Emma Jaramillo
Mrs. Gower
English Honors 8
3 March 2023
A Character’s Inevitable Change There are many ways that a person can change. Whether it be from trauma, acting, or simply, time. Like people, characters also change throughout their stories. But the characters that usually change the most are the protagonists. Namely, Montag. From the way that he behaves to his relationships, he changes everything. He starts the novel off by being a book-burning firefighter that loved his life and the people in it. However, after experiencing many changes sparked by hardship, he ends up saving books and leaving the life he adored before. Bradbury’s development of Montag reflects a motif of inevitable change. One way that you can notice a change in
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He worked with him every day for many years and built up a great amount of trust in him. “Behind him, four men at a card table under a green-lidded light in the corner glanced briefly but said nothing. Only the man with the Captain’s hat and the sign of the Phoenix on his hat, at last, curious, his playing cards in his thin hand, talked across the long room” (Bradbury 23). Beatty was the only firefighter that actually appreciated Montag, taking him under his wing. He visited him when he was sick to warn him, tried to help Montag save himself by burning the books, and was always kind to him. But like with Millie, his relationship with Beatty drastically changed throughout the book. “Montag shut his eyes, shouted, shouted, and fought to get his hands and his ears to clamp and to cut away the sound. Beatty flopped over and over and over, and at last, twisted in on himself like a charred wax doll and lay silent” (Bradbury 113). Montag went from trusting Beatty to killing him in his own house. He felt betrayed that he burned his house and his books, depleting his overall trust. Montag’s relationship changes, and betrayals, especially Beatty’s, made him more paranoid about everything, greatly affecting his
Semester One Final Prompt 1 I believe that when Montag was at the climax of his rage and holding a flamethrower to Beatty and threatening to kill him Beatty continued to insult him and then asked Guy to hand the flamethrower over he didn’t want to die. Though Beatty was insulting Montag even though he was being held at gunpoint when Beatty started talking about himself and then insulting Montag’s literature knowledge and asking for him to give the flamethrower back he proved that he really didn’t want to die. One of the key things that Beatty said to Montag was that “There is no terror, Cassius, in your threats, for I am armed so strong in honesty that they pass me as an idle wind, which I respect not! How's that? Go ahead now you second-hand
Bradbury soon goes on to again indicate theme when Montag realizes that “men were all mirror images of himself” (33), exemplifying how a
This conveyed one of the main problems in the book, after this quote was said many things started happening one after another. Montag was then a main criminal everyone was looking for; Montag had to find a place to go out without being spotted or caught. However, after Beatty being gone and Montag a criminal everyone started to freak out. Montag desire for knowledge in a society where they don't accept it can be hard.
After getting the call from Mildred's friends, saying that Montag owned books, the men made their way to the salamander and went to Montag's house. After arriving at Montag’s house, Beatty had clearly stated that this was Montag’s mess, and that he needed to to burn his house independently. Beatty did not want to see this event happening to Montag, but in the society that they live in he was forced to. If he hadn’t asked Montag to burn his house down, Beatty might have had even worse problems than Montag for refusing to do his job, even if it was his friend who was being
One instance in which this change is apparent is when the novel states, “[Montag] pressed at the pain in his eyes and suddenly the odor of kerosene made him vomit” (Bradbury 47). This differs immensely from his initial viewpoint in which Montag states, “Kerosene… is nothing but perfume to me” (Bradbury 4). This demonstrates that Montag views the society, his life, and his profession from an entirely new lens. Montag begins to look upon his profession with disgust as he realizes the severity of his work. He is removing these books from the world that contain valuable information and stories.
Montag discovers that is better to gather the work within him. They also discover that man is repeating a cycle and they are going to start reading books in the future. Montag also started to lead in the
Throughout the story Beatty would quote pieces of literature from authors such as Sir Philip Sidney and Alexander Pope. Beatty knew that reading books was illegal in their society, and yet he felt the need to go and tell Montag different things he had read. When hearing this, it seems only reasonable that Montag would see this as Beatty’s way of communicating his desire to die. A sane person would not openly announce they had read a book, for they would know the consequences that would accompany it.
Therefore, Montag questions himself, showing that he recognizes a problem within society. He starts to rebel against the government, as he knows what he is doing is wrong. This change happened because he read books, showing how books truly have an emotional impact on a
Bradbury portrays how Montag’s perception of fire and burning books with his personal development changes by the different choices he makes throughout the novel. In the beginning of the book, Montag has a great passion and
Throughout the book, Beatty alludes that he knows more about books than most, even quoting directly from them, suggesting he has read them. I infer that Beatty went through a similar situation as Montag, but instead of fighting, he decided to go along with what was happening. Entry 8: Passage: 'With an effort, Montag reminded himself again that this was no fictional episode to be watched on his run to the river, it was in actuality his own chess game he was witnessing, move by move." Page 131 (Montag)
He was the same as everyone else in his society… until he met a pretty and young seventeen-year-old girl named Clarisse McCellan. Beatty blamed it on her anyway. While all the firemen went to Montag’s house to burn it for breaking the government’s laws of having or hiding books Beatty questioned him, “‘Oh no! You weren’t fooled by that little idiots routine were you? Flowers, butterflies, leaves, sunsets, oh, hell!
After Montag indirectly reveals his book ownership to Captain Beatty, he was committing a crime that left him morally conflicted. “Is it true, the world works hard and we play? Do you know why? I don’t, that’s sure! Maybe these books can get us half out of the cave.
This led to the reason why he had been driven by Beatty to his own house. It wasn’t just because of the fact Millies friends called him in but his own wife did it out of protection. The plan Montag tried to make happen had backfired and ruined his life. He made the women cry and Millie leave him, that wasn’t part of his plan at
Montag and Beatty have many similarities and differences. One similarity is their job, they are both firemen, but they are weird firemen they didn’t put out fires they started them at peoples houses if they had books. A difference is their attitude, at the beginning Montag was a “normal” firemen because Montag states, “It was a pleasure to burn” (Bradbury 1). This shows his lack of feelings towards anything. But when Montag met Clarisse he started to get curious about books and what the society is like at a different point of view.
In literature, characters relationships often change and evolve as they progress with time and effort. I want to address to my readers is that everything changes and that nothing stays the same. Change is everywhere, especially in literature . An example of how a character’s relationship changes and evolves would be in The 5th wave by Yancey. The main character which is named Cassie and Evan, one of the “others”, as told in the story, are a perfect example of a change in a character 's relationship.