In Fahrenheit 451, by Ray Bradbury,
disempowerment is a central theme in the story.
The members
of society live in homes with television screens on the walls, robbing them of the
desire to engage in meaningful conversation or the desire to develop original thought.
At night, as we see with Mildred, she is "plugged" in with the seashell devices which
control her subconscious.
Books are banned; houses with
books are burned. This removes the power of the public to know of the past and to learn.
Knowledge is power, but society has done all it can to rob society of learning. They do
not want people to question the world as it is presented by
society.
Ironically, Clarisse is empowered by her ability
to see beyond the surface of things into the heart of what matters in life: an
interaction with one's environment and the opportunity to learn about the world.
Clarisse ends up dead, killed by a car. Montag imagines it could
have been a car full of wild kids driving at a breakneck speed, but one is left to
wonder if she wasn't considered a threat to the numbness that society promotes in its
population. It doesn't take long for Clarisse's words to become meaningful to Montag,
though the fact that he has already started to secretly collect books shows that he has
begun to move away from a controlled environment that society would
prefer.
When Montag needs a teacher, he turns to Faber.
This is the first overt step Montag has taken to challenge
society's power over him. In contrast, Mildred welcomes the loss of power, and thereby,
her loss of responsibility to think or work out problems. She is so disempowered that
she is like a shadow of a person.
Ironically, those without
power to think for themselves are bombed and the civilization wiped out. Many of those
who have chosen to define the world on their own terms of power are walking through the
woods. Perhaps there they will be able to use the books they have and study the work of
many writers to find a way to rebuild society.
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