Monomyth In Fahrenheit 451 By Ray Bradbury

In his novel Fahrenheit 451, Ray Bradbury creates his own monomyth. The protagonist Guy Montag endures the three stages of the monomyth. The first stage begins before the novel starts when Montag first meets the old man Faber. Faber is the first half of the supernatural assistance in Montag’s journey. Faber fist begins to open Montag’s mind by taking to him in the park and then later gives Montag the story’s “magical item in the form of what Montag calls the green bullet. The second half of the supernatural assistance comes through Clarisse, the neighbor girl. Clarisse continues what Faber started before the novel by talking Montag and asking him questions that cause him to question who he is and what he is doing. After a series of her questions he is described as, “divide[d]… into a hotness and a coldness, a softness and a hardness, a trembling

It is here that he begins to face the majority of his trials. He encounters his story’s temptress and father figure in the form of Captain Beatty. When Beatty first comes to Montag’s home he represents the introduction of the father figure, he is understanding and knows what Montag is going through and then begins his role as temptress, or in this case tempter, by trying to convince him to return to work and return his life to business as usual. Here the first two stages overlap because Montag goes to visit Faber and receives the green bullet. Faber also inherits the role of Goddess/God here by revealing to Montag what he truly desire, not necessarily books but the narration on the human existence that they contain. Montag then goes and reencounters Beatty who fulfills his role as tempter when he quotes books to Montag and forces Montag to burn his own home. Montag then completes Beatty’s role as father figure by killing him and realizing that Beatty wanted to die because of the he sympathized with