Tuesday, July 1, 2025

Shakespeare References in Fahrenheit 451

It seemed a good time to revisit Ray Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451, and I found that it contains several Shakespeare references. The first play mentioned is Hamlet: "But many were those whose sole knowledge of Hamlet (you know the title certainly, Montag; it is probably only a faint rumor of a title to you, Mrs. Montag) whose sole knowledge, as I say, of Hamlet was a one-page digest in a book that claimed: now at last you can read all the classics; keep up with your neighbors" (p. 50). Next Bradbury mentions Shakespeare, having one character ask, "How many copies of Shakespeare and Plato?" (p. 67). Shakespeare is mentioned again ten pages later: "Oh, there are many actors alone who haven't acted Pirandello or Shaw or Shakespeare for years because their plays are too aware of the world" (p. 77). And then: "For these were the hands that had acted on their own, no part of him, here was where the conscience first manifested itself to snatch books, dart off with Job and Ruth and Willie Shakespeare, and now, in the firehouse, these hands seemed gloved with blood" (p. 95). A little later, a character says, "All's well that is well in the end" (p. 97), a variation of Shakespeare's All's Well That Ends Well. The book refers again to Shakespeare, and also to Julius Caesar: "Why don't you belch Shakespeare at me, you fumbling snob? 'There is no terror, Cassius, in your threats, for I am arm'd so strong in honesty that they pass by me as an idle wind, which I respect not!' How's that?" (p. 105). That comes from a speech that Brutus delivers in the fourth act.

Fahrenheit 451 was published in 1953. The copy I read is from the 22nd printing, November 1970.

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