hi everyone so I would rather not annoy
you with a disclaimer and I just want to
get straight to what we came for.
now this is, I would say, a review on
Fahrenheit 451 but the thing of
course is that I really didn't like this
book and so this is a pretty negative
review, in which case a lot of you might
consider it a rant review and therefore
I didn't word it as a review in the
title because most of these is... this
video is pretty much the reasons why I
dislike this book so much not only do I
disagree with this book in a way but I
also think that even as a story it's
just not told well. I know that a lot of
people had to read this in high school. I
didn't have to read it in high school
but I did read it in high school for the
first time when I was 16 and I didn't
really care for it but I just kind of
forgot about it.
And recently I re-read this book and I
disliked it even more pretty much. so 5
points and each point is either no star,
half a star, or a full star. And first
point - the first point is writing style
and to this I do give a half
star. A lot of people think that the writing
style is especially good in this book. I
do have to disagree although I do think
that it is kind of the better aspect of
the book. Most of it is either like lazy
bland explanation, not really description
but just straight-up explanation-  or it is
so flowery that you really have to
struggle to understand what even is
going on in the first place, by which I
mean you kinda have to force yourself to
picture things like a character's
expression or their surroundings and
stuff like that because it's you know he
gives you flowery descriptions of them
but you don't really quite get it
because it's just like a clever quirky
way of writing and not really so much
giving you a good image of what's going, a vivid image I think. And like I said
the rest of it is really dull and bland
and it explains things
like saying "smiling furiously" or
"asking insanely". I mean I don't
think that's impossible to do but how
does that happen? how do you... how would
you describe the way a person asks
insanely or smiles furiously?
because that's the work that
the writer is supposed to do for you, you
know paint the picture for you so that
you can interpret it. If they - if the
writer interprets the --- you know, obviously
that's this is a matter of taste and all
but this is my taste and I just
think that it does not make a lot of
sense for the
writer to interpret everything for you
because then why are you even reading it?
reason why it's actually just half a
star is because I found a couple parts
that I thought were very nicely written
and I liked them a lot.
I'm trying to find one right now there's
this one in page 117. The narrator says
"Now, sucking all the night into
his open mouth and blowing it out pale
with all the blackness left heavily
inside himself he set out in
a steady jogging pace. He carried the
books in his hands" I think it's very
clever sucking all the night your open
mouth and blowing it out pale you
know your breath is white but you suck
in the night - is really the air of
the night but I think that was very nice,
one of the few highlights of this book
in terms of writing style. Now for plot
and world building which I will also add
on this point. I give it no star. The
characters at times - especially the main
character Guy Montag - he makes kind of
senseless decisions. Mostly talking about
the part where I mean this is kind of a
spoiler but I'm being very vague about it
- when he is reading
poetry to these women and all that.
that's pretty much just something that
serves to advance the plot but it makes
no sense for him to do it there's no
explanation or justification for it
other than ''he didn't know what he was
doing'' or ''he was just really being
impulsive'' or whatever. Same with him and Fable
wanting to see whether Beatty
was on their side even though he had
been hostile to him to the main
character before that, and that put their
plan at risk so it was again kind of a
senseless decision. And generally making the other
firemen suspicious of him from the
beginning for a really no reason at all
was - which I felt
like he was almost like deliberately
making them suspicious at times and it felt
kind of lazy in terms of storyline
because it just didn't feel like
something that the character would
naturally do. To me the world just makes no
sense I'm going to be honest here it's
not like I wanted to be realistic
obviously I understand that this is
science fiction but why is it - why is
anything happening here? I mean maybe in
the fifties things were actually very
very different from what they're now I mean in
this aspect, which I doubt in this
particular case that they were that
different because I mean in the history
of humanity 60, 70 years is not even that
much. Yes things have changed a lot but
people tend to respect readers a lot and
reading is something that people do very
much associated with being intelligent
being smart. Readers and people who read
a lot of books are very useful in
different ways to society, even in
capitalism and so on. so it's - there's
just really no way to connect this whole
thing of wanting to burn books and not
wanting anyone to read books and.. the
world working in the first place.
People have all these inventions for
example so many inventions that
pretty much, again, just serve to advance
the plot... so many of these inventions, how
could they have happened in a world
where people don't read books or at
least are very limited in their freedom
to read books. That just doesn't really
make a lot of sense and that was not
really something that was explored at
all in this novel. I mean what's the
logic in this world? who even benefits
from burning books? I know that at some
point a character explains that people
don't like
being challenged and thinking deeply and
so on but.. who benefits from banning
books? I mean yes I know that in the
story it is meant to be kind of a
democratic decision but it still doesn't
quite feel like something that would
ever happen it feels so far-fetched
nothing in the world building makes it
our all believable or scary as dystopia
usually is supposed to be. And if books
were being burned because the population
themselves didn't want books, why isn't
the social pressure - the extreme social
pressure in this case - be enough so that
you didn't even need to ban books
because people are so socially punished
for reading books? that you don't even
need to be legally punished? I mean I
don't know man, this whole thing it just
isn't quite connecting my head. My next
point, point three is characters, which
also has no stars. Probably the weakest
point of this book. The dialogue is actually
terrible. Everyone is constantly being so
transparent with their intentions pretty
much telling their feelings directly
through dialogue I mean there's nothing
that people have to really hide that much
or anything. people just say things
that nobody really ever says. At times
they're just having like an internal
monologue or more like characters are
having a monologue while having a
dialogue in a way that just really work
in in real life and even in fiction it
doesn't really work like that because
you're supposed to be talking to someone
else through dialogue and that's not
really what monologues are and (...)
There's actually a point in which Clarisse -one
of the first characters to be introduced -
tells him that he's not like the others,
she's known the others but he does
different things and so on and that
whole thing is like so corny I mean I
don't know about 50's cliches but this
is such an unfortunate cliche at the
time to talk about the main
character being not like the others and
the... I mean I'm sorry but the honestly
just straight-up Manic Pixie dream girl
that Clarisse herself is, Guy
Montag himself is so dull, his wife is
such a cardboard cutout as are her
friends --- yeah I do think the female
characters are especially bad, but even
the male ones are just terribly written
I mean Beatty is like the mouthpiece for
the author
he takes Beatty as a person who just - he
puts all his thoughts and opinions
directly into the characters mouth so
that this character can explain the
concept of the book to us because
apparently we're like way too fucking
dumb to understand what the book is
about and I know that a lot of you may
think that the wife being a cardboard
cutout is fine because she's obviously
supposed to represent someone who is
very shallow and so on but thing is it
doesn't really work like that
because people in real life are honestly
three-dimensional whether they watch TV a lot or not people honestly have
depth to them. the thing is a lot of
us just don't really care to know
someone enough to understand how deep
they are and just assume that because
someone is obsessed with TV or whatever
they have nothing going on in the brain
which is one of the ideas that I hate so
much about this book and again I do not
agree with the ideas in this book but I
also have issues with the story itself
and how it's written so it's really more
than that. My next point is depth and I'm
sure you can already figure out how I
feel about this one. Again, no stars for
this one. In the title of this video I do
mention that I think it is outdated
which I know is probably a very unpopular
opinion because I've heard from a lot of
people that this book is so important
these days and so on but honestly I
don't think there's that
much to be taken from this book I don't
think there - I mean I'm not sure if in the
fifties there ever was something to take
from this book but I definitely
don't think there's a lot to it today. The
subject itself is relevant but a book is
obviously more than just a subject it's
about how you take it and what you do
with it. And the way that this book takes
the subject and what it does with it it's
honestly just laughable. if you grew up in
the early 2000s you have probably heard
like at least 20 people tell you that TV
rots your brain and you should read
books instead and so on and so on
and I grew up with people being very
sanctimonious about the whole reading
thing throughout my life.
again I'm not sure how it was in the 50s
but today book publishers are definitely
not that selective about the books that
they publish because you have a lot of
books really really bad books very
shallow books going on out there...
and you have to really get through them
in order to find good books and aren't
just like mindless entertainment, so how
is that any different from finding a
good TV show or finding a good movie? I
mean they're just they're just types of
media you know it's not really smarter
necessarily at least and not today
to read a book than to watch the TV show
or to watch a movie there's movies and
TV shows that go real deep and there's
book that go and there's books that just
don't go any deeper than "TV rots your
brain" and then taking out that out of
the equation this book in the way it
tells its message it - it's so
heavy-handed that you might as well be
reading an article because if you
because if your way - if your version of a
novel is to tell the message by putting
it directly into the mouths of the
characters then don't write a novel
because that's not really what it is.
I mean you're supposed to tell the
message through the actual plot through
the things that are going on and how
things happen you know and that's kind
of what gives the reader the capacity to interpret
different things from it but this is
again this is already interpreted for
you. it's just too easy and therefore
lazy to have a character have a whole
monologue about what the book is about
and what you should take from the book
it's actually condescending in a way as
well. The last point that I want to go
through is my personal enjoyment of the
book. No surprise at all that I gave it
no stars for this as well. I just have
few reasons to enjoy this I have already
gone through them all I was a little bit
touched by the part again where Guy
Montag recites poetry for these women
but honestly, again, the scene is... the
whole part itself is so forced in the
plot that it doesn't really make
sense so it kind of takes you out of the
emotional part of the scene, in my case
it did, anyway. And for most of the time
I was reading in this book I just wanted
to be done with it because I just can't
I just couldn't bear it I mean it's only
like 150 pages so I shouldn't really
feel like that about a book but this was
so preachy and just shallow I mean I was
so unimpressed by this book the first
time I read it because I had already...
there was nothing that I had not
expected in it because again I think for
my generation is like such a cliche
thing to think that books are
inherently better than TV or whatever so
that's basically why I think this book
is outdated and also pretty bad just in
general so I hope that you guys enjoyed
this video and if you didn't, I would like
to know your thoughts about this book
and whether you agree or disagree and
why that is and I will see you in the
next video bye!
