Fahrenheit 451

Use these questions or activities to help gauge students’ familiarity with and spark their interest in the context of the work, giving them an entry point into the text itself.

Short Answer

1. How do you think people 50-75 years ago would feel if they were suddenly dropped into our world? What would shock them about our technology and entertainment?

Teaching Suggestion: To help students understand the strange world of Fahrenheit 451, explain how people in the 1950s had a lot of hesitancy about technology. Bradbury’s predictions about TV screens covering all four walls of a room or sea shells playing audio into someone’s ears as they fall asleep might have seemed ludicrous at the time, but the ideas were nevertheless recognizable as extrapolations of 1950s fears and attitudes about the era’s technological innovations and trends. Understanding this context helps us better understand where Bradbury was coming from in imagining a technology-obsessed future.

• The educational website 20th Century History Song Book includes a brief essay explaining the mass consumption of television in midcentury America and why many feared for the future of American culture.
• This ScreenRant article identifies various ways in which predictions in the 1985 movie Back to the Future II about what would happen in 25 years turned out to be wrong. Students will get a kick out of seeing some of the technology that the filmmakers thought was possible. The article should help students appreciate that sci-fi and dystopian literature don’t necessarily attempt to foretell the future so much as they imagine and warn against certain possibilities.

2. Do you think that mid-century fears about television and technology were justified? In what ways have media and social media impacted our society for good? In what ways has the effect been negative?

Teaching Suggestion: Students can reflect on the personal and larger societal impacts of social media and technology. Technology has created beautiful works of art, made communication easy, and given access to important resources. It has also enabled addiction, social competitiveness, and bullying.

• This Psychology Today article explores how the internet has further exacerbated some of the issues that people were concerned about as far back as the 1950s.  

Short Activity

Ray Bradbury was inspired to write Fahrenheit 451 by his experience of living in a society where books were being banned and there was mass censorship occurring during what is now called “The Red Scare.”

• In groups of two, research a book that has been or is currently banned.
• Why was/is the book banned?
• Share your findings with the class.
• With each book, discuss whether or not the reason for banning the book is justified.

Teaching Suggestion: You can create a list of books that have been banned and assign them to students in groups or to individuals. Students might report their findings in response to a short questionnaire, either on paper or on a computer (using Google Forms or a similar tool). 

• This New York Times article explores why book banning is growing across the United States in 2022.
• This Publishers Weekly article explores the history of book banning.

Personal Connection Prompt

This prompt can be used for in-class discussion, exploratory free-writing, or reflection homework before reading the novel.

What makes you feel the most connected to others? When do you feel the loneliest? What about books and literature helps us to connect to others?

Teaching Suggestion: Fahrenheit 451 depicts a society that is so obsessed with television that people are not connected to one another. Entertainment, however, doesn’t always have to cause disconnection. Often we can have empathy for characters or feel empathy for our own experiences. As a class, students might contribute examples to a list or chart that show how entertainment can be isolating and how it can create connection.