Fahrenheit 451

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Fahrenheit 451 is a dystopian novel by Ray Bradbury , which was first published in 1953 by Ballantine Books (now Random House ) and has since been translated into numerous languages. It is based on Bradbury's novella The Fire Man , which appeared in Galaxy Science Fiction (Vol. 1, No. 5, Feb. 1951). The title of the novel refers to the here assumed (see below ) autoignition temperature of paper at 451 ° F , which 233 ° C corresponds. The first German-language translation comes from Fritz Güttinger and appeared for the first time in 1955 under the title Fahrenheit 451. Novel by Arche Verlag in Zurich . Thematic precursors were Bradbury's short stories The Exiles (1949) and Ascher II (1950).

action

Fahrenheit 451 is set in a state where owning or reading books is considered a serious crime . Society is kept anonymous and underage dependent on the political system. Drugs and video walls do not allow boredom to arise. Independent thinking is considered dangerous because it leads to antisocial behavior and thus destabilizes society. Books are considered to be the main reason for thinking and acting not in line with the system.

The fire department is responsible for tracking down and destroying the books . The books are burned on the spot. Mechanical sniffer dogs help track down and hunt down book owners and public enemies who are captured or killed. Fire department helmets and uniforms have the number 451 , the Fahrenheit temperature (adopted by Bradbury) at which paper catches fire and books ignite. The uniforms also have a salamander on their right shoulder, an animal that is said in legends to live in fire.

The protagonist of the novel is the 30-year-old firefighter Guy Montag, who at first seems to work without criticism in this system, but secretly hides some stolen books in his house. Through Clarisse, who is almost 17 years old, he learns the art of words, the value of free thought and the beauty of nature. Clarisse asks him if he is happy. When his wife Mildred almost dies of an alleged accidental overdose of sleeping pills and tranquilizers, Montag begins to think more intensively about Clarisse's question and becomes doubtful. He also notices that there is hardly any media coverage of the war in which his country is currently involved.

On one of his next missions, an old woman chooses to commit suicide by having herself burned with her books. She would rather die than bow to the pressures of the system. Traumatized, Monday stays away from work the following day. His superior, Captain Beatty, visits him and instructs him on the origins of the prevailing conditions: The rejection of literature, culture and independent thinking was not imposed by the government, but took place gradually through social changes that occurred after the general level was leveled and state censorship aimed at ensuring that all citizens are intellectually equal and that no minority feels discriminated against. Beatty claims to have read books himself, but reading them has not given him anything useful.

Montag wants to experience books himself and persuades his wife to read with him. Mildred reacts dismissively, because she feels disturbed in her usual activity of watching TV for hours. In this situation Montag realizes that he needs help and is looking for a mentor in the retired literature professor Faber, who has still seen how the cultural studies departments in the universities are closed. Monday disregarded Faber's warning to behave inconspicuously and reads Mildred and her friends the poem Dover Beach by Matthew Arnold ago. He is then denounced by his wife to his superior Beatty. As a punishment, Montag has to light his own house with the books with his flamethrower . When Beatty also threatens to arrest Faber, Montag turns the flamethrower on his superior and kills him. With Faber's help, Montag managed to escape through the river into the woods outside the city. There he joins a group of dissidents who, hushed up by the media, live in the woods outside the city and remember books they have read in order to save them from being forgotten.

During the war, the city where Montag used to live is almost completely destroyed by an air raid. After the destruction, the dissidents make their way back to the city in the hope of a new beginning with the survivors.

Society

Society is not described in detail in the novel, but the political leadership is obviously acting in an authoritarian manner and human needs are suppressed in order to secure rule. The goal of government action is to keep the population busy with simple means to prevent individuation and the resulting threats to the system. This is achieved, for example, with television shows that can be seen on video screens in the living room at home and in which viewers can participate, but also with large amusement parks . Due to the constant media exposure from radio and television, many people are forced to take sleeping pills in order to be able to sleep at all.

In addition, the company is very aggressive. Social pressures lead people, especially the youth, to view murder as fun. For example, chasing other citizens in traffic becomes an everyday pleasure. Monday's escape is also televised and ends with the death of an innocent, which is reported on Monday. The young people are also underutilized because of the school and so the “amusement parks” are more intended to regulate aggression. Additional prohibitions - e.g. B. Driving too slowly - can bring a free spirit into custody.

Independent thinking is an absolute taboo in this society. The general view is that it only leads to people becoming antisocial and unbalancing the whole of society. In order to avoid precisely this independent thinking, society is entertained nonstop.

Books, such as novels, biographies and poems, are seen as the main enemy of society because they arouse feelings in people and can put them in a sad state. Books are therefore searched for and burned by the “fire brigade”.

The "fire brigade" in this dystopia is not there to put out fires, but to start fire. It can be seen as a second state power alongside the police. People who own and read books are enemies of the state who are persecuted. Their houses and libraries are set on fire by firefighters, and dead people are also accepted. In the German translation, an ambiguity of the original text is lost: The word for firefighter used in the original is not Fire-Fighter , but Fireman , which literally translated simply means Feuermann and could literally be interpreted as an arsonist.

However, this constitution of society was not brought about by the ruling, totalitarian government. Rather, people have put themselves into this situation through their increasing media consumption, particularly through television.

The common opinion that the novel warns of a totalitarian state that tries to secure its power through repression and censorship does not agree with statements from Bradbury. According to an article about Bradbury that appeared in LA Weekly on May 30, 2007 , he said his original intention was to warn of television destroying interest in books. There are still - apparently free - elections in the society of the novel (in which mainly the attractiveness of the candidates is decisive), and the ban on books was not invented by the government but was enacted at the request of the people.

Movies

François Truffaut filmed Fahrenheit 451 in 1966 . Oskar Werner plays the main role of the firefighter . Monday's wife and Clarisse are played in a dual role by Julie Christie .

The story differs slightly from the novel: Monday's wife is called Mildred in the novel, but Linda in the film. In the novel, Clarisse is a 17-year-old girl who dies in the course of the plot. In the film, however, Clarisse is older and works as a teacher who eventually loses her job and has to flee. Also missing in the film is the role of the old man Faber, a former scientist who is on the side of the secret “book movement” (in the film: book people) and who gives Monday valuable information on fleeing the city (only through him could Monday the last second mechanical dog escape). In the film, Montag learns about the book people from Clarisse and how he can find his way to them.

The war from the second half of the book, which ultimately leads to the complete destruction of the city by a nuclear explosion, is only mentioned in passing in the film. The robot dog chasing the fleeing Monday is not featured. The ban on books is extended to include a ban on anything written (in books, popular magazines, television, etc., but also specialist literature for professions and sciences that can be used in practice, can certainly use writing).

The content of the film Equilibrium (2002) with Christian Bale in the leading role is strongly based on the book. Feeling emotions is considered a serious crime in film. The emotions themselves are suppressed with the help of drugs. The main character belongs to the group of Grammaton clerics , whose job it is to destroy all objects that can provoke emotions, especially works of art. In the course of the plot, the main character also comes into contact with emotions and has to flee underground.

The film The Book of Eli (2010) with Denzel Washington is also based on the story. In the film all editions of the Bible are destroyed after a war because they are considered dangerous. It is only thanks to the main character's memorization that it can ultimately be saved for posterity.

In 2018, an American television adaptation was made under the title Fahrenheit 451 and directed by Ramin Bahrani with Michael B. Jordan , Michael Shannon and Sofia Boutella in the leading roles.

Radio plays

In 1970 the WDR produced a five-part radio play that was based on the novel. Under the direction of Günther Sauer spoke among others:

In 1994 the MDR produced a radio play version of the Leipzig Authors' Syndicate ( Steffen Birnbaum , Christian Hussel and Wolfgang Zander ), directed by Holger Rink .

theatre

The British theater group "American Drama Group Europe" brought the book to the stage. The piece is played by four people who each play different roles. The set is very modern, there are only a few square cupboards that function as beds and chairs. There is a lot of work with music and light effects.

Ray Bradbury himself wrote a theatrical version of the novel.

In 2010, the Theater der Jugend in Munich, directed by Gil Mehmert and the rock band Bananafishbones, developed a musical theater piece of the same name based on the Bradbury play. The stage design of the play consists largely of interactive comic projections.

additional

  • In an afterword from 1979 Bradbury points out that his work has been "adapted to the zeitgeist" by the publisher through small changes. In the last edition published (before this year) there were 75 deviations from the first edition, whereby neither he as the author was asked nor the reader was made aware of the passages; and that with a book that deals with censorship.
  • Bradbury wrote the first version of the novel, The Fire Man , on a coin operated typewriter in 1950 in the basement of the University of California Library in Los Angeles. He put 10-cent pieces in the typewriter and wrote against the time running out. In total, the first version cost him $ 9.80, writes Bradbury in the afterword of a later edition. This corresponds to a current purchasing power of around 94 US dollars (2020).
  • In the afterword of a later edition, Bradbury mentions that he subconsciously put the names of two people in relation to the subject of books and literature: Montag is an American paper manufacturer and Faber a German pencil manufacturer.
  • The fire department in this science-fiction novel does not have to delete the task, the fire, but with fire ERS dangers defense s. In the English-language original version, the firemen and the fire brigade now have a task that corresponds to their literal designation.
  • Michael Moore , an American director , chose the title of his film Fahrenheit 9/11 based on Ray Bradbury's work. Fahrenheit 9/11, according to Moore, is "The temperature where freedom burns" (the temperature at which freedom catches fire). However, this happened against Bradbury's will. This said in an interview: “Michael Moore is a stupid bastard. That's how I feel about him. He stole my title and changed the numbers without ever asking my permission. "
  • In 1984 a computer game of the same name was implemented in the form of a text adventure for the Commodore 64 and other home computers.
  • Gary Dexter suggests the alternative title "Fahrenheit 843: The Approximate Temperature at which Rayon Fiber Untreated with N-methyl-dimethyl-phosphonopropionamide Catches Fire, and Burns" in his blog - probably with a twinkle in his eye - because he suspects that Bradbury is the auto-ignition temperature von Papier from the Handbook of Physical Testing of Paper (Jens Borch). The auto-ignition temperature for paper made from viscose fibers is given there as 450 ° C. When choosing his title, Bradbury confused Celsius with Fahrenheit. However, books are usually not printed on viscose.
  • In StarCraft , a real-time strategy game from Blizzard Entertainment , a “hero” or “elite” unit of the Terrans has been named after the hero of the novel (Guy Montag). Significantly, this is an infantry unit equipped with flamethrowers.
  • The German death metal band Burial Vault released a concept album in 2013 called Incendium, which is based on the novel.
  • The HTTP status code 451 for censorship, decided in 2015, is an allusion to the novel.

expenditure

comics

  • Tim Hamilton (illustrator); Fritz Güttinger (translator): Fahrenheit 451. Graphic Novel .
    • Review: Georg Seeßlen : Playing with fire. Isn't a comic version of "Fahrenheit 451", the novel about the disappearance of texts and the victory of images, a fulfillment of one's own dystopia? Konkret 6, 2010, p. 49
  • Fahrenheit 451st Graphic Novel , Eichborn, Frankfurt 2010 ISBN 3-8218-6106-1 (small format)
  • In a Donald Duck comic Funny paperback volume 243: Hot days in Africa , the story was taken up under the name "Celsius 154". However, this is about music that the President (played by Dagobert Duck ) has banned. Donald as a firefighter should destroy them.

literature

  • Susanne Juretko: Don Quixote in the media world. The human being as a metaphorical medium of the media. European University Press , Bochum 2005, ISBN 3-932329-22-8 (= film and television , volume 1, a comparative analysis of books and films, also a dissertation at the University of Bochum 2002).
  • Martin Kohn: Ray Bradbury: "Fahrenheit 451." 4th edition, Bange, Hollfeld 2009, ISBN 978-3-8044-1837-0 (= King's Explanations & Materials 450).
  • Piers HG Stephens: Nature, liberty and dystopia: on the moral significance of nature for human freedom , Routledge, London 2018, ISBN 0415385067 .
  • Dieter Ulm: Ray Bradbury, Fahrenheit 451: Interpretation , Stark, Hallbergmoos 2018, ISBN 9783849032913 .
  • Stefanie Zech: Warning of the overpowering state: the destruction of language and literature in Orwell's “Nineteen eighty-four” and Bradbury's “Fahrenheit 451” , Förderkreis Phantastik in Wetzlar, Wetzlar 1995.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ http://www.laweekly.com/2007-05-31/news/ray-bradbury-fahrenheit-451-misinterpreted
  2. ↑ So Captain Beatty: "It didn't come from above, from the government."
  3. ↑ www.schauburg.net ( Memento of the original from November 9, 2010 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. SCHAUBURG, Theater of Youth, Munich  @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.schauburg.net
  4. ^ Afterword to: Ray Bradbury, Fahrenheit 451, Del Rey Books (Ballantine), 1995, ISBN 978-0-345-34296-6 , pp. 167/168
  5. ↑ FAZ online message ”
  6. ^ Gary Dexter, How Books Got their Titles: 76. Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury. In: blogspot.com. May 13, 2009, accessed September 8, 2019 .
  7. ↑ http://www.augsburger-allgemeine.de/digital/Neue-Fehlermeldung-im-Internet-Dafuer-haben-Error-451-id36411652.html
  8. ↑ several example pages on Amazon
  9. ↑ Ehapa Verlag, PDF ( Memento from April 19, 2009 in the Internet Archive ) ”, literary quotations from Ehapa Verlag, Volume 243