F451 Assignment #3

-Why do you think Bradbury incorporates the scene with the woman? What is this woman supposed to represent?

I think this woman is supposed to represent the damage that is really being done by Guy's job. Before this, Guy had never realized the importance that books might really have on people and what he was doing by destroying them. By burning these books, he very well might be taking away a part of these people, which is what he saw when he came across this woman. Because of this scene, Guy is beginning to realize that the actions that had become second nature to him are wrong and I think from here on we are going to see him question them more and more and start becoming more human as opposed to how robotic he had become because of his job.

-What does Guy mean by this quote, "Well, this fire'll last me the rest of my life. God! I've been trying to put it out, in my mind, all night. I'm crazy with trying (51). Try and relate it to another quote in the reading.

When Guy says this he means that usually he doesn't feel any guilt after burning a house down but, in this case, his eyes were somewhat opened to the meaning that books must have on people. He is baffled as to why the woman would have stayed in the burning house until he realized that she was a human being just like him and that means there must really be something in the books that causes women like her to fight for them. This is hard for him to rationalize the fact that his job is to simply burn these things that clearly really do mean something to people. He no longer saw his job as just burning books, but he saw it as burning people. This bothered him.