Scan barcode
A review by emmabeckman
Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury
2.0
Sigh. Okay. So I liked 4 scenes in particular (spoilers??): when Montag pulls out all the books in front of Mildred, when Beatty tells Montag the history of the firemen, when Faber tells Montag the history of books, and when the men in the forest welcome Montag.
I thought those scenes were great, I loved hearing about the meaning of books and reading, and hearing the perspective that people wouldn't be reading anymore by 1990 (reminded me of that time Elon Musk said we wouldn't need language anymore by 2025). I didn't expect this book to be so like 1984 or Brave New World, for some reason I thought it was going to be more like an alternate history. Therefore, I really didn't care about the actual plot and I wasn't really that interested in the characters. The women were all written into stereotypes, either the ditzy housewife Mildred and her friends or the manic pixie dream girl Clarisse, which was disappointing. There were also so many things I would have done differently, even just in terms of the plot. I think there were a lot more interesting directions it could have gone in (and still reached the same ending).
If I'm honest, I really picked this up so that I could say that I had read it more than because I thought I was actually going to enjoy it. But I did look forward to the musings on books.
Then I got to the very end. Before I get into it, I know that in this whole book implicitly and in the coda explicitly Bradbury is trying to push back against censorship and say that we shouldn't tell people what kind of art to make. But really. It's indescribably disappointing to hear a much beloved and admired author say that he refuses to include more women characters or represent Black people in a better way because his fans, avid readers, have asked him to and he doesn't want other people to force him to write a certain thing. He claims it's all in the name of censorship, that these people are asking him to rewrite his stories to be more inclusive, but it's really gross to see someone be so afraid of criticism and so defensive of the sexism and racism in his books. And I definitely agree with the rest of what he said in the coda in terms of the abridged stories for high schoolers being detrimental for everyone. I think that's all valid. But when a woman asks you to include more women in your stories because they love your work and want to see themselves in it, why not take that as constructive criticism for next time instead of telling them they can go fuck themselves?
I thought those scenes were great, I loved hearing about the meaning of books and reading, and hearing the perspective that people wouldn't be reading anymore by 1990 (reminded me of that time Elon Musk said we wouldn't need language anymore by 2025). I didn't expect this book to be so like 1984 or Brave New World, for some reason I thought it was going to be more like an alternate history. Therefore, I really didn't care about the actual plot and I wasn't really that interested in the characters. The women were all written into stereotypes, either the ditzy housewife Mildred and her friends or the manic pixie dream girl Clarisse, which was disappointing. There were also so many things I would have done differently, even just in terms of the plot. I think there were a lot more interesting directions it could have gone in (and still reached the same ending).
If I'm honest, I really picked this up so that I could say that I had read it more than because I thought I was actually going to enjoy it. But I did look forward to the musings on books.
Then I got to the very end. Before I get into it, I know that in this whole book implicitly and in the coda explicitly Bradbury is trying to push back against censorship and say that we shouldn't tell people what kind of art to make. But really. It's indescribably disappointing to hear a much beloved and admired author say that he refuses to include more women characters or represent Black people in a better way because his fans, avid readers, have asked him to and he doesn't want other people to force him to write a certain thing. He claims it's all in the name of censorship, that these people are asking him to rewrite his stories to be more inclusive, but it's really gross to see someone be so afraid of criticism and so defensive of the sexism and racism in his books. And I definitely agree with the rest of what he said in the coda in terms of the abridged stories for high schoolers being detrimental for everyone. I think that's all valid. But when a woman asks you to include more women in your stories because they love your work and want to see themselves in it, why not take that as constructive criticism for next time instead of telling them they can go fuck themselves?