Colour Symbolism in Fahrenheit 451 This world can sometimes be seen as impure, but occasionally, someone can make it pure again. The novel Fahrenheit 451 shows this throughout its many pages. In the dystopian novel by Ray Bradbury, colour symbolism can be used to show purity and impurity. Montag and the firemen, Faber, and Clarisse are three characters used in the symbolism. Bradbury’s characters, Montag and the firemen, are represented by the colour black. The novel reads that Montag “hung up his black beetle-coloured helmet and shined it…” (Bradbury 2). The colour black in this novel represents impurity, power, and evil. The firemen in this novel do not stop fires. Instead, they start them to burn books. The dark colour can be seen a few pages later when Montag is talking to Clarisse for the first time and he says, “’Well, doesn’t this mean anything to you?’ He tapped the numerals 451 stitched on his char- coloured sleeve.” (Bradbury 6). Montag is curious as to why the girl is not afraid …show more content…
There is not any specific colour symbolism about his changing, but the reader can see it through his development as a person. The two are talking when Montag, “felt his body divide itself into a hotness and a coldness, a softness and a hardness, a trembling and a not trembling, the two halves grinding one upon the other” (Bradbury 21). He is having internal conflict with himself. His mind is unsure what to think. Montag is a fireman, yet he believes things that most firemen would not. Something similar is seen again when he decides to take a book from the martyr’s home. Montag is watching the woman when his hand had suddenly “done it all, his hand, with a brain of its own, with a conscience and curiosity in each trembling finger, had turned thief. Now, it plunged the book back under his arm…” (Bradbury 35). Though he feels guilty now, later he does not. Instead, it makes him feel strong to have such