Key Facts
full title · Fahrenheit 451
author · Ray Bradbury
type of work · Novel
genre · Science fiction
language · English
time and place written · 1950–1953, Los Angeles, California
date of first publication · 1953 (a shorter version entitled
“The Fireman” published 1951 in Galaxy
Science Fiction)
publisher · Ballantine Books
narrator · Third-person, limited omniscient. Follows Montag's
point of view, often articulating his interior monologues
climax · Montag's murder of Beatty
protagonist · Montag
antagonist · Beatty, but also society in general
setting (time) · Sometime in the twenty-first century; there have been
two atomic wars since 1990
setting (place) · In and around an unspecified city
point of view · Montag's
falling action · Montag's trip out of the city into the country
tense · Past, with occasional transitions into present tense
during Montag's interior monologues and stream-of-consciousness
passages
foreshadowing · Montag's uncanny feelings of prescience; early descriptions
of the Mechanical Hound; Montag's nervous glances toward the ventilator
shaft where he has hidden his books; discussion of the qualities
of fire
tone · Foreboding and menacing, disoriented, poetic, bitterly
satirical
themes · Censorship, knowledge versus ignorance
motifs · Paradoxes, animals and nature, religion, television
and radio
symbols · Fire, blood, the Electric-Eyed Snake, the hearth, the
salamander, the phoenix, the sieve and the sand, Denham's Dentifrice,
the dandelion, mirrors
