Burning Desire

Prompt 2: Choose a character in a novel or play of your choice (from the AP List!) and write about the conflict(s) that arise since they are in conflict with the society they are from. This may be socially, religiously, and/or morally. Dig deep! You should also address whether your character comes to a good/bad fate due to this conflict(s).

He ignored society’s rules and followed his instincts. A harmless act yet abhorred by society. Guy Montag of Ray Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 451 was caught in a social turmoil. He was a fireman; a man whose job it was to hunt out all books and destroy them by burning them. Now, in a greatly censored society, he is searching for answers in the very place he is forbidden to even glance at. By looking for the truth in books that the government had banned years ago, Montag is shunned and outcast from the only place he ever knew.

In Bradbury’s world, all books that evoke negative emotions are deemed as unfit to read and therefore claimed as contraband. The only books that have survived the government’s mad censorship were generally worthless and brainless entertainment. Therefore, the people of this time have lost the art of reading comprehension. It was not enough for Montag to merely be a fugitive with illegal books in possession. He was a fugitive with contraband that he could not even understand. He was frustrated that none of the books made sense to him. Countless times, he felt ready to give up and confiscate the books himself, yet he had an innate attraction to the intricacies of the written language that he had never previously been exposed to elsewhere. Thus, he felt conflict within himself. He longed to understand, yet he barely had the patience or knowledge to do so.

However, regardless of his comprehension skills or efforts in reading these books, he was condemned just for having them in his possession. If captured, he would be sentenced to death. Nevertheless, Montag desperately wanted to help his fellow citizens because he knew that censorship would lead them to ruin, yet they shunned him. He carried the burden, the knowledge that self-destruction was inevitable, alone. He felt helpless while he witnessed the destruction of his world from afar.

Guy Montag had nowhere to run, no friends to turn to, no one he could trust. He was isolated because he was caught in a world where ignorance was promoted by the citizens and knowledge was punished by the government. This was the only world he knew, but he willingly turned his back on it. He looked for salvation in the books he burned and instantly found confusion and heartache. Yet, his curiosity and innate desire for knowledge made him persistent enough to continue searching for the answers he and previous generations have been deprived of in the place everyone else was scared to look.

(37 minutes to write the essay)