“Surely you remember the boy in your own school class who was exceptionally ‘bright,’ did most of the reciting and answering while the others sat like so many leaden idols, hating him. And wasn’t it this bright boy you selected for beatings and tortures after hours? Of course it was. We must all be alike. Not everyone born free and equal, as the Constitution says, but everyone made equal. Each man the image of every other; then all are happy, for there are no mountains to make them cower, to judge themselves against. So! A book is a loaded gun in the house next door. Burn it. Take the shot from the weapon. Breach man’s mind. Who knows who might be the target of the well-read man? Me? I won’t stomach them for a minute.”
This quote is from one of endless Beatty’s monologues. He states the core reason for burning the books: it’s jealousy and fear, imagining intellectualism as a weapon.
“Hell!” the operator’s cigarette moved on his lips. “We get these cases nine or ten a night. Got so many, starting a few years ago, we had the special machines built.”
This quote is the first hint that something is wrong with the whole world, not only with Mildred.
“I don’t know what it is. I’m so damned unhappy, I’m so mad, and I don’t know why I feel like I’m putting on weight. I feel fat. I feel like I’ve been saving up a lot of things, and don’t know what. I might even start reading books. […] Before I hurt someone. Did you hear Beatty? Did you listen to [Beatty]? He knows all the answers. He’s right. Happiness is important. Fun is everything. And yet I kept sitting there saying to myself, I’m not happy, I’m not happy.”
“I am.” Mildred’s mouth beamed. “And proud of it.”
False, forced happiness is another important theme of Fahrenheit 451, and Mildred, who recovered from overdose just a week ago, is its perfect example.
“Ten million men mobilized,” Faber’s voice whispered in his other ear. “But say one million. It’s happier.”
Another sign of false happiness and censorship, not to mention the level of violence: if one million mobilized soldiers is “happy” news for a “quick war”, than happiness is a really strange thing in this world.
“He touched it, just to be sure it was real. He waded in and stripped in darkness to the skin, splashed his body, arms, legs, and head with raw liquor; drank it and snuffed some up his nose. Then he dressed in Faber’s old clothes and shoes. He tossed his own clothing into the river and watched it swept away. Then, holding the suitcase, he walked out in the river until there was no bottom and he was swept away in the dark.”
Nicely written scene, associated with ritual of baptizing. The river takes away old smell, old clothes and, supposedly, old soul of Montag. He is cleansed and reborn while floating to his salvation.