Part Three, Reading 5 · Burning Bright

Fahrenheit 451

Pathfinders · 7th–9th

Copywork

My grandfather ran off the V-2 rocket film a dozen times and then hoped that some day our cities would open up and let the green and the land and the wilderness in more, to remind people that we’re allotted a little space on earth and that we survive in that wilderness that can take back what it has given, as easily as blowing its breath on us or sending the sea to tell us we are not so big. When we forget how close the wilderness is in the night, my grandpa said, some day it will come in and get us, for we will have forgotten how terrible and real it can be.

Someone produced a small frying-pan and the bacon went into it and the frying-pan was set on the fire. After a moment the bacon began to flutter and dance in the pan and the sputter of it filled the morning air with its aroma. The men watched this ritual silently.

Read both passages aloud. In each one, what is made to seem big, and what is made to seem small?

For the educator Two passages; copy them as shown. The first is Granger, before the bombs, telling Montag about his grandfather’s rocket films; the second comes after the blast, when the men cook breakfast just before Granger speaks of the Phoenix. The first opens with one long sentence that piles things up with “and” (“the green and the land and the wilderness”), gives two things the cities should remind people of, each after “that”, and ends on two ways the wilderness can take back what it gave, “as easily as blowing its breath on us or sending the sea”. The last sentence sets “my grandpa said” in the middle, gives its reason with “for”, meaning because, and ends on two plain words, “terrible and real”. The second passage opens with a sentence held together by “and” twice. The next gives the bacon two motion words, “flutter and dance”, and a sound, “the sputter of it”. It closes on a short sentence of six words. Have the student copy “we’re” with its apostrophe, and “V-2” and “frying-pan” with their hyphens. For imitation, have the student read a passage twice, set it aside, rebuild it from memory, and then compare. The talk prompt has more than one answer for each passage. In the first, most will say people are made small: they have only “a little space on earth”, and the sea can “tell us we are not so big”; some will say the wilderness is made huge. In the second, some will say a small thing is made big: a “small frying-pan” of bacon becomes a “ritual”; others will say the silence does that. Once they have answered, ask which words do the shrinking or the growing. Do not say whether there is good reason to believe Granger’s hope; the last written question asks the student to judge it.

Discussion

Narration Tell the reading back in order, from the walk by the river to the verse Montag saves for noon. Give the bombs a sentence or two, and give more to what the men do after them.

1. The men are saving their books for later readers, “some with clean and some with dirty fingers.” Who has the dirty fingers?Inference

2. After Granger’s story about his grandfather, Montag says, “Poor Millie, poor Millie.” What does he mean by “poor”?Tone

3. When Montag asks himself what he gave the city, the answer is “Ashes.” By the grandfather’s rule about touching, what kind of mark is that?Moral reasoning

4. As the bombs fall, Montag pictures Mildred at her walls. Why does he picture her seeing “her own face reflected there”?Inference

5. Granger wonders how many knew the war was coming, and then how many were surprised. How could a person know and still be surprised?Moral reasoning

6. Montag says “Yes” to a time to break down and a time to build up, and still asks himself, “What else?” Why is the tree of life the verse he saves for noon?Character

Make a Connection Think of someone who taught you to do something with your hands, like cooking a meal or fixing a bike. When you do it now, whose way is it?

Vocabulary

allotted to remind people that we’re allotted a little space on earthGiven a share that is measured out by someone else, not chosen. Granger’s grandfather says people have only a small share of the earth, with the wilderness all around it.

convolutions in the convolutions of my brain you’d find the big ridges of his thumbprintThe folds and twists of something rolled or coiled, here the wrinkled ridges of the brain. Granger says his grandfather’s thumbprint is pressed into them.

desolation Though the desolation had not yet arrived, was still in the air, it was certain as man could make it.Ruin and emptiness, a place wrecked and left lonely. As the bombs fall, Montag thinks of the ruin as already sure, though it has not yet come.

prattled where the family prattled and chatted and said her name and smiled at her and said nothing of the bombTalked on and on about nothing that matters. The family on Mildred’s walls prattles to her, in Montag’s picture, while the bomb falls.

incessantly Silently, Granger arose, felt his arms, and legs, swearing, swearing incessantly under his breath, tears dripping from his face.Without stopping, on and on. Granger swears under his breath again and again, with tears on his face, before he can say anything aloud.

ritual The men watched this ritual silently.Something done in the same careful way each time, often with a meaning beyond itself, like a ceremony. The men watch the bacon cook in silence, as if it were one.

pyre every few hundred years he built a pyre and burned himself up.A great pile of wood built for burning, especially for burning the dead. The Phoenix builds its own, and Granger says people keep building theirs.

Critical thinking

1. Walking with Granger, Montag says of his wife, “I can’t remember anything.” What brings back “Chicago” once the bombs fall?

2. The men carry books in their heads, but Granger wants to “build a mirror-factory first”. Why start with mirrors and not books?

3. Granger says people, unlike the Phoenix, can remember what they did and so may one day stop building funeral pyres. After this morning's bombs, is there good reason to believe him?