. Throughout most of the book, Montag lacks knowledge and believes only what he hears. Clarisse McClellan inspires Montag's change, even though they do not know each other for very long.
*'''Clarisse McClellan''' is a teenage girl one month short of her 17th birthday<ref group="note">Clarisse tells Montag she is "seventeen and crazy", later admitting that she will actually be seventeen "next month".</ref> who is Montag's neighbor.<ref name=koster_p31>{{cite book|editor-last=De Koster|editor-first=Katie|title=Readings on Fahrenheit 451|url=https://archive.org/details/readingsonfahren00deko|url-access=registration|year=2000|series=Literary Companion Series|publisher=Greenhaven Press|location=San Diego, CA|isbn=1-56510-857-4|page=[https://archive.org/details/readingsonfahren00deko/page/31 31]|quote=Montag's new neighbor, the sixteen-year-old Clarisse, appears in only a few scenes at the beginning of the novel.}}</ref> She walks with Montag on his trips home from work. A modern critic has described her as an example of the [[Manic Pixie Dream Girl]],<ref name="maher20130923">{{cite web | url=https://www.filfre.net/2013/09/fahrenheit-451-the-book/ | title=Fahrenheit 451: The Book | work=The Digital Antiquarian | date=2013-09-23 | access-date=10 July 2014 | author=Maher, Jimmy | archive-date=April 24, 2019 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190424013933/https://www.filfre.net/2013/09/fahrenheit-451-the-book/ | url-status=live }}</ref> as Clarisse is an unusual sort of person compared to the others inhabiting the bookless, hedonistic society: outgoing, naturally cheerful, unorthodox, and intuitive. She is unpopular among peers and disliked by teachers for asking "why" instead of "how" and focusing on nature rather than on technology. A few days after her first meeting with Montag, she disappears without any explanation; Mildred tells Montag (and Captain Beatty confirms) that Clarisse was hit by a speeding car and that her family moved away following her death. It is implied that Beatty may have assassinated Clarisse. In the afterword of a later edition, Bradbury notes that the [[Fahrenheit 451 (1966 film)|1966 film adaptation]] changed the ending so that Clarisse (who, in the film, is now a 20-year-old schoolteacher who was fired for being unorthodox) was living with the exiles. Bradbury, far from being displeased by this, was so happy with the new ending that he wrote it into his later stage edition.
*'''Mildred "Millie" Montag''' is Guy Montag's wife. She is addicted to sleeping pills, absorbed in the shallow dramas played on her "parlor walls" (large, flat-panel televisions), and indifferent to the oppressive society around her. She is described in the book as "thin as a [[praying mantis]] from dieting, her hair burnt by chemicals to a brittle straw, and her flesh like white bacon." Despite her husband's attempts to break her from the spell society has on her, Mildred continues to be shallow and indifferent. After Montag scares her friends away by reading ''Dover Beach'', and finding herself unable to live with someone who has been hoarding books, Mildred betrays Montag by reporting him to the firemen and abandoning him, and presumably dies when the city is bombed.
*'''Captain Beatty''' is Montag's boss and the book's main [[antagonist]]. Once an avid reader, he has come to hate books due to their unpleasant content and contradicting facts and opinions. After he forces Montag to burn his own house, Montag kills him with a flamethrower. In a scene written years later by Bradbury for the ''Fahrenheit 451'' play, Beatty invites Montag to his house where he shows him walls of books left to molder on their shelves.
*'''Stoneman''' and '''Black''' are Montag's coworkers at the firehouse. They do not have a large impact on the story and function only to show the reader the contrast between the firemen who obediently do as they are told and someone like Montag, who formerly took pride in his job but subsequently realizes how damaging it is to society. Black is later framed by Montag for possessing books.
*'''Faber''' is a former English professor. He has spent years regretting that he did not defend books when he saw the moves to ban them. Montag turns to him for guidance, remembering him from a chance meeting in a park sometime earlier. Faber at first refuses to help Montag and later realizes Montag is only trying to learn about books, not destroy them. He secretly communicates with Montag through an electronic earpiece and helps Montag escape the city, then gets on a bus to [[St. Louis]] and escapes the city himself before it is bombed. Bradbury notes in his afterword that Faber is part of the name of a German manufacturer of pencils, [[Faber-Castell]]; it is also the name of a publishing company, [[Faber and Faber]].
*'''Mrs. Ann Bowles''' and '''Mrs. Clara Phelps''' are Mildred's friends and representative of the anti-intellectual, hedonistic mainstream society presented in the novel. During a social visit to Montag's house, they brag about ignoring the bad things in their lives and have a cavalier attitude towards the upcoming war, their husbands, their children, and politics. Mrs. Phelps' husband Pete was called in to fight in the upcoming war (and believes that he will be back in a week because of how quick the war will be) and thinks having children serves no purpose other than to ruin lives. Mrs. Bowles is a three-times-married single mother. Her first husband divorced her, her second died in a jet accident, and her third committed suicide by shooting himself in the head. She has two children who do not like or respect her due to her permissive, often negligent and abusive parenting; Mrs. Bowles brags that her kids beat her up, and she's glad she can hit back. When Montag reads ''[[Dover Beach]]'' to them, he strikes a chord in Mrs. Phelps, who starts crying over how hollow her life is. Mrs. Bowles chastises Montag for reading "silly awful hurting words".
*'''Granger''' is the leader of a group of wandering intellectual exiles who memorize books in order to preserve their contents.

==Title ==

The title page of the book explains the title as follows: ''Fahrenheit 451—The temperature at which book paper catches fire and burns...''. On inquiring about the temperature at which paper would catch fire, Bradbury had been told that {{convert|451|F|C}} was the [[Autoignition temperature#Autoignition temperature of selected substances|autoignition temperature]] of paper.<ref>{{cite web|last=Rogers|first=John|title=Author of 'Fahrenheit 451', Ray Bradbury, Dies at 91|date=June 6, 2012|agency=Associated Press|magazine=U.S. News & World Report|url=https://www.usnews.com/science/news/articles/2012/06/06/ray-bradbury-author-of-fahrenheit-451-dies|access-date=August 3, 2013|quote=(451 degrees Fahrenheit, Bradbury had been told, was the temperature at which texts went up in flames)|archive-date=August 17, 2013|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130817223753/http://www.usnews.com/science/news/articles/2012/06/06/ray-bradbury-author-of-fahrenheit-451-dies|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |title=The View from the Cheap Seats |first=Neil |last=Gaiman |publisher=HarperCollins |isbn=978-0-06-226226-4 |chapter=Ray Bradbury, ''Fahrenheit 451'', and what science fiction is and does |page=180 |quotation=He called the Los Angeles fire department and asked them at what temperature paper burned. ''Fahrenheit 451'', somebody told him. He had his title. It didn't matter if it was true or not.|date=May 31, 2016 }}</ref> In various studies, scientists have placed the autoignition temperature at a range of temperatures between {{convert|424|and|475|F|C}}, depending on the type of paper.<ref name=TCForensics>{{cite web|last1=Cafe|first1=Tony|title=PHYSICAL CONSTANTS FOR INVESTIGATORS|url=http://www.tcforensic.com.au/docs/article10.html|website=tcforensic.com.au|publisher=TC Forensic P/L.|access-date=11 February 2015|archive-date=January 27, 2015|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150127145128/http://www.tcforensic.com.au/docs/article10.html|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{cite report|url=http://www.fpl.fs.fed.us/documnts/fplmisc/rpt1464.pdf|title=Ignition and charring temperatures of wood|year=1964|publisher=Forest Products Laboratory, [[United States Forest Service]]|access-date=February 5, 2018|archive-date=February 18, 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200218103155/https://www.fpl.fs.fed.us/documnts/fplmisc/rpt1464.pdf|url-status=live}}</ref>

==Writing and development==

''Fahrenheit 451'' developed out of a series of ideas Bradbury had visited in previously written stories. For many years, he tended to single out "The Pedestrian" in interviews and lectures as sort of a proto-''Fahrenheit 451''. In the preface of his 2006 anthology ''Match to Flame: The Fictional Paths to Fahrenheit 451'' he states that this is an oversimplification.<ref>{{cite book|last=Bradbury|first=Ray|author-link=Ray Bradbury|editor1-last=Albright|editor1-first=Donn|editor2-last=Eller|editor2-first=Jon|title=Match to Flame: The Fictional Paths to Fahrenheit 451|year=2006|publisher=Gauntlet Publications|location=Colorado Springs, CO|isbn=1-887368-86-8|edition=1st|chapter=Preface|page=9|quote=For many years I've told people that ''Fahrenheit 451'' was the result of my story 'The Pedestrian' continuing itself in my life. It turns out that this is a misunderstanding of my own past. Long before 'The Pedestrian' I did all the stories that you'll find in this book and forgot about them.}}</ref> The full genealogy of ''Fahrenheit 451'' given in ''Match to Flame'' is involved. The following covers the most salient aspects.<ref>{{Cite book|title=Match to Flame: The Fictional Paths to Fahrenheit 451|last=Bradbury|first=Ray|publisher=Gauntlet Pr|year=2007|isbn=978-1887368865|location=USA}}</ref>

Between 1947 and 1948,<ref>{{cite journal|date=May 1963|journal=The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction|publisher=Mercury|volume=24|page=23|quote=''Ray Bradbury calls this story, the first of the tandem, 'a curiosity. I wrote it [he says] back in 1947–48 and it remained in my files over the years, going out only a few times to quality markets like'' [[Harper's Bazaar]] ''or'' [[The Atlantic Monthly]], ''where it was dismissed. It lay in my files and collected about it many ideas. These ideas grew large and became&nbsp;...'' |title=FAHRENHEIT 451|issue=5}}</ref> Bradbury wrote the short story "Bright Phoenix" (not published until the May 1963 issue of ''[[The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction]]''<ref>{{cite journal|last=Bradbury|first=Ray|author-link=Ray Bradbury|title=Bright Phoenix|date=May 1963|journal=The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction|publisher=Mercury|volume=24|pages=23–29|issue=5}}</ref><ref name=big>{{cite web|url=http://www.ebr.lib.la.us/circ/advisory/onebook/aboutthebookF451.htm |title=About the Book: Fahrenheit 451 |work=The Big Read |publisher=[[National Endowment for the Arts]] |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120511040857/http://www.ebr.lib.la.us/circ/advisory/onebook/aboutthebookF451.htm |archive-date=May 11, 2012 |df=mdy }}</ref>) about a librarian who confronts a book-burning "Chief Censor" named Jonathan Barnes.

In late 1949,<ref>{{cite book|last=Eller|first=Jon|editor1-last=Albright|editor1-first=Donn|editor2-last=Eller|editor2-first=Jon|chapter=Writing by Degrees: The Family Tree of Fahrenheit 451|title=Match to Flame: The Fictional Paths to Fahrenheit 451|year=2006|publisher=Gauntlet Publications|location=Colorado Springs, CO|isbn=1-887368-86-8|edition=1st|page=68|quote=The specific incident that sparked 'The Pedestrian' involved a similar late-night walk with a friend along Wilshire Boulevard near Western Avenue sometime in late 1949.}}</ref> Bradbury was stopped and questioned by a police officer while walking late one night.<ref name=bigread>{{cite AV media|title=Ray Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451 audio guide|work=The Big Read|url=https://www.arts.gov/initiatives/nea-big-read/fahrenheit-451|at=14:18–14:54|quote=When I came out of a restaurant when I was thirty years old, and I went walking along [[Wilshire Boulevard]] with a friend, and a police car pulled up and the policeman got up and came up to us and said, 'What are you doing?'. I said, 'Putting one foot in front of the other' and that was the wrong answer but he kept saying, you know, 'Look in this direction and that direction: there are no pedestrians' but that give me the idea for 'The Pedestrian' and 'The Pedestrian' turned into Montag! So the police officer is responsible for the writing of ''Fahrenheit 451''.}}</ref><ref name=koster_p26>{{cite book|editor-last=De Koster|editor-first=Katie|title=Readings on Fahrenheit 451|url=https://archive.org/details/readingsonfahren00deko|url-access=registration|year=2000|series=Literary Companion Series|publisher=Greenhaven Press|location=San Diego, CA|isbn=1-56510-857-4|page=[https://archive.org/details/readingsonfahren00deko/page/26 26]}}</ref> When asked "What are you doing?", Bradbury wisecracked, "Putting one foot in front of another".<ref name=bigread/><ref name=koster_p26/> This incident inspired Bradbury to write the 1951 short story "The Pedestrian".<ref group=note>"The Pedestrian" would go on to be published in ''[[The Reporter (magazine)|The Reporter]]'' magazine on August 7, 1951, that is, after the publication in February 1951 of its inspired work "The Fireman".</ref><ref name=bigread/><ref name=koster_p26/>

In "The Pedestrian", Leonard Mead is harassed and detained by the city's only remotely operated police cruiser for taking nighttime walks, something that has become extremely rare in this future-based setting, as everybody else stays inside and watches television ("viewing screens"). Alone and without an [[alibi]], Mead is taken to the "Psychiatric Center for Research on Regressive Tendencies" for his peculiar habit. ''Fahrenheit 451'' echoed this theme of an [[Authoritarianism|authoritarian]] society distracted by [[broadcast media]].{{citation needed|date=October 2023}}<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Alam |first=Mohammad Farogh |date=November 2024 |title=Censorship and the Suppression of Knowledge in Ray Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451 |url=https://theacademic.in/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/10.pdf |journal=The Academic: International Journal of Multidisciplinary Research |volume=2 |issue=11}}</ref>

Bradbury expanded the book-burning premise of "Bright Phoenix"<ref name=koster_p158>{{cite book|editor-last=De Koster|editor-first=Katie|title=Readings on Fahrenheit 451|url=https://archive.org/details/readingsonfahren00deko|url-access=registration|year=2000|series=Literary Companion Series|publisher=Greenhaven Press|location=San Diego, CA|isbn=1-56510-857-4|page=[https://archive.org/details/readingsonfahren00deko/page/158 158]|quote=He writes '{{sic|The Phoenix|expected=Bright Phoenix}},' which he will later develop into the short story 'The Fireman,' which will eventually become ''Fahrenheit 451''.}}</ref> and the [[totalitarian]] future of "The Pedestrian"<ref>{{cite book|last=Eller|first=Jon|editor1-last=Albright|editor1-first=Donn|editor2-last=Eller|editor2-first=Jon|chapter=Writing by Degrees: The Family Tree of Fahrenheit 451|title=Match to Flame: The Fictional Paths to Fahrenheit 451|year=2006|publisher=Gauntlet Publications|location=Colorado Springs, CO|isbn=1-887368-86-8|edition=1st|page=68|quote=As Bradbury has often noted, 'The Pedestrian' marks the true flashpoint that exploded into 'The Fireman' and ''Fahrenheit 451''.}}</ref> into "The Fireman", a [[novella]] published in the February 1951 issue of ''[[Galaxy Science Fiction]]''.<ref>{{cite journal|last=Bradbury|first=Ray|author-link=Ray Bradbury|title=The Fireman|journal=Galaxy Science Fiction|date=February 1951|volume=15|series=5|issue=1|pages=4–61}}</ref><ref name=koster_p164_1>{{cite book|editor-last=De Koster|editor-first=Katie|title=Readings on Fahrenheit 451|url=https://archive.org/details/readingsonfahren00deko|url-access=registration|year=2000|series=Literary Companion Series|publisher=Greenhaven Press|location=San Diego, CA|isbn=1-56510-857-4|page=[https://archive.org/details/readingsonfahren00deko/page/164 164]|quote=The short story which Bradbury later expanded into the novel ''Fahrenheit 451'', was originally published in ''Galaxy Science Fiction'', vol. 1, no. 5 (February 1951), under the title 'The Fireman.'}}</ref> "The Fireman" was written in the basement of [[University of California, Los Angeles|UCLA]]'s [[Powell Library]] on a typewriter that he rented for a fee of ten cents per half hour.<ref name=eller_p57>{{cite book|last=Eller|first=Jon|editor1-last=Albright|editor1-first=Donn|editor2-last=Eller|editor2-first=Jon|chapter=Writing by Degrees: The Family Tree of Fahrenheit 451|title=Match to Flame: The Fictional Paths to Fahrenheit 451|year=2006|publisher=Gauntlet Publications|location=Colorado Springs, CO|isbn=1-887368-86-8|edition=1st|page=57|quote=In 1950 Ray Bradbury composed his 25,000-word novella 'The Fireman' in just this way, and three years later he returned to the same subterranean typing room for another nine-day stint to expand this cautionary tale into the 50,000-word novel ''Fahrenheit 451''.}}</ref> The first draft was 25,000 words long and was completed in nine days.<ref>{{cite book|last=Bradbury|first=Ray|author-link=Ray Bradbury|title=Fahrenheit 451|year=2003|publisher=Ballantine Books|location=New York, NY|isbn=0-345-34296-8|pages=167–68|edition=50th anniversary}}</ref>

Urged by a publisher at [[Ballantine Books]] to double the length of his story to make a novel, Bradbury returned to the same typing room and made the story 25,000 words longer, again taking nine days.<ref name=eller_p57/> The title "Fahrenheit 451" came to him on January 22. The final manuscript was ready in mid-August, 1953.<ref>{{cite book|last=Weller|first=Sam|title=Bradbury Chronicles}}</ref> The resulting novel, which some considered as a [[fix-up]]<ref name="liptak20130805">{{Cite magazine |last=Liptak |first=Andrew |date=2013-08-05 |title=A.E. van Vogt and the Fix-Up Novel |url=https://www.kirkusreviews.com/features/e-van-vogt-and-fix-novel/ |magazine=Kirkus Reviews |access-date=January 12, 2018 |archive-date=January 12, 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180112101140/https://www.kirkusreviews.com/features/e-van-vogt-and-fix-novel/ |url-status=live }}</ref> (despite being an expanded rewrite of one single novella), was published by Ballantine in 1953.<ref>{{cite book|last=Baxter|first=John|title=A Pound of Paper: Confessions of a Book Addict|date=2005|publisher=Macmillan|isbn=9781466839892|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=TF9_cwQsL_IC&q=%22When+it+published+the+first+edition+in+1953%2C+Ballantine+also+produced+200+signed+and+numbered+copies+bound+in+Johns-Manville+Quintera%2C+a+form+of+asbestos.%22&pg=PA393|page=393|quote=When it published the first edition in 1953, Ballantine also produced 200 signed and numbered copies bound in Johns-Manville Quintera, a form of asbestos.}}</ref>

===Supplementary material===

Bradbury has supplemented the novel with various [[Front matter|front]] and [[back matter]], including a 1979 coda,<ref name="coda">{{cite book|last=Brier|first=Evan|title=A Novel Marketplace: Mass Culture, the Book Trade, and Postwar American Fiction|date=2011|publisher=University of Pennsylvania Press|isbn=9780812201444|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Ygke3pOSL8gC&q=%22Bradbury+closes+his+1979+Coda+to+Fahrenheit+451%2C+one+of+numerous+comments+on+the+novel+he+has+published+since+1953%2C%22&pg=PA65|page=65|quote=Bradbury closes his 1979 'Coda' to ''Fahrenheit 451'', one of numerous comments on the novel he has published since 1953, ...|access-date=November 11, 2020|archive-date=November 17, 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211117115852/https://books.google.com/books?id=Ygke3pOSL8gC&q=%22Bradbury+closes+his+1979+Coda+to+Fahrenheit+451%2C+one+of+numerous+comments+on+the+novel+he+has+published+since+1953%2C%22&pg=PA65|url-status=live}}</ref> a 1982 [[afterword]],<ref name=reidafterward>{{cite book|last=Reid|first=Robin Anne|title=Ray Bradbury: A Critical Companion|series=Critical Companions to Popular Contemporary Writers|year=2000|publisher=Greenwood Press|location=Westport, CT|isbn=0-313-30901-9|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=wvMEoM8gu74C&q=%22In+a+1982+afterword%22&pg=PA53|page=53|quote=In a 1982 afterword...|access-date=November 11, 2020|archive-date=November 17, 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211117115914/https://books.google.com/books?id=wvMEoM8gu74C&q=%22In+a+1982+afterword%22&pg=PA53|url-status=live}}</ref> a 1993 [[foreword]], and several [[introduction (essay)|introductions]].

==Publication history==
The first U.S. printing was a paperback version from October 1953 by The Ballantine Publishing Group. Shortly after the paperback, a hardback version was released that included a special edition of 200 signed and numbered copies bound in [[asbestos]].<ref>{{cite book|last=Tuck|first=Donald H.|author-link=Donald H. Tuck|date=March 1974|title=The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction and Fantasy|location=Chicago, Illinois|publisher=Advent|isbn=0-911682-20-1|lccn=73091828|volume=1: Who's Who, A–L|page=62|quote=Special edition bound in asbestos—200 copies ''ca''. 1954, $4.00 [probably Ballantine text]}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|title=Fahrenheit 451|url=http://www.spaceagecity.com/bradbury/f451.htm|work=Ray Bradbury Online|publisher=spaceagecity.com|access-date=September 4, 2013|quote=200 copies were signed and numbered and bound in 'Johns-Manville Quinterra,' an asbestos material.|archive-date=May 16, 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170516052254/http://www.spaceagecity.com/bradbury/f451.htm|url-status=live}}</ref><ref name=koster_p164_2>{{cite book|editor-last=De Koster|editor-first=Katie|title=Readings on Fahrenheit 451|url=https://archive.org/details/readingsonfahren00deko|url-access=registration|year=2000|series=Literary Companion Series|publisher=Greenhaven Press|location=San Diego, CA|isbn=1-56510-857-4|page=[https://archive.org/details/readingsonfahren00deko/page/164 164]|quote=A special limited-edition version of the book with an asbestos cover was printed in 1953.}}</ref> These were technically collections because the novel was published with two short stories, "The Playground" and "And the Rock Cried Out", which have been omitted from later printings.<ref name=crider/><ref>{{cite book|last=Weller|first=Sam|author-link=Sam Weller (journalist)|title=The Bradbury Chronicles: The Life of Ray Bradbury|year=2006|publisher=HarperCollins|isbn=978-0-06-054584-0|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=EiWCIK4vGSMC&q=%22The+Playground%22+%22and+the+rock+cried+out%22&pg=PA208|page=208|quote=To fulfill his agreement with Doubleday that the book be a collection rather than a novel, the first edition of ''Fahrenheit 451'' included two additional short stories—'The Playground' and 'And the Rock Cried Out.' (The original plan was to include eight stories plus ''Fahrenheit 451'', but Ray didn't have time to revise all the tales.) 'The Playground' and 'And the Rock Cried Out' were removed in much later printings; in the meantime, Ray had met his contractual obligation with the first edition. ''Fahrenheit 451'' was a short novel, but it was also a part of a collection.|access-date=November 11, 2020|archive-date=November 17, 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211117115827/https://books.google.com/books?id=EiWCIK4vGSMC&q=%22The+Playground%22+%22and+the+rock+cried+out%22&pg=PA208|url-status=live}}</ref> A few months later, the novel was serialized in the March, April, and May 1954 issues of nascent ''[[Playboy]]'' magazine.<ref name=aggelis_pxxix/><ref name=koster_p159>{{cite book|editor-last=De Koster|editor-first=Katie|title=Readings on Fahrenheit 451|url=https://archive.org/details/readingsonfahren00deko|url-access=registration|year=2000|series=Literary Companion Series|publisher=Greenhaven Press|location=San Diego, CA|isbn=1-56510-857-4|page=[https://archive.org/details/readingsonfahren00deko/page/159 159]|quote=A serialized version of ''Fahrenheit 451'' appears in the March, April, and May 1954 issues of ''Playboy'' magazine.}}</ref>

===Expurgation===

Starting in January 1967, ''Fahrenheit 451'' was subject to [[expurgation]] by its publisher, Ballantine Books, with the release of the "Bal-Hi Edition" aimed at high school students.<ref>{{cite journal|last=Crider|first=Bill|editor1-last=Lee|editor1-first=Billy C.|editor2-last=Laughlin|editor2-first=Charlotte|title=Reprints/Reprints: ''Ray Bradbury's FAHRENHEIT 451''|journal=Paperback Quarterly|date=Fall 1980|volume=III|issue=3|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=8FVzjEjyHH0C&q=%22The+censorship+began+with+a+special+Bal-Hi+edition+in+1967%2C+an+edition+designed+for+high+school+students%22&pg=PA25|page=25|quote=The censorship began with a special 'Bal-Hi' edition in 1967, an edition designed for high school students...|isbn=9781434406330|access-date=November 11, 2020|archive-date=May 4, 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210504155135/https://books.google.com/books?id=8FVzjEjyHH0C&q=%22The+censorship+began+with+a+special+Bal-Hi+edition+in+1967,+an+edition+designed+for+high+school+students%22&pg=PA25|url-status=live}}</ref><ref name=karolides2011_1>{{cite book| last1=Karolides| first1=Nicholas J.| last2=Bald| first2=Margaret| last3=Sova| first3=Dawn B.| title=120 Banned Books: Censorship Histories of World Literature| edition=Second| year=2011| publisher=Checkmark Books| isbn=978-0-8160-8232-2|page=488|quote=In 1967, Ballantine Books published a special edition of the novel to be sold in high schools. Over 75 passages were modified to eliminate such words as ''hell'', ''damn'', and ''abortion'', and two incidents were eliminated. The original first incident described a drunk man who was changed to a sick man in the expurgated edition. In the second incident, reference is made to cleaning [[Lint (material)#Navel lint|fluff]] out of the human [[navel]], but the expurgated edition changed the reference to cleaning ears.}}</ref> Among the changes made by the publisher were the [[censorship]] of the words "hell", "damn", and "abortion"; the modification of seventy-five passages; and the changing of two incidents.<ref name=karolides2011_1/><ref>{{cite book| last=Burress| first=Lee| title=Battle of the Books: Literary Censorship in the Public Schools, 1950–1985|date=1989|publisher=Scarecrow Press| isbn=0-8108-2151-6| url=https://archive.org/details/battleofbookslit0000burr| url-access=registration|page=[https://archive.org/details/battleofbookslit0000burr/page/104 104]}}</ref>

In the first incident, a drunk man is changed to a "sick man", while the second involves cleaning [[Lint (material)#Navel lint|fluff]] out of a human [[navel]], which instead becomes "cleaning ears" in the other.<ref name=karolides2011_1/><ref name=greene2007>{{cite journal| last=Greene| first=Bill| date=February 2007| title=The mutilation and rebirth of a classic: Fahrenheit 451| journal=Compass: New Directions at Falvey| publisher=Villanova University| volume=III| issue=3| url=http://newsletter.library.villanova.edu/147| access-date=August 3, 2013| archive-date=February 11, 2021| archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210211171456/http://newsletter.library.villanova.edu/147| url-status=live}}</ref> For a while, both the censored and uncensored versions were available concurrently, but by 1973, Ballantine was publishing only the censored version.<ref name=greene2007/><ref name=karolides2011_2>{{cite book|last1=Karolides|first1=Nicholas J.| last2=Bald| first2=Margaret| last3=Sova|first3=Dawn B.| title=120 Banned Books: Censorship Histories of World Literature| edition=Second|year=2011| publisher=Checkmark Books| isbn=978-0-8160-8232-2| page=488| quote=After six years of simultaneous editions, the publisher ceased publication of the adult version, leaving only the expurgated version for sale from 1973 through 1979, during which neither Bradbury nor anyone else suspected the truth.}}</ref> That continued until 1979, when it came to Bradbury's attention:<ref name=greene2007/><ref name=karolides2011_2/>

<blockquote>In 1979, one of Bradbury's friends showed him an expurgated copy of the book. Bradbury demanded that Ballantine Books withdraw that version and replace it with the original, and in 1980 the original version once again became available. In this reinstated work, in the Author's Afterword, Bradbury relates to the reader that it is not uncommon for a publisher to expurgate an author's work, but he asserts that he himself will not tolerate the practice of manuscript "mutilation".</blockquote>

The "Bal-Hi" editions are now referred to by the publisher as the "Revised Bal-Hi" editions.<ref>{{cite journal|last=Crider|first=Bill|editor1-last=Lee|editor1-first=Billy C.|editor2-last=Laughlin|editor2-first=Charlotte|title=Reprints/Reprints: ''Ray Bradbury's FAHRENHEIT 451''|journal=Paperback Quarterly|date=Fall 1980|volume=III|issue=3|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=8FVzjEjyHH0C&q=%22There+is+no+mention+anywhere+on+the+Bal-Hi+edition+that+it+has+been+abridged%2C+but+printing+histories+in+later+Ballantine+editions+refer+to+the+Revised+Bal-Hi+editions.%22&pg=PA25|page=25|quote=There is no mention anywhere on the Bal-Hi edition that it has been abridged, but printing histories in later Ballantine editions refer to the 'Revised Bal-Hi Editions'.|isbn=9781434406330|access-date=November 11, 2020|archive-date=November 17, 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211117115812/https://books.google.com/books?id=8FVzjEjyHH0C&q=%22There+is+no+mention+anywhere+on+the+Bal-Hi+edition+that+it+has+been+abridged%2C+but+printing+histories+in+later+Ballantine+editions+refer+to+the+Revised+Bal-Hi+editions.%22&pg=PA25|url-status=live}}</ref>

===Non-print publications===

An audiobook version read by Bradbury himself was released in 1976 and received a [[Grammy Award for Best Spoken Word Album|Spoken Word]] [[19th Annual Grammy Awards|Grammy nomination]].<ref name=grammy/> Another audiobook was released in 2005 narrated by Christopher Hurt.<ref>{{cite book|last=Bradbury|first=Ray|author-link=Ray Bradbury|others=Read by Christopher Hurt|title=Fahrenheit 451|year=2005|publisher=Blackstone Audiobooks|location=Ashland, OR|isbn=0-7861-7627-X|edition=Unabridged}}</ref> The [[e-book]] version was released in December 2011.<ref>{{cite news|title=Fahrenheit 451 becomes e-book despite author's feelings|date=November 30, 2011|work=BBC News|url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-15968500|access-date=August 24, 2013|archive-date=January 6, 2013|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130106225928/http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-15968500|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|title=Fahrenheit 451 ebook published as Ray Bradbury gives in to digital era|last=Flood|first=Alison|work=The Guardian|date=November 30, 2011|url=https://www.theguardian.com/books/2011/nov/30/fahrenheit-451-ebook-ray-bradbury|access-date=October 6, 2013|archive-date=October 2, 2013|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131002215731/http://www.theguardian.com/books/2011/nov/30/fahrenheit-451-ebook-ray-bradbury|url-status=live}}</ref>

==Reception==

In 1954, ''Galaxy Science Fiction'' reviewer [[Groff Conklin]] placed the novel "among the great works of the imagination written in English in the last decade or more."<ref>{{cite journal|last=Conklin|first=Groff|author-link=Groff Conklin|date=February 1954|title=Galaxy's 5 Star Shelf|journal=Galaxy Science Fiction|page=108}}</ref> The ''[[Chicago Sunday Tribune]]''<nowiki>'</nowiki>s [[August Derleth]] described the book as "a savage and shockingly prophetic view of one possible future way of life", calling it "compelling" and praising Bradbury for his "brilliant imagination".<ref>{{cite news|last=Derleth|first=August|author-link=August Derleth|title=Vivid Prophecy of Book Burning|newspaper=Chicago Sunday Tribune|date=October 25, 1953}}</ref> Over half a century later, [[Sam Weller (journalist)|Sam Weller]] wrote, "upon its publication, ''Fahrenheit 451'' was hailed as a visionary work of social commentary."<ref>{{cite book|last=Weller|first=Sam|author-link=Sam Weller (journalist)|title=Listen to the Echoes: The Ray Bradbury Interviews|year=2010|publisher=Melville House|location=Brooklyn, NY|page=124}}</ref> Today, ''Fahrenheit 451'' is still viewed as an important [[cautionary tale]] about [[conformity]] and the evils of government censorship.<ref>{{cite journal|last=McNamee|first=Gregory|title=Appreciations: Fahrenheit 451|journal=Kirkus Reviews|date=September 15, 2010|volume=78|issue=18|page=882}}</ref>

When the novel was first published, there were those who did not find merit in the tale. [[Anthony Boucher]] and [[J. Francis McComas]] were less enthusiastic, faulting the book for being "simply padded, occasionally with startlingly ingenious gimmickry, ... often with coruscating cascades of verbal brilliance [but] too often merely with words."<ref>"Recommended Reading", ''[[The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction|F&SF]]'', December 1953, p. 105.</ref> Reviewing the book for ''[[Analog Science Fiction and Fact|Astounding Science Fiction]]'', [[P. Schuyler Miller]] characterized the title piece as "one of Bradbury's bitter, almost hysterical diatribes," while praising its "emotional drive and compelling, nagging detail."<ref>"The Reference Library", ''[[Analog Science Fiction and Fact|Astounding Science Fiction]]'', April 1954, pp. 145–46</ref> Similarly, ''The New York Times'' was unimpressed with the novel and further accused Bradbury of developing a "virulent hatred for many aspects of present-day culture, namely, such monstrosities as radio, TV, most movies, amateur and professional sports, automobiles, and other similar aberrations which he feels debase the bright simplicity of the thinking man's existence."<ref>{{cite news|title=Nothing but TV|newspaper=The New York Times|date=November 14, 1953}}</ref>

''Fahrenheit 451'' was number seven on the list of "Top Check Outs OF ALL TIME" by the [[New York Public Library]].<ref>{{Cite web|url = https://gothamist.com/arts-entertainment/nypl-most-checked-out-books-ever|title = These Are the NYPL's Top Check Outs OF ALL TIME|date = January 13, 2020|access-date = January 13, 2020|archive-date = January 13, 2020|archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20200113215347/https://gothamist.com/arts-entertainment/nypl-most-checked-out-books-ever|url-status = live}}</ref>

===Censorship/banning incidents===

In the years since its publication, ''Fahrenheit 451'' has occasionally been banned, censored, or redacted in some schools at the behest of parents or teaching staff either unaware of or indifferent to the inherent irony in such censorship. Notable incidents include:
*In [[Apartheid]] [[South Africa]], the book was burned along with thousands of banned publications between the 1950s and 1970s.<ref>{{Cite web| last1=Dick | first1=Archie | editor-first1=Charles | editor-last1=Leonard |url=https://theconversation.com/how-the-apartheid-regime-burnt-books-in-their-tens-of-thousands-102355|title = How the apartheid regime burnt books -- in their tens of thousands| date=October 24, 2018 | doi=10.64628/AAJ.vh5vy6r3a }}</ref>
*In 1987, ''Fahrenheit 451'' was given "third tier" status by the [[Bay District Schools|Bay County School Board]] in [[Panama City, Florida]], under superintendent Leonard Hall's new three-tier classification system. Third tier was meant for books to be removed from the classroom for "a lot of vulgarity". After a resident class-action lawsuit, a media stir, and student protests, the school board abandoned their tier-based censorship system and approved all the currently used books.<ref name=karolides2011_p501_502>{{cite book|last1=Karolides|first1=Nicholas J.|last2=Bald|first2=Margaret|last3=Sova|first3=Dawn B.|title=120 Banned Books: Censorship Histories of World Literature|edition=Second|year=2011|publisher=Checkmark Books|isbn=978-0-8160-8232-2|pages=501–02}}</ref>
*In 1992, [[Venado Middle School]] in [[Irvine, California]], gave copies of ''Fahrenheit 451'' to students with all "obscene" words blacked out.<ref name=karolides2011_p489>{{cite book|last1=Karolides|first1=Nicholas J.|last2=Bald|first2=Margaret|last3=Sova|first3=Dawn B.|title=120 Banned Books: Censorship Histories of World Literature|edition=Second|year=2011|publisher=Checkmark Books|isbn=978-0-8160-8232-2|page=489|quote=In 1992, students of Venado Middle School in Irvine, California, were issued copies of the novel with numerous words blacked out. School officials had ordered teachers to use black markers to obliterate all of the 'hells', 'damns', and other words deemed 'obscene' in the books before giving them to students as required reading. Parents complained to the school and contacted local newspapers, who sent reporters to write stories about the irony of a book that condemns bookburning and censorship being expurgated. Faced with such an outcry, school officials announced that the censored copies would no longer be used.}}</ref> Parents contacted the local media and succeeded in reinstalling the uncensored copies.<ref name=karolides2011_p489/>
*In 2006, parents of a 10th-grade high school student in [[Montgomery County, Texas]], demanded the book be banned from their daughter's English class reading list.<ref name=wrigley>{{cite news|last=Wrigley|first=Deborah|title=Parent files complaint about book assigned as student reading|date=October 3, 2006|newspaper=ABC News|url=http://abclocal.go.com/ktrk/story?section=news/local&id=4625303|access-date=March 2, 2013|archive-date=September 27, 2013|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130927204624/http://abclocal.go.com/ktrk/story?section=news%2Flocal&id=4625303|url-status=dead}}</ref> Their daughter was assigned the book during [[Banned Books Week]], but stopped reading several pages in due to what she considered the offensive language and description of the burning of the [[Bible]]. In addition, the parents protested the violence, portrayal of Christians, and depictions of firemen in the novel.<ref name=wrigley/>

==Themes==

Discussions about ''Fahrenheit 451'' often center on its story foremost as a warning against state-based censorship. Indeed, when Bradbury wrote the novel during the McCarthy era, he was concerned about [[censorship in the United States]]. During a radio interview in 1956,<ref>{{cite web |author=Ray Bradbury |others=Narrated by Norman Rose |title=Ticket to the Moon (tribute to SciFi) |date=December 4, 1956 |website=Biography in Sound |publisher=NBC Radio News |url=https://oldradioprograms.us/My%20Old%20Radio%20Shows/B/Biographies%20In%20Sound/Biographies%20In%20Sound%20(NBC)-1956-12-04-Ticket%20To%20The%20Moon%20-%20Tribute%20To%20Scifi.mp3 |format=mp3 |access-date=February 2, 2017 |at=27:10–27:57 |archive-date=February 9, 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210209110704/https://oldradioprograms.us/My%20Old%20Radio%20Shows/B/Biographies%20In%20Sound/Biographies%20In%20Sound%20(NBC)-1956-12-04-Ticket%20To%20The%20Moon%20-%20Tribute%20To%20Scifi.mp3 |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>{{cite web|title=The Definitive Biography in Sound Radio Log|url=http://www.digitaldeliftp.com/DigitalDeliToo/dd2jb-Biography-In-Sound.html|access-date=March 1, 2013|archive-date=March 21, 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210321070834/http://www.digitaldeliftp.com/DigitalDeliToo/dd2jb-Biography-In-Sound.html|url-status=live}}</ref> Bradbury said

<blockquote>I wrote this book at a time when I was worried about the way things were going in this country four years ago. Too many people were afraid of their shadows; there was a threat of book burning. Many of the books were being taken off the shelves at that time. And of course, things have changed a lot in four years. Things are going back in a very healthy direction. But at the time I wanted to do some sort of story where I could comment on what would happen to a country if we let ourselves go too far in this direction, where then all thinking stops, and the dragon swallows his tail, and we sort of vanish into a limbo and we destroy ourselves by this sort of action.</blockquote>

As time went by, Bradbury tended to dismiss censorship as a chief motivating factor for writing the story. Instead he usually claimed that the real messages of ''Fahrenheit 451'' were about the dangers of an illiterate society infatuated with mass media and the threat of minority and special interest groups to books. In the late 1950s, Bradbury recounted

<blockquote>In writing the short novel ''Fahrenheit 451'', I thought I was describing a world that might evolve in four or five decades. But only a few weeks ago, in [[Beverly Hills, California|Beverly Hills]] one night, a husband and wife passed me, walking their dog. I stood staring after them, absolutely stunned. The woman held in one hand a small cigarette-package-sized radio, its antenna quivering. From this sprang tiny copper wires which ended in a dainty cone plugged into her right ear. There she was, oblivious to man and dog, listening to far winds and whispers and soap-opera cries, sleep-walking, helped up and down curbs by a husband who might just as well not have been there. This was ''not'' fiction.<ref>Quoted by [[Kingsley Amis]] in ''New Maps of Hell: A Survey of Science Fiction'' (1960). Bradbury directly foretells this incident early in the work: "And in her ears the little Seashells, the thimble radios tamped tight, and an electronic ocean of sound, of music and talk and music and talking coming in." p.12</ref></blockquote>

This story echoes Mildred's "Seashell ear-thimbles" (i.e., a brand of in-ear headphones) that act as an emotional barrier between her and Montag. In a 2007 interview, Bradbury maintained that people misinterpret his book and that ''Fahrenheit 451'' is really a statement on how mass media like television marginalizes the reading of literature.<ref name=LAweekly>{{cite web|title=Ray Bradbury: Fahrenheit 451 Misinterpreted|last=Johnston|first=Amy E. Boyle|date=May 30, 2007|work=LA Weekly website|url=https://www.laweekly.com/ray-bradbury-fahrenheit-451-misinterpreted/|access-date=July 9, 2019|quote=Bradbury still has a lot to say, especially about how people do not understand his most famous literary work, ''Fahrenheit 451'', published in 1953&nbsp;... Bradbury, a man living in the creative and industrial center of reality TV and one-hour dramas, says it is, in fact, a story about how television destroys interest in reading literature.|archive-date=July 9, 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190709154603/https://www.laweekly.com/ray-bradbury-fahrenheit-451-misinterpreted/|url-status=live}}</ref> Regarding minorities, he wrote in his 1979 Coda

<blockquote>'There is more than one way to burn a book. And the world is full of people running about with lit matches. Every minority, be it Baptist/Unitarian, Irish/Italian/Octogenarian/Zen Buddhist, Zionist/Seventh-day Adventist, Women's Lib/Republican, [[Mattachine]]/[[Four Square Gospel]] feels it has the will, the right, the duty to douse the kerosene, light the fuse. [...] Fire-Captain Beatty, in my novel ''Fahrenheit 451'', described how the books were burned first by minorities, each ripping a page or a paragraph from this book, then that, until the day came when the books were empty and the minds shut and the libraries closed forever. [...] Only six weeks ago, I discovered that, over the years, some cubby-hole editors at Ballantine Books, fearful of contaminating the young, had, bit by bit, censored some seventy-five separate sections from the novel. Students, reading the novel, which, after all, deals with censorship and book-burning in the future, wrote to tell me of this exquisite irony. [[Judy-Lynn del Rey]], one of the new Ballantine editors, is having the entire book reset and republished this summer with all the damns and hells back in place.<ref>{{cite book|last=Bradbury|first=Ray|author-link=Ray Bradbury|date=2003|title=Fahrenheit 451|edition=50th anniversary|publisher=Ballantine Books|location=New York, NY|isbn=0-345-34296-8|pages=175–79}}</ref></blockquote>

Book-burning censorship, Bradbury would argue, was a side-effect of these two primary factors; this is consistent with Captain Beatty's speech to Montag about the history of the firemen. According to Bradbury, it is the people, not the state, who are the culprit in ''Fahrenheit 451''.<ref name=LAweekly/> Fahrenheit's censorship is not the result of an authoritarian program to retain power, but the result of a fragmented society seeking to accommodate its challenges by deploying the power of entertainment and technology. As Captain Beatty explains (p.&nbsp;55)

<blockquote>...The bigger your market, Montag, the less you handle controversy, remember that! All the minor minorities with their navels to be kept clean."[...] "It didn't come from the Government down. There was no dictum, no declaration, no censorship, to start with, no! Technology, mass exploitation, and minority pressure carried the trick, thank God.</blockquote>

A variety of other themes in the novel besides censorship have been suggested. Two major themes are resistance to conformity and control of individuals via technology and mass media. Bradbury explores how the government is able to use mass media to influence society and suppress individualism through book burning. The characters Beatty and Faber point out that the American population is to blame. Due to their constant desire for a simplistic, positive image, books must be suppressed. Beatty blames the minority groups, who would take offense to published works that displayed them in an unfavorable light. Faber went further to state that, rather than the government banning books, the American population simply stopped reading on their own. He notes that the book burnings themselves became a form of entertainment for the general public.<ref name="reid_p59-60">{{cite book|last=Reid|first=Robin Anne|title=Ray Bradbury: A Critical Companion|series=Critical Companions to Popular Contemporary Writers|year=2000|publisher=Greenwood Press|location=Westport, CT|isbn=0-313-30901-9|pages=59–60}}</ref>

In a 1994 interview, Bradbury stated that ''Fahrenheit 451'' was more relevant during this time than in any other, stating that, "it works even better because we have [[political correctness]] now. Political correctness is the real enemy these days. The black groups want to control our thinking and you can't say certain things. The homosexual groups don't want you to criticize them. It's [[thought control]] and [[freedom of speech]] control."<ref name=":3">[http://diginole.lib.fsu.edu/islandora/object/fsu:168044/datastream/PDF/view Bradbury Talk Likely to Feature the Unexpected] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190710071242/http://diginole.lib.fsu.edu/islandora/object/fsu:168044/datastream/PDF/view |date=July 10, 2019 }}, Dayton Daily News, 1 October 1994, City Edition, Lifestyle/Weekendlife Section, p. 1C.</ref>

==Predictions for the future==

''Fahrenheit 451'' is set in an unspecified city and time, though it is written as if set in a distant future.<ref name=":0" group="note" /><ref name=":0">{{cite book |author=Society for the Study of Midwestern Literature |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ZnuYKJSoHCMC&q=%22Fahrenheit+451+is+not+set+in+any+specific+locale%22&pg=PA78 |title=Dictionary of Midwestern Literature |date=2001 |publisher=Indiana University Press |isbn=9780253336095 |editor-last=Greasley |editor-first=Philip A. |volume=1, The Authors |page=78 |quote=''Fahrenheit 451'' is not set in any specific locale... |access-date=March 5, 2014 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210930174911/https://books.google.com/books?id=ZnuYKJSoHCMC&q=%22Fahrenheit+451+is+not+set+in+any+specific+locale%22&pg=PA78 |archive-date=September 30, 2021 |url-status=live}}</ref> The earliest editions make clear that it takes place no earlier than the year 2022 due to a reference to an atomic war taking place during that year.<ref group="note">In early editions of the book, Montag says, "We've started and won two [[Nuclear warfare|atomic wars]] since 1960", in the first pages of ''The Sieve and the Sand''. This sets a lower bound on the time setting. In later decades, some editions have changed this year to 1990 or 2022.</ref><ref name="reid_p59_1">{{cite book |last=Reid |first=Robin Anne |title=Ray Bradbury: A Critical Companion |publisher=Greenwood Press |year=2000 |isbn=0-313-30901-9 |series=Critical Companions to Popular Contemporary Writers |location=Westport, CT |page=53 |quote=''Fahrenheit 451'' is set in an unnamed city in the United States, possibly in the Midwest, in some undated future.}}</ref>

Bradbury described himself as "a ''preventer'' of futures, not a predictor of them."<ref name="aggelis_p99">{{cite book|editor-last=Aggelis|editor-first=Steven L.|others=Interview by Shel Dorf|title=Conversations with Ray Bradbury|year=2004|publisher=University Press of Mississippi|location=Jackson, MS|isbn=1-57806-640-9|page=99|quote=I am a ''preventor'' of futures, not a predictor of them. I wrote ''Fahrenheit 451'' to prevent book-burnings, not to induce that future into happening, or even to say that it was inevitable.}}</ref> He did not believe that book burning was an inevitable part of the future; he wanted to warn against its development.<ref name="aggelis_p99" /> In a later interview, when asked if he believes that teaching ''Fahrenheit 451'' in schools will prevent his totalitarian<ref name="gerall" /> vision of the future, Bradbury replied in the negative. Rather, he states that education must be at the kindergarten and first-grade level. If students are unable to read then, they will be unable to read ''Fahrenheit 451''.<ref>{{cite book|editor-last=Aggelis|editor-first=Steven L.|title=Conversations with Ray Bradbury|year=2004|publisher=[[University Press of Mississippi]]|location=Jackson, MS|isbn=1-57806-640-9|page=189}}</ref>

As to technology, Sam Weller notes that Bradbury "predicted everything from flat-panel televisions to earbud headphones and twenty-four-hour banking machines."<ref>{{cite book|last=Weller|first=Sam|author-link=Sam Weller (journalist)|title=Listen to the Echoes: The Ray Bradbury Interviews|year=2010|publisher=Melville House|location=Brooklyn, NY|page=263|isbn=978-1935554035|url=https://archive.org/details/listentoechoesra0000well/page/n1/mode/2up}}</ref>

==Adaptations==
===Television===

''[[Playhouse 90]]'' broadcast [[A Sound of Different Drummers (Playhouse 90)|"A Sound of Different Drummers"]] on [[CBS]] in 1957, written by [[Robert Alan Aurthur]]. The play combined plot ideas from ''Fahrenheit 451'' and ''[[Nineteen Eighty-Four]]''. Bradbury sued and eventually won on appeal.<ref>{{cite journal|last=Nolan|first=William F.|author-link=William F. Nolan|title=Bradbury: Prose Poet in the Age of Space|date=May 1963|journal=The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction|pages=7–21}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|last=Bowie|first=Stephen|title=The Sound of a Single Drummer|date=August 17, 2010|work=The Classic TV History Blog|publisher=wordpress.com|url=http://classictvhistory.wordpress.com/2010/08/19/the-sound-of-a-single-drummer|access-date=August 29, 2013|archive-date=August 31, 2013|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130831154652/http://classictvhistory.wordpress.com/2010/08/19/the-sound-of-a-single-drummer/|url-status=live}}</ref>

===Film===

{{main|Fahrenheit 451 (1966 film)|Fahrenheit 451 (2018 film)}}
A [[Fahrenheit 451 (1966 film)|film adaptation]] written and directed by [[François Truffaut]] and starring [[Oskar Werner]] and [[Julie Christie]] was released in 1966.<ref>{{cite book|last=Frey|first=James N.|title=How to Write a Damn Good Thriller: A Step-by-Step Guide for Novelists and Screenwriters|edition=1st|date=2010|publisher=Macmillan|isbn=978-0-312-57507-6|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=POPvQNgZYIQC&q=%22FAHRENHEIT+451%22&pg=PA255|access-date=March 5, 2014|page=255|quote=FAHRENHEIT 451* (1966); written by François Truffaut from the novel by Ray Bradbury; starring Oskar Werner and Julie Christie; directed by François Truffaut.|archive-date=November 17, 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211117115812/https://books.google.com/books?id=POPvQNgZYIQC&q=%22FAHRENHEIT+451%22&pg=PA255|url-status=live}}</ref>

A [[Fahrenheit 451 (2018 film)|film adaptation]] directed by [[Ramin Bahrani]] and starring [[Michael B. Jordan]], [[Michael Shannon]], [[Sofia Boutella]], and [[Lilly Singh]] was released in 2018 for [[HBO]].<ref>{{cite magazine |last=Hipes |first=Patrick |url=https://deadline.com/2017/04/fahrenheit-451-movie-michael-b-jordan-michael-shannon-hbo-1202072639/ |title=HBO's 'Fahrenheit 451' Movie: Michael B. Jordan & Michael Shannon To Star |magazine=Deadline |date=2017-04-19 |access-date=2017-05-08 |archive-date=January 21, 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200121120606/https://deadline.com/2017/04/fahrenheit-451-movie-michael-b-jordan-michael-shannon-hbo-1202072639/ |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/mummy-star-sofia-boutella-joins-michael-b-jordan-fahrenheit-451-1010672|title='Mummy' Star Sofia Boutella Joins Michael B. Jordan in 'Fahrenheit 451'|last=Ford|first=Rebecca|website=[[The Hollywood Reporter]]|date=6 June 2017|access-date=April 16, 2020|archive-date=November 12, 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201112040439/https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/mummy-star-sofia-boutella-joins-michael-b-jordan-fahrenheit-451-1010672|url-status=live}}</ref>

===Theater===
[[File:Pandemonium Theatre Company's Fahrenheit 451 2008 Cast with Ray Bradbury, Fremont Centre Theatre.jpg|thumb|[[Mageina Tovah]], [[Ray Bradbury]], David Mauer (Montag), [[Jessica D. Stone]] (Clarisse), Michael Prichard (Captain Beatty) and Roses Prichard backstage of ''Fahrenheit 451'' by the Pandemonium Theatre Company at the Fremont Centre Theatre, [[Pasadena, California]] in August 2008]]

In the late 1970s Bradbury adapted his book into a play. At least part of it was performed at the Colony Theatre in [[Los Angeles]] in 1979, but it was not in print until 1986 and the official world premiere was only in November 1988 by the [[Fort Wayne, Indiana|Fort Wayne, Indiana Civic Theatre]]. The stage adaptation diverges considerably from the book and seems influenced by Truffaut's movie. For example, fire chief Beatty's character is fleshed out and is the wordiest role in the play. As in the movie, Clarisse does not simply disappear but in the finale meets up with Montag as a book character (she as [[Robert Louis Stevenson]], he as [[Edgar Allan Poe]]).<ref name=play>[http://home.wlv.ac.uk/~in5379/books/451_play.htm Fahrenheit 451 (play)] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170420153402/http://home.wlv.ac.uk/~in5379/books/451_play.htm |date=April 20, 2017 }}, BradburyMedia; accessed September 17, 2016.</ref>

The UK premiere of Bradbury's stage adaptation was not until 2003 in [[Nottingham]],<ref name=play/> while it took until 2006 before the Godlight Theatre Company produced and performed its [[New York City]] premiere at [[59E59 Theaters]].<ref>{{cite news|last=Genzlinger|first=Neil|author-link=Neil Genzlinger|title=Godlight Theater's 'Fahrenheit 451' Offers Hot Ideas for the Information Age|url=http://theater.nytimes.com/2006/03/25/theater/reviews/25fahr.html?adxnnl=1&adxnnlx=1364390999-4fShVjfkzVUOVr8NqZtCcg|access-date=March 2, 2013|newspaper=The New York Times|date=March 25, 2006|archive-date=November 17, 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211117115922/https://www.nytimes.com/2006/03/25/theater/reviews/godlight-theaters-fahrenheit-451-offers-hot-ideas-for-the.html|url-status=live}}</ref> After the completion of the New York run, the production then transferred to the [[Edinburgh Festival]] where it was a 2006 Edinburgh Festival ''Pick of the Fringe''.<ref>{{cite web|title=The Edinburgh festival 2006 – Reviews – Theatre 'F' – 8 out of 156|publisher=Edinburghguide.com|url=http://www.edinburghguide.com/festival/2006/fringe/review_theatre.php?page=f|access-date=June 15, 2013|archive-date=September 23, 2012|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120923135801/http://www.edinburghguide.com/festival/2006/fringe/review_theatre.php?page=f|url-status=dead}}</ref>

The [[Off-Broadway]] theatre [[The American Place Theatre]] presented a [[one man show]] adaptation of ''Fahrenheit 451'' as a part of their 2008–2009 Literature to Life season.<ref>{{cite web |title=Literature to Life – Citizenship & Censorship: Raise Your Civic Voice in 2008–09 |publisher=The American Place Theatre|url=http://www.americanplacetheatre.org/stage/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=331&Itemid=1|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20091110220249/http://www.americanplacetheatre.org/stage/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=331&Itemid=1|archive-date=November 10, 2009|url-status=dead}}</ref>

Bradbury's Pandemonium Theatre Company<ref>{{cite book|last1=Callow, Jr.|first1=Christos|last2=Bould|first2=Mark|last3=Butler|first3=Andrew M.|last4=Vint|first4=Sheryl|title=The New Routledge Companion to Science Fiction (Routledge Literature Companions) 2nd Edition|chapter=Science Fiction Theatre|chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=MRcLEQAAQBAJ&dq=fremont+centre+theatre+fahrenheit+451&pg=PA157|date=June 13, 2024|publisher=[[Routledge]]|location=United Kingdom|pages=157|isbn=978-0367690533}}</ref> staged a production at the Fremont Centre Theatre in [[Pasadena, California|South Pasadena]] from April<ref>Sokoloff, Philip (12 March 2008). [https://www.onstage411.com/newsite/review/play_reviews.asp?show_id=1457 "Ray Bradbury's 'Fahrenehit 451' Opens at Fremont Centre Theatre on April 19"]. ''OnStage 411''. Retrieved 14 May 2025.</ref> through December 2008,<ref name="Fahrenheit 451 Monrovia Weekly">[https://infoweb-newsbank-com.lvccld.idm.oclc.org/apps/news/document-view?p=WORLDNEWS&t=&sort=YMD_date%3AD&page=18&hide_duplicates=0&offset=61&maxresults=20&f=advanced&val-base-0=fahrenheit%20451&fld-base-0=alltext&bln-base-1=and&val-base-1=2008&fld-base-1=YMD_date&docref=news/12323B65732A1560 "The legendary Ray Bradbury - Ray Bradbury's 'Fahrenheit 451' Returns To Fremont Centre Theatre Starting October 18"]. ''The Monrovia Weekly''. 11 September 2008. Retrieved 14 May 2025 – via [[NewsBank]].</ref><ref>[https://www.newspapers.com/image/193296898/?match=1&terms=fahrenheit%20451 "LA Stage Times: Returning 10/17 By Demand! Ray Bradbury's FAHRENHEIT 451 - Fremont Centre Theatre, So.,Pasadena"]. ''[[Los Angeles Times]]'': 61. 11 October 2008.</ref><ref>[https://www.newspapers.com/image/193871977/?match=1&terms=fahrenheit%20451 "Ray Bradbury's FAHRENHEIT 451 Directed by ALAN NEAL HUBBS - EXTENDED by Demand through 12/20!"] ''[[Los Angeles Times]]'': 97. 13 November 2008.</ref> which was led by resident director Alan Neal Hubbs, produced by Bradbury and Racquel Lehrman, and starred David Polcyn (alternated with David Mauer and Lee Holmes) as Montag,<ref name="Fahrenheit 451 LA Times Review">Stoudt, Charlotte; Nichols, David C. (4 July 2008). [https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-2008-jul-04-et-stage4-story.html " 'Fahrenheit 451' burns in flashes"]. ''[[Los Angeles Times]]''. Retrieved 14 May 2025.</ref> [[Mageina Tovah]] alternating with Tanya Mounsey as Montag's wife, [[Jessica D. Stone]] as Clarisse, and [[Michael Prichard]] as Captain Beatty.<ref>[https://www.fremontcentretheatre.com/archives/rb_fahrenheit451_2008.shtml "Opened October 2008: Ray Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451. Written by Ray Bradbury, directed by Alan Neal Hubbs. Presented by Ray Bradbury's Pandemonium Theatre Company"]. ''Fremonet Centre Theatre''. Retrieved 26 April 2025.</ref> The play was extended multiple times during its run for its reported popularity with audiences.<ref name="Fahrenheit 451 Monrovia Weekly" />

''Fahrenheit 451'' inspired the [[Birmingham Repertory Theatre]] production ''Time Has Fallen Asleep in the Afternoon Sunshine'', which was performed at the [[Birmingham Central Library]] in April 2012.<ref>{{cite web|last=Edvardsen|first=Mette|title=''Time Has Fallen Asleep In The Afternoon Sunshine'' Presented at Birmingham Central Library|url=http://birmingham-rep.co.uk/event/time-has-fallen-asleep-in-the-afternoon-sunshine|access-date=March 22, 2013|archive-date=May 31, 2012|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120531152057/http://www.birmingham-rep.co.uk/event/time-has-fallen-asleep-in-the-afternoon-sunshine/|url-status=live}}</ref>

===Radio===
In 1982, [[Gregory Evans (dramatist)|Gregory Evans]]' radio dramatization of the novel was broadcast on [[BBC Radio|BBC Radio 4]] starring [[Michael Pennington]] as Montag.<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Nichols|first=Phil|date=2007-10-17|title=A sympathy with sounds: Ray Bradbury and BBC Radio, 1951–1970|url=https://www.researchgate.net/publication/233550915|journal=The Radio Journal: International Studies in Broadcast and Audio Media|language=en|volume=4|issue=1, 2, 3|pages=111–123|doi=10.1386/rajo.4.1,2,3.111_1 |doi-broken-date=July 1, 2025 |hdl=2436/622705|issn=1476-4504|via=[[ResearchGate]]|access-date=November 16, 2021|archive-date=November 16, 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211116080411/https://www.researchgate.net/publication/233550915_A_sympathy_with_sounds_Ray_Bradbury_and_BBC_Radio_1951-1970|url-status=live|hdl-access=free}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|author=Nigel Deacon|title=Ray Bradbury Radio Plays & Readings|url=http://www.suttonelms.org.uk/ray-bradbury.html|url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120613124857/http://www.suttonelms.org.uk/ray-bradbury.html|archive-date=June 13, 2012|access-date=June 7, 2012|website=Diversity Website|publisher=}}</ref><ref>{{cite AV media|url=https://archive.org/details/RayBradbury_Fahrenheit451|title=Ray Bradbury: Fahrenheit 451|date=1982-11-13|last=Bradbury|first=Ray|type=Radio broadcast|publisher=[[BBC Radio 4]]|access-date=2021-11-16|via=[[Internet Archive]]}}</ref> It was broadcast eight more times on [[BBC Radio 4 Extra]], twice each in 2010, 2012, 2013, and 2015.<ref name=":1">{{cite web|title=BBC Radio 4 Extra - Ray Bradbury - Fahrenheit 451|url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00vs0f0|url-status=live|access-date=November 16, 2021|work=[[BBC]]|archive-date=November 16, 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211116053639/https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00vs0f0}}</ref>

BBC Radio's second dramatization, by David Calcutt, was broadcast on BBC Radio 4 in 2003, starring [[Stephen Tomlin]] in the same role.<ref name=":2">{{cite web|date=July 5, 2003|title=The Saturday Play: Fahrenheit 451|url=https://genome.ch.bbc.co.uk/47451189447e4db1b04de21f61c18c44|url-status=dead|access-date=July 23, 2021|work=BBC Programme Index|archive-date=March 11, 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210311183922/https://genome.ch.bbc.co.uk/47451189447e4db1b04de21f61c18c44}}</ref>

===Music===
In 1984 the [[New wave music|new wave]] band ''Scortilla'' released the song Fahrenheit 451 inspired by the book by R. Bradbury and the film by F. Truffaut.

In 2025, one composition on the instrumental concept album ''The Ray Bradbury Chronicles''<ref>{{Cite web |last=The Electricity Club |date=2025-02-03 |title=LEVENTE - The Ray Bradbury Chronicles |url=https://www.electricityclub.co.uk/levente-the-ray-bradbury-chronicles/ |access-date=2025-04-17 |website=ELECTRICITYCLUB.CO.UK |language=en-GB}}</ref> was based on the book, with three sections (City, Escape, Exile) inspired by the key stages of the novel's plotline.

===Computer games===
{{main|Fahrenheit 451 (video game)}}
In 1984, the novel was adapted into a computer [[text adventure]] [[Fahrenheit 451 (video game)|game of the same name]] by the software company [[Telarium|Trillium]],<ref>{{cite journal|title=Fahrenheit 451|journal=Antic's Amiga Plus|volume=5|date=May 1985|page=81|first=Gil|last=Merciez|issue=1}}</ref> serving as a [[sequel]] to the events of the novel, and co-written by Len Neufeld and Bradbury himself.

===Comics===

In June 2009, a [[graphic novel]] edition of the book was published. Entitled ''Ray Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451: The Authorized Adaptation'',<ref>{{cite web|url=http://us.macmillan.com/raybradburysfahrenheit451|title=Macmillan: Ray Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451: The Authorized Adaptation Ray Bradbury, Tim Hamilton: Books|publisher=Us.macmillan.com|access-date=September 21, 2009|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090927223657/http://us.macmillan.com/raybradburysfahrenheit451|archive-date=September 27, 2009|url-status=dead|df=mdy-all}}</ref> the paperback graphic adaptation was illustrated by Tim Hamilton.<ref>{{cite news|last=Neary|first=Lynn|title=Reimagining 'Fahrenheit 451' As A Graphic Novel|newspaper=All Things Considered|date=July 30, 2009|agency=NPR|url=https://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=106929166|access-date=March 17, 2014|archive-date=March 17, 2014|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140317053229/http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=106929166|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|last=Maury|first=Laurel|title=Bradbury Classic In Vivid, 'Necessary' Graphic Form|date=July 30, 2009|work=NPR|url=https://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=111068946|access-date=March 17, 2014|archive-date=March 17, 2014|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140317045324/http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=111068946|url-status=live}}</ref> The introduction in the novel is written by Bradbury himself.<ref>{{cite news|last1=Minzesheimer|first1=Bob|title=Graphic novel of 'Fahrenheit 451' sparks Bradbury's approval|url=https://usatoday30.usatoday.com/life/books/news/2009-08-02-bradbury-fahrenheit-451-graphic-novel_N.htm|access-date=18 December 2017|work=[[USA Today]]|date=2 August 2009|archive-date=October 19, 2015|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20151019135957/http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/life/books/news/2009-08-02-bradbury-fahrenheit-451-graphic-novel_N.htm|url-status=live}}</ref>

==Cultural references==
[[File:Пикетчик 1 (12 августа).jpg|thumb|A protester against the [[Bhagavad Gita As It Is trial|''Bhagavad Gita'' trial]] in Russia showing a quote from the novel: "– Do you ever read any of the books you burn? – That's against the law".]] 
[[Michael Moore]]'s 2004 documentary ''[[Fahrenheit 9/11]]'' refers to Bradbury's novel and the [[September 11 attacks]], emphasized by the film's tagline "The temperature where freedom burns". The film takes a critical look at the presidency of [[George W. Bush]], the [[war on terror]], and its coverage in the news media, and became the highest grossing documentary of all time.<ref name=BoxOfficeMojo>{{cite web|url=https://www.boxofficemojo.com/movies/?id=fahrenheit911.htm|title=Fahrenheit 9/11|work=[[Box Office Mojo]]|access-date=October 2, 2011|archive-date=October 15, 2011|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20111015051845/http://boxofficemojo.com/movies/?id=fahrenheit911.htm|url-status=live}}</ref> Bradbury was upset by what he considered the appropriation of his title, and wanted the film renamed. He really didn't want to be associated in any way.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.nbcnews.com/id/wbna5324876|title="Fahrenheit 451" author wants title back|work=[[Hardball with Chris Matthews]]|publisher=[[NBC News]]|date=June 29, 2004|access-date=April 16, 2020|archive-date=February 24, 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200224054616/http://www.nbcnews.com/id/5324876|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{cite news|url=http://www.msnbc.msn.com/ID/5319756|title=Call it a tale of two 'Fahrenheits'|publisher=[[MSNBC]]|date=June 29, 2004|access-date=August 15, 2016|archive-date=November 5, 2012|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121105125050/http://www.msnbc.msn.com/ID/5319756/|url-status=dead}}</ref> Moore filmed a subsequent documentary about the [[2016 United States presidential election|2016 election of Donald Trump]] called ''[[Fahrenheit 11/9]]'' in 2018, but compared to the earlier documentary, there was a complete shift in interest by the general audience.<ref>{{cite news | last=France | first=Lisa Respers | url=https://www.cnn.com/2017/05/17/entertainment/michael-moore-trump-documentary/index.html | title=Michael Moore's surprise Trump doc: What we know | work=cnn.com | publisher=[[CNN]] | date=May 17, 2017 | access-date=September 5, 2018 | archive-date=March 8, 2021 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210308062849/https://www.cnn.com/2017/05/17/entertainment/michael-moore-trump-documentary/index.html | url-status=live }}</ref>

In 2015, the [[Internet Engineering Steering Group]] approved the publication of ''An HTTP Status Code to Report Legal Obstacles'', now ''<nowiki>RFC 7725</nowiki>'', which specifies that websites forced to block resources for legal reasons should return a [[list of HTTP status codes|status code]] of [[HTTP 451|451]] when users request those resources.<ref>{{cite web|first=Mark|last=Nottingham|title=mnot's blog: Why 451?|work=Mark Nottingham |url=https://www.mnot.net/blog/2015/12/18/451|date=December 21, 2015|access-date=December 21, 2015|archive-date=December 29, 2015|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20151229211231/https://www.mnot.net/blog/2015/12/18/451|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|publisher=[[Internet Engineering Steering Group]]|title=An HTTP Status Code to Report Legal Obstacles|url=https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/draft-ietf-httpbis-legally-restricted-status|date=December 21, 2015|access-date=December 21, 2015|archive-date=February 29, 2016|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160229095657/https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/draft-ietf-httpbis-legally-restricted-status/|url-status=live}}</ref>{{Ref RFC|7725|quote=Thanks also to [[Ray Bradbury]].}}<ref>{{cite web|title=What is Error 451?|url=https://www.451unavailable.org/what-is-error-451|publisher=[[Open Rights Group]]|access-date=December 21, 2015|archive-date=November 17, 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211117115936/https://www.451unavailable.org/what-is-error-451/|url-status=live}}</ref>

Guy Montag (as Gui Montag) is used in the 1998 real-time strategy game ''[[StarCraft (video game)|StarCraft]]'' as a terran firebat hero.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Blizzard Entertainment |title=Starcraft |url=http://ftp.blizzard.com/pub/misc/StarCraft.PDF |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140322075844/http://ftp.blizzard.com/pub/misc/StarCraft.PDF |archive-date=2014-03-22 |url-status=live}}</ref>
<!-- Additions to this list that don't cite a reference, or just say "is mentioned in", will probably get removed. -->

The numbers "451", and sometimes "0451", are often included as the first security code a player encounters in [[immersive sim]] video games as a reference to the ''[[System Shock]]'' series of games which first included the code as their own reference to Bradbury's novel.<ref>{{cite web |last1=LeBlanc |first1=Marc |title=OG System Shock dev plays remake 1 |url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3vL-Zt7Axes&t=20m38s |website=YouTube |date=June 2023 |access-date=18 August 2023}}</ref>

==See also==
* ''[[Brave New World]]''
* [[Burning of books and burying of scholars]]
* [[HTTP 451]]

==Notes==
{{Reflist|group=note}}

==References==
*{{cite journal |last1=Jerrin |first1=Neil Beeto |last2=Bhuvaneswari |first2=G. |title=Distortion of 'Self-Image': Effects of Mental Delirium in Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury |journal=Theory and Practice in Language Studies |date=2022 |volume=12 |issue=8 |pages=1634–1640 |doi=10.17507/tpls.1208.21|doi-access=free }}

{{Reflist|30em}}

==Further reading==

* {{cite journal |last=McGiveron |first=R. O. |year=1996 |title=What 'Carried the Trick'? Mass Exploitation and the Decline of Thought in Ray Bradbury's ''Fahrenheit 451'' |journal=Extrapolation |publisher=Liverpool University Press |issn=0014-5483 |volume=37 |issue=3 |pages=245–256|doi=10.3828/extr.1996.37.3.245 }}
* {{cite journal |last=McGiveron |first=R. O. |year=1996 |title=Bradbury's ''Fahrenheit 451'' |doi=10.1080/00144940.1996.9934107 |journal=Explicator |volume=54 |issue=3 |pages=177–180 |issn=0014-4940}}
* {{cite journal |last=Smolla |first=Rodney A. |author-link=Rodney A. Smolla |date=April 2009 |title=The Life of the Mind and a Life of Meaning: Reflections on ''Fahrenheit 451'' |journal=Michigan Law Review |issn=0026-2234 |volume=107 |pages=895–912 |url=https://repository.law.umich.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1333&context=mlr |format=PDF |issue=6}}

==External links==
*{{Wikiquote-inline|Fahrenheit 451|''Fahrenheit 451''}}
*{{Commons category-inline|Fahrenheit 451|''Fahrenheit 451''}}
*{{ISFDB title|id=1972|title=Fahrenheit 451}}

{{Ray Bradbury}}
{{Retro Hugo Award Best Novel}}
{{Authority control}}

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