In addition to its theme, an initial element in Fahrenheit 451 to discuss is the main characters. At the start of the novel, Guy Montag enjoys destroying mankind’s history. The class needs to feel outraged by his mindlessly burning the literature of the ages. However, his satisfaction with his work is a façade he’s adopted all his life. He meets a seventeen-year-old who makes him realize that he is, in fact, deeply unhappy. Clarisse McClellan represents what teachers dream about—a student who has something that can rarely be taught—intellectual curiosity. Bradbury implicitly contrasts the beautiful simplicity of Clarisse’s life with the ugliness of Montag’s world. In sharp contrast, Mildred, like others in Bradbury’s world, is alienated from all that’s good and meaningful. She can only fill her life with distractions that prevent her from facing the sterility of her existence. The fire chief, Captain Beatty, is the novel’s educated but satanic antagonist. The class should understand that Beatty’s comments about books and happiness are full of distortions and falsehoods. The job of the Mechanical Hound, modeled on Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s Baskerville hound, is to pursue and kill its prey—nonconformists who resist the state. It’s the tool of a totalitarian government that wields complete control over citizens of the state.

A version of pseudo-education prevails in Bradbury’s fictional world. The fruit of this non-education—a mere regurgitation of facts—is predictable. Many teenagers don’t talk about important issues and routinely commit violent acts. These young people haven’t been taught to adopt moral behavior or to enjoy what is true and meaningful. During an interview included in the fiftieth anniversary edition of the novel, Bradbury talks about his own education in the 1920s. All students were proficient readers and writers by the end of first grade. One is reminded of America’s founding fathers who were proficient in reading, writing, and arithmetic before they started school. Bradbury’s book reverses this model. From childhood, the young people of Fahrenheit 451 are manipulated by the state via an impoverished education system.

At this point, students should note the epigraph by Spanish poet Juan Ramón Jiménez that exhorts the reader to resist conformity. Why are books in Bradbury’s society destroyed? Beatty assures Montag of the false notion that books promote conflict and unhappiness. Thus, ridding the world of books ensures conformity and happiness; people becomes equal to everyone else. They are not of course. Some people have more wealth, more intelligence, more attractiveness than others. But because everyone in Bradbury’s world must be reduced to the lowest common denominator, people are taught not to question but to accept the status quo. In order to train people to become robots, books must be eradicated. History is rewritten to enforce compliance. It is, of course, essential that young people recognize these false precepts and that they understand the inestimable value of books. Books contain ideas that cause us all to reflect and to grow intellectually. Non-readers, on the other hand, can more easily be brainwashed into believing anything they are told; if such brainwashing occurs, these impoverished people remain robots who mindlessly obey the laws of the state. C. S. Lewis brilliantly distinguishes between readers and non-readers in his seminal essay “The Few and the Many” included in An Experiment in Criticism. It’s a good idea to display a list of the contrasts Lewis makes between readers and non-readers for students to stare at all year long.

This explanation of Bradbury’s world is crucial for students to grasp—or begin to grasp. The focus of much education today is to teach conformity.  Conformity is the mindset of contemporary America; differences among people—intelligence, financial circumstances, sexual orientation —are becoming blurred. We are told that we should share the wealth, take from the rich and give to the poor, decide on our preferred sexual identity. Politicians talk of income equality as a goal for American society. In fact, people are indeed created equal in the eyes of God, but all people are not equal in terms of ability, advantages, opportunities, and so on. The concept of wealth sharing is a socialist principle that has been endorsed and adopted by many of today’s politicians and educators.

I am reminded of Alan Bloom’s opening thoughts in his analysis of contemporary culture that was published some thirty years ago. In his classic work The Closing of the American Mind, Bloom argues that the crisis of the twentieth century in America is an intellectual crisis. Students, says Bloom, are being taught to fear intolerance and to espouse the virtue of openness. Bloom points out that they cannot defend this mindset because they have been trained to simply adopt it. He goes on to say that rather than being trained in rigorous academics, students are indoctrinated with the social propaganda of toleration. They are ignorant about the past. They cannot engage in rational debate but merely cite their opinions as proof of any argument. How much more relevant is Bloom’s warning today. Like Bradbury’s characters, we live in an age devoted to instant gratification and tolerance for all lifestyles, all worldviews. Remove books from a society, take away people’s ability to think, suppress their nurturing instincts and all that makes life meaningful, and people will be reduced to mindless robots. Bradbury’s totalitarian state keeps people content by urging them to buy four walls of mindless television and discouraging conversation. That’s why houses in Bradbury’s world have no porches or rocking chairs.