Fahrenheit 451: The Irony of "The Hearth and the Salamander"
The title 'The Hearth and the Salamander' is purposely ironic. Montag's home life is ironic to the title. Montag and Mildred do not really know each other. Montag and Mildred have trouble communicating. Webster's Dictionary says that a hearth means "the fireside, family life, or home." Hearth usually implies warmth. When Montag goes into his house for the first time he describes it like "coming into the cold marbled room of a mausoleum." His house should have been happy, not like going into a cold, deserted tomb. Montag's home life definitely took a plunge when his wife tried to commit suicide by overdosing on sleeping pills. When Montag came home he kicked the "small crystal bottle of sleeping tablet which earlier {that day} had been filled with thirty capsules and which now lay uncapped and empty" on the bedr
" For Mildred, the living room is becoming one of the only parts of the residence that she enters. Mildred is actually treating the TV as a closer relative than her husband. For it would be the face of an unknown, a street face, a newspaper image and it was suddenly so very wrong that he had begun to cry, not at death but at the thought of not crying at death, a silly empty man near a silly empty woman, while the hungry snake made her still more empty. Montag and Mildred do not really know each other. No matter when he came in, the walls were always talking to Mildred. The title "The Hearth and the Salamander" is ironic. Montag is starting to wonder what that reason is. This seems to keep Montag and Mildred from remaining close. When Montag vomits on the rug while sick after burning the lady with her house, Mildred asks "'Why'd you do that?'" Montag responds "'We burnt an old woman with her books. '" As if she had not heard Montag, Mildred says "'It's a good thing the rug's washable'" Montag is clearly upset that the firemen had to burn a woman with the books. There was "'a wall between {Montag} and Mildred. "The living room; what a good job of labeling that was now.
Common topics in this essay:
Montag Mildred,
Webster's Dictionary,
Mildred Montag,
Mildred Mildred,
Mildred Literally,
montag mildred,
Hearth Salamander,
Hearth Salamander',
montag's home,
mildred montag,
home life,
montag's home life,
,
montag mildred montag,
trouble communicating,
mildred absorbed,
mildred trouble,
silly empty,
ironic montag's,
ironic montag's home,
montag mildred trouble,
mildred montag mildred,
|
Acceptance Essays
