With each post today, provide evidence or context for your thinking with a quote or a plot point. Here are a couple examples.
Zach wrote:
When Hazel says,
"That's all right, he tried. That's the big thing. He tried to do the best
he could with what God gave him. He should get a nice raise for trying so
hard." do you wish the world was like that? I personally think it is
rediculous that he should be rewarded for trying. He needs to earn his raise
And Austin posted:
"The year was
2081, and everyone was finally equal."
-Kurt Vonnegut
Is this showing that Vonnegut sees it as good the everyone is equal?
Would you be happy if it was 2081 and you were equal to everyone?
-Kurt Vonnegut
Is this showing that Vonnegut sees it as good the everyone is equal?
Would you be happy if it was 2081 and you were equal to everyone?
Blake brings up a good point that on page 3, Guy made up this ghost figure named Clarisse. The more I think about this theory, the more it makes sense. Why would a girl be alone at 3 am in the first place, and furthermore, why would she gladly befriend a stranger?
ReplyDeleteShe is from a different era where communicating face to face was normal. Her family was one of the last ones left and opened Montag's mind up to think for himself.
DeleteI think there is a possibility that she is a figment of his imagination. On page 7, she asks him, "Are you happy". the following passages he questions his answer to the question. Perhaps she is some sort of inner mind, making him think inner thoughts he may not normally have, through a fake human being to talk it out with.
DeleteAlso on page 3 he says "letting the motion of the wind and the leaves carry her forward." It sounds like a Pocahontas thing where the wind is carrying the spirits that are believed to be there.
DeleteI think Clarissa wanted to become friends with Montag because he was a firemen. On page 5 "Do you mind if I ask? How long've have you worked at being a firemen." Clarissa stated how she said that most people are afraid of firemen and to see that she is not afraid of them. Yet at the same time she was carious of how they went from putting out fire and now starting fire on page 5.
DeleteDo you guys think that we are comfortable with the things we do with our lives until they are a questioned by others?
ReplyDeleteWords to live by
DeleteI think it depends on the type of person you are, some people aren't out to impress anyone but they just want to do whatever they wanna do with their life
DeleteYes, we are comfortable in our lives until people make an opinion. Society cares about others thoughts and how things look in other peoples eyes.
DeleteYes. Nobody considers something abnormal, or weird, until somebody points it out to you. It is where we get our rules and laws. Someone must question an action, before persecuting someone for it. This is much like how our main character is questioned about his happiness on Pg 7, and his following thoughts about it.
DeleteI think we are comfortable with the things in our life until they are questioned by others because we think that what we are doing right but from another persons point of view it could look different or wrong
DeleteDefinitely. If there isn't a societal issue with what we are doing, then we don't question the morality or normality of it. This is especially apparent on pg. 2 when Montag talks about how he "might wink at himself". He is proud about setting the books on fire because that is what he has always been told to do, and he was never questioned for it. However, we would never do anything like that today because everyone would think that we were psychopaths for destroying precious books.
DeleteHe also assumed that he was happy until Clarisse asked him if he actually was, and that was the first time he actually considered the fact that maybe he wasn't contempt with his life. It often times takes others to magnify what we are too blind to notice ourselves.
On page 6 the second to last paragraph, why do you think everything is a blur?
ReplyDeleteWhen it says "If you showed a driver a green blur, oh yes! He's say that's grass!" I think she compares the racers to real life and how sometimes you have to slow down to recognize the little things in life. The drivers symbolize everyone in the world who doesn't appreciate the little things in life which, sometimes, have the most significant meaning.
DeleteIn that section of the page they are talking about the "jet cars" as Clarisse says two paragraphs above and then she says later that her uncle drove 40 mph on a highway one and he got jailed for two days. I think this means that the blurs were the cars, and that they have to go fast, maybe because in this futuristic society everyone is in a hurry, even more than we are now.
DeleteMy favorite quote from this text section was, “She was like an eager watcher of a marionette show…” pg. 9
ReplyDeleteThe reason I love this quote so much is because she truly is like a person who is viewing a puppet show. She is watching Montag, who is simply just doing as he is told by the government. He doesn't realize the absurdity of his job, because he figures that what ever the government is telling him to do is right. The society to her is a marionette show, and I think she is one of the few who is self-conscious enough to be part of the audience.
I think this is a great analysis of the quote, and I believe it can be applied even further. Montags questioning of his actions and happiness is sort of like a puppet coming to life, and breaking from his strings. Perhaps he will find newfound freedom when/if he "breaks away" later in the book.
DeleteThe beginning of the book focuses on Guys job as a fireman and his home life. Do you think this helps the reader relate to the book?
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteOn page 9, Guy thinks to himself "He was not happy. He was not happy. He said the words to himself." Why do you think he is not happy and how do you think he will attempt to fix this?
ReplyDeleteBlake's thought of, could Clarisse be a ghost is a really good one? Because of Guy's job does this require him to have two personalities? His firemen job drags him down, so does he have to create this happy little girl in his mind to keep him from being depressed so much?
ReplyDeleteThat's an interesting point that you make, because that could be exactly what the girl could represent. I definitely agree.
DeleteZack, that's definitely a possibility. That's kind of what I was thinking. Its kind of like an alter ego to get away from his day job
DeleteAlso, I think that she could represent everything that he is burning, happiness, creativity, individuality, and going against the crowd. It says on page 14 in the first paragraph that nobody knows each other because strangers bring nothing good, but Clarisse disregards that completely and just walks right up to Guy, like nobody else in this society would
DeleteOn page 4-7 Guy talks to Clarisse. I wonder how Clarisse is important to the story and what her significance is.
ReplyDeleteI think that Clarisse is important to the story because she helps teach Guy the potential beauty in the world like on page 5 she says " I like to smell things and look at things, and sometimes stay up all night, walking, and watch the sun rise."
Deleteolder people tend to forget, mildrid is around 50-60, she could've forgotten that she took the pills.
ReplyDeleteI don't think there is any evidence to suggest that she is old. I actually believe that she might be around 30, since her husband is that age and people tend to marry people they are close in age to. I think that she forgot about her suicide attempt not only because of the operation, but also because she avoiding confronting her life, which is evident in her religious TV watching.
DeleteOn page 5, Clarisse describes herself as "seventeen and crazy". What do you think made her crazy? What type of crazy do you think she means?
ReplyDeleteThat is what her uncle wants her to say whenever anybody asks. "Seventeen and insane".
DeleteI think her uncle told her to say this so that it would seem more normal for her to just go up and talk to random strangers, because "normal"people in this society would never do that.
DeleteI believe that on page 7 when Clarisse tells Montag that there is dew on grass in the morning the fact that he is surprised puts emphasis on how we are constantly loosing sight of things in the real world due to our lack of interest in reading and our growing interest in television. This growing interest in television is being exaggerated on page 18 when Mildered is asking about how she wants a 4th tv wall put in.
ReplyDeleteI have a theory that Clarisse might not only be a figment of Guy's imagination, but maybe, because Bradbury loves to make metaphors, she might be a metaphor of what will happen later in the story. Not the plot itself, but how Guy's thoughts on what he does as a fireman change throughout the book.
ReplyDeleteI agree with your theory Bradbury has a lot of these connections.
Deleteon page 6, "he drove forty miles an hour and they jailed him for two days" Do you think that she is trying to compare his driving to society and how now-a-days it is a sin to notice the little things and everyone worries about the big picture a little too much?
ReplyDeleteTo answer Haley's question of why do firemen start fires now when they used to put them out? I think that they burn books now because books are a way to learn about the past. I think this futuristic world leaders do not want people to learn about the past and how the world used to be.
ReplyDeleteDo you think that in this story the world leaders are afraid of the past?
Deletei definitely agree with that.
DeleteI like Haley's question of "how have fire fighters changed from now to then with the idea of putting out fires to starting fires" i'm actually clueless on this but i would like to hear some other thoughts
ReplyDeleteLike Clarissa said, on page 6, she brought up the idea that she thought fire fighters use to "put out" the fires. But Montag simply replied that houses have always been fire proof and that fire fighters never use to put out fires.
DeleteAs Casey brought up "Harrison Bergeron" in relation to Clarrise, It made me wonder, DO you think she will be the start to a rebellion because she does not fit into the norms of the society in the book?
ReplyDeleteI wonder how one would grow up to take the job of fireman. Would Guy's childhood lead him to want to be a fireman? Can we get clues about his childhood from the way he sees things today?
ReplyDeleteIn the first paragraph on page one, Guy is describing the joy he feels at burning the books, I think this could be a good indication that he has fantasized of this job all his life and he still enjoys it to this day so this must have been something that he wanted.
DeleteHow do you think Guy gets along with the other firemen? Even with a little girl, Clarisse, he can barely hold a conversation. Are all of the firemen as disturbed as he is?
ReplyDeleteI think this novel, so far, will try to explain to us how being sheltered from reading and more engaged in tv we will eventually get a society more similar to this one. I think that Clarisse and her family enjoy to read books, talk, and go out into the world. Clairisse and her family definitely seem to have a greater sense of happiness based on their laughing and the symbol of the light in their home. This shows how our society, constantly becoming more immersed in technology, is making us more and more incapable of seeing these great things in our life that Clarisse can see.
ReplyDeleteOn page 8 "The girl's face was there, really quite beautiful in memory:..but moving also toward a new sun." In this paragraph, Guy describes Clarisse as a clock and I think it symbolizes the fact that they meet because of timing and I think something big is going to happen soon where she will be there when the timing is right.
ReplyDeleteYes, on page 5 Montag has been a firemen for 10 years already and used being a firemen everyday and to see when he met Clarissa he just answers her question really quick and to see that one day she just asked so much question making Montag think about his life. When he came home on Page 8 thinking to himself weather he was really happy or not.
ReplyDeleteOn page 13 the operator says, "we get these cases 9 or 10 a night." What do you think this demonstrates about the level of education of the people? Is this related to their lack of reading?
ReplyDelete