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Tiffany Lin
Ms. Rooney
English 10H, Period 3
28 October 2013
A Reflection
In this world, many things that we see are not always what they will be. Let us observe the
phenomenon of two-way glass. On one side, it appears to be a shining, silvery mirror. However, when
viewed from the opposite side, it becomes a secret window into the world on the other side. One
viewpoint is quite superficial, and the other allows more depth to be seen. Much like two-way glass, the
symbol of fire in Ray Bradburys dystopian novel Fahrenheit 451 is viewed through different
perspectives throughout the book. Guy Montag, the protagonist of the story, starts out as a fireman who
finds satisfaction in burning books. As the story progresses, many symbols like the mythical phoenix and
other allusions are used to illustrate various stages of his journey. Fire is one such symbol, and it shifts
from being a destructive force into a renewing one. In this book, fire comes to have a different meaning
throughout Montags quest for knowledge.
At the start of Montags voyage, he knows that fire is a powerful weapon. The first line of the
book states, It was a pleasure to burn (Bradbury 3). It is almost as if burning things gives Montag a
masculine sense of pride. Like Napoleon seeking power to make himself feel less inferior, Montag tries to
make himself feel useful and important by burning books. However, when he meets his new neighbor
Clarisse, she makes him question his initial beliefs on fire and life in general. She asks him the simple
question, Are you happy? (Bradbury 10). These simple words have such a profound effect on Montag
that he begins to wonder if his current life is as pleasant as he is led to believe. The moment Clarisse
raises this question, a whole chain of events occurs as part of Montags adventure. However, at this point

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he is still in the early stages of his transformation. He will need to progress to the second stage of his
journey in which he crosses the threshold to try and find meaning in life.
After Montag begins to doubt his beliefs, he will need a final catalyst that will cause him to take
action. This occurs when Montag realizes that fire extremely destructive. Of course, because of his daily
experiences working with flames, he is familiar with this property of fire, but he is not able to witness the
true extent of his handiwork until he meets a victim of his job. One night he and some other firemen are
assigned to burn house. However, what makes this case so much different than the other ones they had
worked on is the fact that the resident of the house was still inside of her abode. After having her house
completely raided by the firemen, she takes out a match and burns her house down herself (Bradbury 39).
In essence, the woman decided that she would rather die than live a bookless life. This causes Montag to
wonder why exactly she had decided to stay inside of her residence and be killed rather than continue
living life without books. Later, he tells his wife Mildred, There must be something in books, things we
cant imagine, to make a woman stay in a burning house; there must be something there. (Bradbury 51).
At this moment, he begins to thirst for the knowledge that he had previously been destroying. It is at this
point when he finally decides to progress from an environment in which he has endless questions to one
that has a plethora of answers. However, this transition does not occur without challenges.
When Montag begins to speculate what exactly is inside of books, his allegiances to firefighting
begin to be doubted by various sources. This sets off a chain of events that ultimately lead him to burning
his own house. In this part of his journey, Montag is trying to navigate his way through the figurative
wilderness. During this time, he faces many challenges. For example, his supervisor at the fire
department, Captain Beatty, tries to steer Montag away from pursuing the answers to his questions in
books. He proclaims to Montag, What traitors books can be! (Bradbury 107) Nevertheless, Montag
defies Beatty and turns to a retired English professor named Faber to provide him with guidance to
understand his predicament instead. Montag begins to desire awareness through reading books. However,
his wife Mildred is highly cautious of him and eventually turns her own husband in to the fire department.

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During his lowest moment, in which he is entrenched in his personal abyss, Beatty hands him a
flamethrower and tells him to burn his own house. Beatty references an old Greek myth to explain why
Montag is in this dilemma. He tells Montag, Well now you did it. Old Montag wanted to fly near the sun
and now that hes burnt his damn wings, he wonders why (Bradbury 113). Montag has no choice but to
follow the captains instructions. After this task is finished, Beatty begins to belittle Montag for being so
nave. Provoked by Beattys harsh words, Montag lashes out and kills the former fire chief by burning
him. In a way, this is a paradigm of the old adage, What goes around comes around. Nevertheless, this
still has a powerful effect on Montag. Beatty, who was once his friend, has been reduced to nothing more
but a pile of ashes. With the burning of all remnants of his former life, he discarded his old lifestyle in
hopes that he might find a new one worth living. Following the rejection of his old daily life, Montag
begins to flee from the authorities. Since he had just committed two felonies (owning books and murder),
Montag has reason to worry. However, from that moment on, his journey becomes more navigable.
Once Montag begins to run from the crime scene, he begins to enter the second threshold of his
heros journey. During this portion of the story, he begins to realize that fire can have a warming and
renewing aspect to it too. This pursuit takes him far beyond the oppressive city walls. In one scene, he
goes through a sort of baptism that introduces him to a new world. After being chased by the Mechanical
Hound, a robot designed to for hunting and killing fugitives, for quite a while, Montag finds himself in
the river that flows past the immense metropolis. Surrounded by nature, Montag begins to appreciate
beauty in the world around him. For the first time in his whole life, he is able to see the world in a clear
light. Incidentally, he is reminded of Clarisse, his neighbor whose name is derived from the Latin word
clarus, which means clarity. Somehow, he is sure that, once, long ago, Clarisse had walked here, where
he was walking now (Bradbury 145). Montag continues to journey on and meets a group of homeless
intellectuals living in the forest. The first time he sees them, he notices how gentle their campfire is, how
renewing fire could be. It was not burning. It was warming (Bradbury 145).As he spends more time
with these men, he learns new ways to think about life. For example, Montag learns about the legend of

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the phoenix, a mythical bird that regenerates itself in fire. This allusion shows how fire can symbolize
rebirth instead of destruction. When the book finally ends, Montag begins to understand the ties that bind
humanity together. Society functions because people make informed decisions, and without that it will
deteriorate into nothing. The intellectuals are set on rebuilding the city and helping others resolve their
problems. He realizes that things once important to him in the past can hold a different meaning in the
future.
In conclusion, the meaning of fire changes to Montag throughout the book. At first, he believes
fire is extremely destructive and despises all things associated with it. However, through various
encounters, he comes to realize that it can have a different function in different situations. With his
transitions through the various stages of the heros journey, Montag changes not only his attitude but also
his character. When one goes through such a cycle, one will often experience different situations that
might be new or foreign. It is how one reacts to these encounters through which a persons character
develops. Evidently, Montag has let his own experiences change his ideals and emerged as a better
person. For him, fire has changed from a negative force to a restorative one. When Montag acquires this
point of view, it is almost as if he has changed from looking at himself in front of a mirror to looking at
the world from an outside point of view. Attainment of knowledge is one of the key human experiences,
and to go through such a journey to obtain it definitely changes ones moral fiber.