Fahrenheit 451 Study Questions: The Hearth and the Salamander
Set 1 (pgs. 1-23)
1. Who is the main character?
1.
2. What is his job?
2.
3. Characterize Clarisse
3.
4. What two symbols are on the
4.
main character’s chest?
5. What is unusual about Clarisse?
5.
6. What does Montag say is against
6.
the law?
7. What does Clarisse say about
7.
billboards?
8. Who is Montag’s wife?
8.
9. What has she done?
9.
10. How many cases do the operators
10.
get a night?
11. What does Mildred always have
11.
in her ears?
12. What does Mildred think
12.
happened?
13. What is Mildred going to do
13.
during the day?
14. What does she want to have
14.
installed?
Set 2: (pgs. 23-41)
15. What is the mechanical hound?
16. What did the hound do to
Montag?
17. What happens at Clarisse’s
school?
18. What does Montag ask about
firemen in the past?
19. What fuel do they use to burn
books?
20. What did the woman do when
they started burning her books?
21. What did Montag take with him?
22. What was the woman quoting?
Set 3: (41-52)
23. What metaphor is used to
describe their bed?
24. What question does Montag ask
Mildred?
25. What was her response?
26. What does Montag think is
between he and Mildred?
15.
16.
17.
18.
19.
20.
21.
22.
23.
24.
25.
26.
27. What does Mildred say is her
family?
28. The fact that Montag vomited
after the incident with the woman
who was burned with her books
suggests what?
29. What conclusion does Montag
make about books, based on the
woman’s death?
Set 4: (52-end)
30. What does Beatty attribute the
decline of books to?
31. What does Beatty say can undo
the stuff they learn at school?
32. According to Beatty, what are
some of the ways people have
been made happy?
33. What happens if a fireman takes
home a book?
34. Why did they get rid of front
porches and gardens?
35. What is Montag hiding in the airconditioning unit?
36. What is Montag trying to figure
out?
27.
28.
29.
30.
31.
32.
33.
34.
35.
36.
Critical Thinking: The Hearth and the Salamander
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
Describe Montag's relationship with Mildred.
Compare and contrast Mildred and Clarisse.
Describe Clarisse’s school and what she says teenagers are like.
What series of events acted as a catalyst for Montag’s change in behavior?
Recall what the woman was quoting as Montag and Beatty doused her house in
kerosene. How do her words have relevance to what is occurring in their society?
The Sieve and the Sand
Set 1: (pg. 71-88)
1. What are Mildred and Montag doing at the beginning of this section?
2. Who did Montag meet in the park?
3. Describe that man.
4. What does Montag ask that man for?
5. What question does Montag ask Mildred about love?
6. What is the significance of the Sieve and the Sand metaphor?
7. Who does Montag go to see?
8. What has Christ become? Describe it.
9. What does Montag want the man to teach him?
10. What does the man say Montag needs?
11. What does the man say was special about books?
12. What is the reason he gives for why books are hated and feared?
13. What plan does Montag suggest?
14. Who does Faber hold responsible for the degradation of society? In other words,
who decided to stop reading and wanting information?
Set 2 (pgs. 88-110)
1. What does Faber say those who don’t build must do?
2. What has Faber invented?
3. Who is over at Mildred’s?
4. What is the country getting ready to do?
5. What agreement do Mrs. Phelps and her husband have?
6. What does Montag compare Mildred’s friends to?
7. How does Mrs. Bowles have children?
8. How does she “deal with them?”
9. What did Mrs. Bowels base her presidential election decision on?
10. What is Montag going to read to them?
11. What does Mildred tell the ladies concerning Montag owning a book?
12. What poem does he read to them?
13. How did Mrs. Phelps react?
14. How did Mrs. Bowles react?
15. What did Montag continually do when he got back to the firehouse?
16. What is Beatty trying to do to Montag?
17. Where do the firemen go when the alarm is sounded?