In Fahrenheit 451, Tim Robbins narrates Ray Bradbury’s critically acclaimed novel set in a bleak, dystopian future, setting it apart from other 20th-century novels.
Guy Montag is a fireman. He starts fires rather than extinguishes them in his world, where television rules and literature is on the verge of extinction. As part of his job, he destroys the most illegal of commodities, the printed book, as well as the houses in which they are hidden. As Montag returns each morning to his bland life and Mildred, who loves television, he never questions the destruction and ruin his actions produce. His life changes after meeting Clarisse, an eccentric neighbor who introduces him to a past where people did not live in fear, and to a present in which ideas in books are more important than mindless television chatter. Following Mildred’s suicide attempt and Clarisse’s disappearance, Montag begins to question everything. The fireman starts hiding books in his home, and when his pilfering is discovered, he runs for his life.